18 



sites referred to above, one of which is a Pteromalus and the other a 

 Perilanipus, only one specimen has thns far issued from a single pupa 

 of the Lace- wing. 



Besides the losses in their ranks occasioned by the attacks of these 

 internal parasites, and the losses sustained through the cannibalistic 

 habits of their fellows, the Lace-wings suffer still further from the at- 

 tacks of spiders, which I have occasionally seen feeding upon the eggs 

 of this insect as well as upon the adult Lace-wing itself. Notwith- 

 standing the fact that the eggs of this insect are elevated on the tip 

 of a slender pedicel, an evident provision of nature to protect them 

 from the rapacious jaws of the Lace- wing larvae, still many of them, 

 as just stated, fall a prey to spiders and doubtless also to vaiious kinds 

 of predaceous insects, or even to the attacks of the Lace- wing larvae 

 themselves, as if nature were unable to cope with the scheming and 

 cunning of her many children. With all of these drawbacks to con- 

 tend with, it is not to be wondered at that these Lace- wing larvae never 

 become more numerous than they have at any time in the past. At 

 the same time it is evidently not within our power to change the exist- 

 ing conditions to such an extent that these larvae would become so 

 numerous as to free our plants and trees of the noxious insects that 

 infest them. 



Besides the above-mentioned enemies of the Bed Scale there are also 

 other agencies not at present clearly understood, but which occasionally 

 very materially lessen the numbers of these pests. A few years ago 

 Mr. H. F. Gardner, of Orange, in the adjoining county of the same 

 name, drew my attention to the fact that a large percentage of the Bed 

 Scales of all sizes upon his orange and lemon trees, as well as of the 

 Black Scales (Lecanium olece Bern.) upon his olive trees were dead, 

 although they had not been treated with any kind of insecticide. A 

 close inspection of his trees revealed the fact that fully 80 per cent of 

 the Bed Scales upon these particular trees were dead, while upon the 

 adjofning olive trees we found only a single colony of Black Scales still 

 alive. This latter colony was in a sheltered situation and contained 

 about a dozen individuals of all sizes. All of the other Black Scales 

 upon the trees that I examined were dead and dry. In neighboring 

 orange groves I also found several trees upon which fully 60 per cent 

 of the Bed Scales of all sizes were dead. Thinking that perhaps these 

 might have been destroyed by some low form of fungus, I submitted 

 specimens of them to Mr. Galloway, the Mycologist of this Department, 

 with the request that they be examined for traces of such fungus, and 

 under date of October 11, 1889, Miss E. A. Southworth, the Assistant 

 Mycologist, wrote me as follows concerning them: 



I have examined the scales on the lemons and find that the black ones are covered 

 with a fungus which also spreads over the fruit to some extent. Whether or not 

 this fungus is what kills the scales I can not say positively, but I find a little 

 of the fungus on some of the scales that seem to be living, which would indicate 

 that it does attack the living ones and destroys them. 



