276 AUSTRALASIAN 
bers, which, he said, resembled cheese-mites. Ina foot-note to 
his letter, which was published in the late Journal, I suggested 
the probability of their having been bred in the pollen, but 
could not say what insects they were. Since then I have 
examined under a microscope several lots of pollen taken from 
combs that had been stowed away for winter, and in each case 
I discovered these mites. On describing their appearance to 
Mr. T. F. Cheeseman, curator of the Auckland Museum, he 
said he had no doubt they were mites, but whether parasitical 
or not he could not say. Professor Cook says: “The bee-mite 
is very small, hardly more than five milimeters (one-fiftieth of 
an inch) long. The female is slightly larger than the male, 
and somewhat transparent. The colour is black, though the 
legs and more transparent areas of the females appear yellow- 
ish.” Those I examined were of a greyish colour, and semi- 
transparent ; the full-grown insects possessing eight legs, and 
some having long bristly-looking hairs scattered over their 
bodies. 
I have no doubt that where very numerous they might 
become very troublesome, and do considerable injury to the 
bees, though I doubt much whether they would be able 
to gain a fvoting in strong colonies. I would suggest as a 
remedy making an examination of the pollen in the hives 
where they are found, and removing all that is infested by 
them ; also to shift the bees into clean hives, and wash the 
bottom-boards with a solution of carbolic acid. Probably 
spraying the infested vombs with a solution of phenol would 
rid them of the pest. 
A CAUTION TO IMPORTERS OF BEES. 
I have it from good authority that the bee-moth mentioned 
by Mr. Fullwood as having worked such sad havoc amongst 
the black bees in Queensland was accidentally introduced into 
that country in the following manner :—In one of the earlier 
attempts to introduce Italian bees (previous to the one made 
by Mr. Fullwood in 1880) an imported hive with bees had 
been landed at the apiary of a bee-keeper in the Vicinity of 
Brisbane. This hive, it appears, not only contained bees, but 
also their greatest enemy, the wax moth peculiar to the country 
from whence the bees had come, in all stages of growth, from | 
