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TASMANIAN LADYBIRDS AND THE " AMERICAN BLIGHT." 



In reviewing my notes on Australian and Tasmanian insects, pub- 

 lished in Vol. I, No. 12, of Insect Life, Mr. Fraser S. Crawford, in The 

 Garden and Field for September, takes exceptions to my statement that 

 the same coccinellid which is so efficient in destroying Schizoneura lani- 

 gera about Adelaide, South Australia, was found destroying Ehopalosi- 

 phum on carrot in Tasmania. 



When Mr. Koebele and myself parted company in Melbourne, he to 

 go to New Zealand and I to Tasmania, and later to South Australia to 

 secure a supply of the Schizoneur a- eating coccinellid, I received no 

 description or specimen of the object of my journey to Adelaide, Mr. 

 Koebele stating that Mr. Crawford and myself would have no difficulty 

 in recognizing it. 



Of the fruitless search at Heathpool, both Mr. Crawford and my- 

 self have written. After rejoining Mr. Koebele at Auckland, New Zea- 

 land, on our homeward voyage, and while comparing notes on steamer, I 

 understood Mr. Koebele to say that my Tasmanian species, specimens of 

 which I gave him, was the same as the one I sought to secure at Heath- 

 pool. On returning home and preparing the notes for Insect Life, re- 

 lying on my understanding of Mr. Koebele's statement, I wrote as I did, 

 and not knowing the name of the species, left it blank in the manu- 

 script, and it was supplied in the office of the Division at Washington. 



On receipt of the September number of Garden and Field I took 

 pains to have my specimens again determined by the same authority 

 and the species was again pronounced Leis conformis Mulsant. The 

 second lady beetle, mentioned as feeding on Rhopalosiphum, infesting 

 carrot in Mr. Keen's garden in Kingston, Tasmania, is Coccinella re- 

 panda Thunberg. Now, Kingston is a small hamlet, surrounded almost 

 entirely by woods and hills, and Mr. Keen's garden is on the outskirts 

 of the village and contains fruits of different kinds, including apples as 

 well as vegetables. 



On thinking the matter over again, I remember that the G. repanda 

 were much more numerous on the infested carrot tops than L. confor- 

 mis, yet there were a few of the latter present. Leis conformis was also 

 very abundant about young bushes of some species of Eucalyptus, in- 

 fested by Eriococcus eucalypti Cr. and, after reading Mr. Crawford's notice, 

 I have no doubt but that they were feeding upon this coccid and some 

 of them had strayed away to Mr. Keen's garden. In reply to Mr. Craw- 

 ford's objection to the use of the term " little," as applied to Leis confor- 

 mis, I would state that my specimens are from 5 mm to 6 mm in length. It 

 would not be at all surprising that they were much larger than this in 

 South Australia. 



In Tasmania a large number of the pupae were observed to have 

 been parasitized, and I succeeded in rearing a number of minute Hy- 

 menopters from them, but on submitting these to Mr. Howard they 

 were found to be secondary parasites. — [F. M. Webster. 



