.144 



take care of Ms parasite material that tlie insectary was built and 

 equipped, and while little was known regarding the requirements 

 of the work previous to his arrival the insectary proved entirely 

 adequate and gave the greatest facility to the work of multiply- 

 ing the parasites, which it was necessary to do before it could be 

 expected to liberate them cut-of-doors. 



The two classes of parasites, larval and pupal, one laying 

 their eggs in the Avorm through the skin of the fruit, the other 

 in exposed pupae, required somewhat different handling. The 

 host material of the latter was prepared by laying infested fruit 

 on sand and sifting out the pupae. The" former were placed 

 inside cages with the wormy fruit itself. 



The larval parasites, owing to the small numbers we had to 

 w^ork with and our inexperience in the matter of cages, slowly 

 dwindled instead of multiplying and were finally lost altogether 

 in the insectary, but not before a few individuals of the South 

 African and Australian species had been liberated under tents in 

 the coffee fields of Kona, This "log shot" on the establishment 

 of the species, as will appear later, was a most fortunate move. 



The pupal parasites, on the other hand, propagated well from 

 the start and in a short time were being produced in thousands. 

 The aim of the work iii the insectary was to increase the number 

 of parasites as rapidly as possible so as to be able to liberate large 

 colonies in favored places on the different islands, which could 

 by sheer force of numbers overcome the element of chance and 

 bring about a quick and widespread establishment ; and the criter- 

 ion of this fact was to be the recovery of the species in nature. 



As already stated, the work with the larval parasites came 

 to an end abruptly when there were no more females to propagate 

 the species, but not so with the pupal parasites ; and in carrying 

 out the original intention to continue multiplying and distributing 

 the parasites until they were recovered, outside, these two species 

 were produced in enormous numbers, 73,639 by the end of 1913, 

 when the breeding work was slackened down to a minimum ; and 

 they are still being produced in small numbers as neither species 

 has yet been recovered in nature. I cannot at present think other- 

 wise than that these species have really become established, but 

 owing to the difficulties in the way of testing the question we may 

 have to wait some time until chance brings us the proof. 



'No attempt was made to recover the larval parasites until 

 October of that year when some infested coffee berries were sent 

 to the insectary by the Board's agent in Kona. To the astonish- 

 ment of everyone this material yielded a large number of the 

 South African species. These were multiplied in the insectary 

 without further trouble, and good sized colonies Avere later dis- 

 tributed to eA^ery fruit groAving section in the Islands. 



