INSECTS OF SAMOA 



Part III. Fasc. 2 



MICRO-LEPIDOPTERA. 



By Edward Meyrick, B.A., F.R.S. 



Hardly half-a-dozen named species of Micro-Lepidoptera were recorded from 

 Samoa before the receipt of the present collection, by which the total number is 

 raised to 137. Out of this whole number thirty are found also in Papuan, 

 Australian, or extra-Pacific regions, and it is probable that the whole of these 

 are introduced by man through ships, though in some cases the actual habits are 

 not yet known ; seventeen are found in other islands of Polynesia (excluding 

 the Papuan region), but not elsewhere, and these also are probably transferred 

 from one group to another only by man, though they may be capable in some 

 cases of passing without help from one island to another within the same group ; 

 and the remaining ninety are all endemic. These numbers are practically in 

 the ratios of 6:1:2; that is, jj ? or § of the species are endemic, and of the 

 remaining third, § belong to other faunas and ^ are of strictly Polynesian origin. 

 These proportions are likely to be maintained for a considerable period ; I am 

 satisfied that a large number of endemic species remain to be discovered, but the 

 importation of species will still go on at a proportionate rate ; in Hawaii, where 

 careful observations have been made by the resident entomologists for a number 

 of years, it is found that, notwithstanding the peculiar isolation of that group, 

 fresh imported species are continually turning up. These ratios prove unques- 

 tionably that Samoa constitutes, by the test of specific endemicity, a perfectly 

 distinct and isolated faunal region. 



The relation of this fauna to others must be studied through the genera. 

 The total number of genera is seventy-nine, but twenty-five of these are only 

 represented by apodemic species and may be disregarded ; the ninety endemic 



species are then distributed in fifty-four genera, which also include sixteen of 

 in (2) 1 



