12 BULLETIN 732, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
that is, at the time when the next generation of insects is ready to 
issue. It is, therefore, impossible for a fig to pollinate itself. Here, 
then, is a striking instance of one of nature’s metheds of preventing 
self-fecundation. 
In the regular female flower of the Smyrna fig the style is long 
and slim, two or three times longer than the style of the flower of the 
caprifig, and this is the reason that it is unsuited for the purpose 
of the insect. It is divided at the summit usually into two stigmas, 
{ 
f 
; 4 
OTT NSS 
Fig. 6.—Biastophaga psenes: a, Adult female with wings extended, seen from above; 6, female not yet 
entirely issued from pupal skin and still contained in gall; ec, antenna of female: d, head of female f-om 
below; eandj, adult males. (Ail greatly enlarged.) 
and they appear to be identical with those of the flowers of the 
Adriatic class, to whien belong all those figs which reach an edible 
condition without pollination. The stigmas or the latter, some 
authors say, are mostly malformed and can not be fertilized. 
LIFE OF THE BLASTOPHAGA. 
The beneficent insect upon which depends absolutely the whole 
Smyrna fig industry is a small species of very stiange structure 
(figs. 6 and 7). The female, a little less than an eighth of an inch 
in length, is black in color, is provided with wings, and in a favorable 
wind has been known to fly several miles. The male is wingless, is 
amber or brownish yellow in color, and somewhat resembles a small 
ij 
; 
F 
Fy 
j 
+ 
; 
i 
; 
Mpa» 
