20 THE FIG MOTH. 
and chocolate. Even if we could ignore the unwholesomeness of 
eating or drinking substances containing the ordure and dead bodies 
of insects, the thought of using such materials in our food and bev- 
erages is repulsive, and yet the writer was credibly informed in 
1893 that infested cacao beans were used not only for such purposes, 
but that when infested they brought precisely the same price per 
pound as the clean article and were not considered by the manufac- 
turers in any degree inferior for their uses. 
The fresh beans have an agreeable, nutty, slightly bitter flavor, but 
insect-infested nuts are more bitter and sometimes have a decidedly 
disagreeable taste, and there is at least a suspicion that the bitterness 
of the cheaper forms of so-called pure chocolate, sold in compressed 
cakes and in powder form, may be due largely to the work of the 
Ephestia larvae and the possible decomposition that would be induced 
from their attack. 
It will be readily noticed by perusal of the earlier records of the 
occurrence of the fig moth in the United States that there was ap- 
parent fondness shown for material containing an abundance of oily 
matter, such as various nuts, cotton seed, flaxseed, and the products 
of Indian corn, in all of which it bred freely. It was a matter of 
some surprise, therefore, to find later that it bred quite as freely on 
rice, which contains little oil} 7 matter, as also to learn that it had 
already established itself as a rice pest in the Gulf States. Doubtless 
in time it will be found to feed upon most if not all of the cereals, 
if we except such as unhulled oats and rye, the hulls of which are 
difficult to penetrate unless first attacked by some other insect. 
It is still early to predict the future of this moth as a pest in the 
United States. Perhaps in the course of time it may be introduced 
from the Gulf region northward, but in spite of appearances which 
indicate that it is perfectly capable of becoming exceedingly trouble- 
some, it is doubtful if it will ever become so serious a pest as is the 
Mediterranean flour moth. It is practically established in the South, 
but its increase in the North is problematical. 
Some remark should be made in regard to the injury accomplished 
by this insect to figs. The main injury is accomplished before the 
figs reach America, the principal damage being effected en route 
from the orchards to our American ports. Examination in this 
office of many samples of imported figs furnished by the Bureau of 
Chemistry seldom showed the larvae or " worms " in any number and 
few were alive ; but in badly infested samples the excreta were very 
much in evidence and it is due more to the presence of the excreta 
and " worm holes " than to the presence of the " worms " themselves 
that the figs are deemed unwholesome or, more technically, wormy, 
filthy, and unfit for human consumption. Samples of such infested 
figs are shown in Plate I. 
