TACHINID PARASITES OF THE GIPSY MOTH. 
235 
The specimens reared, to the number of several hundred, with 
several hundred of the Japanese Crossocosmia, were colonized 
together, and under favorable circumstances, as indicated by the 
recovery of Blepharipa from the immediate vicinity as the result of 
coincidental colonization. Should the two species be in very truth 
the same, they will probably hybridize, and enough have been 
liberated to make one good colony. Should they refuse to inter- 
mingle, there is not a sufficient number to make what past experience 
has indicated as a "satisfactory" colony of either. 
UNIMPORTANT TA4 BIND) PARASITES OF THE OIPS1 MOTH. 
There are not as many unimportant dipterous as there are unim- 
portant hymenopterous parasites of the gipsy moth in Europe, and 
there are other reasons why they need not be considered at so much 
length. One of them. Pales }>ar\da Meig., which is occasionally 
present in shipments of gipsy-moth caterpillars, is much more com- 
monly received as a parasite of the brown-tail moth, and Dexodes 
nigripes Fall., which is very rarely associated with the gipsy moth, 
is a very common parasite of the other host. Both of these species 
will be discussed later, and something will be said of their life and 
habits and of what has been done toward securing their establish- 
ment in America. 
Of the remaining tachinids which have been reared from imported 
material from Europe, none ha-- been positively associated with the 
gipsy moth itself. There is always the chance that one or two cater- 
pillars of some other species may have been accidentally included 
amongst those of the gipsy moth, and while the number of such has 
always been very small, the chance that a strange parasite should be 
reared from them rather than from the gipsy-moth caterpillars is 
large. 
To date at least 98 per cent of the tachinid puparia which have 
been received from Japan as parasitic upon the gipsy moth have been 
either of Tachina or Crossocosmia. The remaining 1 or 2 per cent 
have been of various species, among which was one that resembled 
Pales pavida and another has been described as "Compsilura-Hke." 
There have been so few of these strange forms as to make impossible 
a definite statement as to their host relations. It seems rather 
curious thai against the s European tachinids, all of which are of at 
Least local importance as parasites of the gipsy moth, Japan should 
be able to produce only two. It may be that the tachinid fauna of 
Japan is much less extensive than that of Europe or of America. 
It may also be that a more thorough survey of the Japanese situation 
will reveal the presence of species which have not been received 
hitherto on account of the inadequacy of the methods of collection 
