658 
Journal of Agricultural Research 
Vol. V, No. is 
the suggestion and with the assistance of Dr. L. 0 . Howard experiments 
were carried on to determine the effect of cold-storage temperatures upon 
still other insects affecting stored goods. Dr. Howard (i), 1 in a paper 
read before the eighth annual meeting of the Association of Economic 
Entomologists in 1896, discussed for the first time in professional ento¬ 
mological literature the important use to which cold-storage tempera¬ 
tures may be put in controlling insects. In 1905 Duvel (2), while 
investigating the storage of cowpeas ( Vigna sinensis) , found that storage 
at 32 0 to 34 0 E. was entirely practicable and economical in combating 
the common bean weevil (Bruchus obtectus) , the cowpea weevil (. BruchUs 
chinensis) } and the four-spotted bean weevil {Bruchus quadrimaculatus). 
While the work referred to above was carried on primarily to safeguard 
produce and stored goods from attack during certain periods when pests 
are active, experiments to determine the effect of cold-storage tempera¬ 
tures upon the Mediterranean fruit fly have been undertaken with the 
object of killing the various stages within the fruit. The interest in 
this work in Africa and Australia has grown out of the fact that the 
growers have sought for their surplus fruit markets in northern Europe, 
England, and North America, and even in South America, China, and 
the Hawaiian Islands. To reach these markets their fruits must be in 
transit a sufficiently long time for infestations overlooked at the packing 
houses to cause considerable decay unless the cold-storage temperature 
to which the fruit is subjected en route either suspends or kills chance 
cases of infestation. 
In 1906, Fuller (3) recorded the resistance of fruit-fly larvae in a cer¬ 
tain lot of peaches in Natal to 40° F. for 124 days. The writers question 
the accuracy of this statement, as they have been unable at this tem¬ 
perature to keep larvae or eggs alive for more than 22 days, in tests 
covering several thousand larvae and eggs (see Table I). Fuller believes 
from his observation that cold storage as a method of substitution for 
quarantines involves considerable risk. 
Eounsbury (4) states in 1907 that experiments conducted by him in 
South Africa indicate that a temperature of 38° to 40°, continued for 
three weeks, is sufficient to insure the death of all fruit-fly larvae in 
infested fruit, that two weeks at such a temperature causes considerable 
mortality, and that one week is thoroughly ineffective. In 1908, in a 
second paper (6), he records no living larvae among 511 specimens found 
in peaches held for 21 and 27 days at 38° to 40°. It is his belief that 
the storage temperature necessary for the preservation of fruit in transit 
from Africa to countries of the Northern Hemisphere and to America is 
amply low to effect the extinction of all life in larvae and eggs of the 
fruit fly contained within it. 
Hooper (5) recorded in 1907 in West Australia that he had found that 
larvae and eggs of the fruit fly could not resist temperatures ranging from 
1 Reference is made by number to "Literature cited, p. 665-666. 
