FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
73 
tions. The generally persistent presence 
of the fungi parasitic upon the whitefly 
in whitefly infested groves after they have 
once been introduced, and the thorough¬ 
ness with which they do their work, when 
once well under headway, places these 
fungi among the most remarkably efflcient 
of fungus parasites. These fungi came 
unbidden to begin their good work, and 
not a few growers have learned to spread 
them from tree tO' tree and from grove to 
grove, and are depending altogether upon 
them' to keep the fly in check. The num¬ 
ber of the fungi parasitic upon the white¬ 
fly is generally given as three, although 
a fourth one, the red headed scale fungus 
already mentioned, occasionally develops 
upon the whitefly larvae ; but the number 
it destroys, so far as observed, is insignifi¬ 
cant. These three fungi are the Red, the 
Yellow and the Brown. The red and 
the brown are pretty generally distributed 
throughout the whitefly infested groves 
of western Flodda from. Fort Myers to 
Lake City, and as far east as Orlando. 
The red fungus has been known for about 
fifteen years, and the brown for about 
eleven. I desire to emphasize that this 
red fung'us of the whitefly is not the 
same as the red-headed scale fungus al¬ 
ready mentioned several times. The yel¬ 
low fungus was first recognized as such 
by Prof. P. H. Rolfs last September on 
specimens sent in from: Winter Park, 
Florida. At this writing the yellow fun¬ 
gus appears to be limited to Eastern 
Florida, and is found in the groves at 
Orlando, Winter Park, Oviedo, and 
Mims. The scientific name of the red 
fungus is Aschersonia aleyrodes, Web., of 
the yellow Aschersonia davo-citrina, P. 
Henn. The fruiting stage of the brown 
not being known, this fungus has received 
no definite name. It is this so-called 
Brown fungus, furthermore, for which 
some evidence exists that it represents two 
fungi. Professor H. S. Fawcett, of the 
Florida Agricultural Experiment Station 
has several times observed a form of this 
fungus that he thought might be the fruit¬ 
ing stage and even succeeded in getting 
artificial cultures from which he again 
succeeded in infecting whitefly larvae. 
This fungus, however, appeared to be a 
species of Verticillium, and somewhat dif¬ 
ferent in appearance from that of the 
Brown as it or'dinarily appears. Recently 
a similar condition, but not fruiting, was 
observed by him on some specimens sent 
in by the writer from Palmetto, Fla. 
These latter specimens presented two 
forms of Brown on the same leaf, thus 
indicating very strongly the presence of 
two fungi, each working on the larvae of 
the whitefly. Further observations must 
determine whether these different appear¬ 
ing fungi are different forms of the same 
fungus or distinct species and also their 
relative efficiency. 
A UNIQUE PHENOMENON. 
The phenomenon of these several fungi 
parasitic upon the larvae and pupae of the 
whitefly in Florida is unique in several 
ways: (i.) The fact that there are at 
least three of the fungi practically lim¬ 
ited to- a single food supply (the larvae 
and pupae of the whitefly) is surely re¬ 
markable; (2.) The abundance of infect¬ 
ing material generally at hand in infected 
groves practically ready to be used for 
starting the fungi in other groves, to¬ 
gether with (3.) The relative ease with 
which this can be applied in infecting 
other whitefly-infested groves are facts of 
great importance to the man in charge of 
the grove; (4.) The favorable climatic 
