140 THE AUSTRALIAN NATURALIST. 
Calliphora oceaniae.—One of the smaller ‘‘blow”’ _flies. 
The brilliance of its steel blue body with the patch of dull 
yellow on either side, gives it a striking appearance. 
Calliphora villosa.—A large common yellow house ‘‘blow 
tly.’ Its body is covered with golden pubescence. 
Calliphora tibialis.—A “‘blow’’ fly not previously noticed 
about the house. It looks like a small, dull colored form of 
Calliphora villosa, but is quite distinct. 
Lucilia sericata.—The metallic ‘‘blue bottle’ fly. It is 
the common English ‘‘blue bottle’ fly, which is very fond of 
meat. 
Pegomyia rujipes.—Looks like dlusca domestica, but has 
distinctively spotted wings. One species is a pest in Cali- 
fornia, on the sugar beet. 
Chrysomyza melanopsis.— 
ON THE ARTIFICIAL REARING OF POLISTES 
TASMANIENSIS. 
(Ly Miss Mabel Brewster.) 
On March 3rd I found an intermediate sized nest of the 
wasp Poliste Tasmaniensis, at the Army Reserve, Clifton 
Gardens. There were two eggs in some of the cells, while 
others contained one only, and in others again there were a 
total of ten larvae. The adult wasp having been killed, | 
tried feeding the larvae with Allenbury’s t'cod, a partly 
digested food, using a whisp of straw for the purpose. When 
drops of food were offered, some of the larvae ted greedily, 
and would take food as often ag it was offered, others would 
take only a little at 2 time and not often. After a few meals 
the larvae developed rapidly, and some were ready to pupate. 
When the nest was captured there were a few purpae in it, 
and these soon began to hatch out. One wasp which so 
hatehed took food while resting on my hand. I[ then put 
the nest in the open tied to a branch of a shrub, but ag 
ants crawled to it, I removed it indoors again. A few days 
later I noticed that the adult wasp had a large object in 
its mouth, which proved to be one of the larvae which it had 
killed and was eating. I hunted the wasp off and it flew 
away and did not. return. Another wasp hatched out and 
began to feed the larvae, but about the third day it had 
taken one of the larvae out of its cell and bit its head off. 
J kept the insects a fortnight on Allenburys Food, when the 
nest was accidentally lost. I tried feeding the larvae on 
honey, but they did not seem to like it. 
