4. 
238 THE AUSTRALIAN NATURALIST. 
dently they are doomed to destruction. We have been flogging 
the leaves off the trees with a wire whip, so as not to kill them, 
if all the branches are lopped off the Myall tree dies.’ He 
also says: “In this neighbourhood there are thousands of dead 
Myall and Yarrani trees that have evidently been killed about 
the same time, a century ago, probably. I was under the im- 
pression that perhaps they had met their fate in some unusually 
severe drought.in the past, such as the whites had no idea of, 
but since discovering this pest I am inclined to think that 
this or some similar pest was the cause of their destruction.” 
Cryptes buccatum infests many different species of Acacias 
and has a very wide range over New South Wales, both in the 
coastal districts and far inland. Mr, Froggatt also exhibited a 
series of specimens of a fine Hepialid Moth, Pielus hyalin- 
atus, showing its variable markings, different shades of colour 
from buff to yellow, light brown and pink. The naked larvae 
feeds upon the roots of wattles and gum trees, and pupates in a 
stout yellow skin, when ready to emerge it forces its way up 
through the surface of the soil, exposing about a third of its 
length, leaving the skin sticking out of the ground when the 
moth emerges. This last year these moths have been remark- 
able for their abundance in all parts of the State, at Borenore 
Caves I saw scores of the pupal cases sticking out of the ground 
in May. At Moree half a dozen flew into a lamp in one of the 
shops, on the creek banks there were many pupal cases, from 
Deniliquin they were reported to be very plentiful about the 
same time, and at the Cordeaux River Dam my daughter caught 
a number attracted to the are: light on the works. The cater- 
pillar of this moth is very often the involuntary host of the 
curious bull-rush fungus Cordiceps that turns the infested cater- 
pillar into a hard, woody substance, with a fruiting stalk like a 
little bull-rush growing upward from the body. 
CENTRAL AUSTRALIA——Mr. David G. Stead mentioned at 
meeting, 8rd August, 1920, that he had recently spent some 
time in Central (Southern) Australia in the vicinity of Ooldea. 
This locality had been made of the first importance to Aus- 
tralians because of the existence of water in an otherwise vast 
waterless region at the so-called Ooldea Soak. Here water 
was obtained by seepage and was pumped to the trans-contin- 
ental railway line, both for human consumption and for en- 
gines. ‘This soak had been known to the aborgines of Aus- 
tralia for ages, and had been a great meeting place. Ooldea 
