462 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Dexc., 1898. 
On washing out the upper cavities (Plate LXX., Fig. A a) of healthy 
pineapple fruitlets with sterilised water, the spores of a fungus, that proves to be 
identical with those of the foregoing, are to be met with. These will germinate 
in fresh pineapple juice. In an attempt, however, to artificially produce the 
disease by sowing living spores, it will be found that only the fourth method— 
mentioned by Dr. Brown—can, as a rule, be successfully availed of—that is, 
the “fungus may enter through a wounded surface.” In order, therefore, 
that the disease may originate under natural conditions, it is necessary—or 
nearly always so—that there occurs as a primary condition some agency by 
which such injury may be affected; otherwise the fungus may be present— 
as often is the case—without any disease occurring, or indeed any abnormal 
feature whatever being remarked.* 
On examining the cavity of the fruit that contains the essential organs, it 
will be noticed that the basal portion below the level at which the stamens 
originate is of a brownish colour, and is irregularly, but shallowly, fissured. 
This fissuring, however, occurs invariably in healthy fruitlets ; the fissures are 
rendered impervious to the developing spores of the Monilia owing to an 
alteration in the condition (suberation) of the superficial layer of tissue-cells 
that they expose; and, moreover, the disease does not commence where they 
are met with. Hence they must be dismissed as possible ports of entry. 
As to the occurrence of special agencies occasioning injury. It may be 
stated that this cavity also serves as the temporary or permanent home of 
many forms of animal life, almost all of which inflict mechanical damage of 
one kind or another. (1) The caterpillar of a diminutive moth (? Fam. Tineina) 
not infrequently occupies it, in order to consume the stamens and pistil that it 
gnaws right down to their points of origin. (2) An occasional Mealy Bug 
(Dactylopius bromeli@) may have become imprisoned in it, having entered 
probably before or soon after the flower was shed. Similarly a species of 
Thrips may occasionally occur therein. These insects are, however, found in 
both healthy and diseased fruitlets alike, but usually in those that are quite 
sound, and, moreover, no disease seems to ever attend their presence. 
LXXD) more frequent denizens are, however, various species of mites. (Plate 
Now one of these mites it is that inflicts the injury to the fruitlet, that is 
the essential precursor to the disease, and, through the medium of this, infection 
by the fungus described takes place. It must accordingly be regarded as being 
the originator of the disease. This mite belongs to the genus Varsonemus, 
founded by Canestrini and Fanzago in 1876. It is of minute dimensions, and 
cannot be seen without the aid of the microscope. Figs. 1 and 2 of Plate LX XI. 
represent male and female individuals as they appear when suitably prepared 
and magnified, and will serve to generally represent them. These illustrations 
may, however, be supplemented by the following technical description :— 
Tarsonemus ananas, sp. nov. 
Mate.— Oval in shape, with the hinder margin rounded. A narrow linear groove 
crossing the body immediately behind the second pair of legs divides it into two unequal 
parts. In front of this line it narrows to the fore-border of the head, and somewhat 
widens behind it. It measures from 173 », to 188 in length, and from 75 p to 76 w in 
extreme breadth, being somewhat smaller than is the female. The head and sexual (?) 
organs, that terminate the body in front and behind respectively, are almost identical 
in form and size, being ovate and slightly excavated at the base and terminally 
rounded, The latter, however, is somewhat the larger of the two. ‘Two short set 
occur on each side between the second and third pairs of legs, and one on each side 
of the sexual organ. The first pair of legs iatett beyond the rostrum, and the second 
pair almost equal them. Both they and the third pair are composed of five 
Joints, and are nearly identical in form. The first pair each terminate in a single 
claw, and have three small fusiform sensory bodies on the outer borders of their last 
joint or tarsus. The second and third pair are two-clawed, and the former have 
apparently one sensory club only on their tarsi; each has a few—one or two of which 
* This is agreeable to the discovery of C. H. Peck with regard to a closely allied fungus— 
Montlia fructigena, Pers.—that “the hyphe are incapable of penetrating the unruptured epidermis 
of various fruits.” (Vide ‘‘ Journal of Mycology,” vol. vii., p, 164, 1892.) 
