The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-04-06

or the most extreme advocates of in.
ternal parasites have claimed thai
these insects and others as serious car
be controlled by their parasitic enc
mics, although we know they are more
or less infested.
4 Mr.. p. v. Theobald, economic zooio-
gist to the British Museum and to the
Board of Agriculture of England, says:
The subject of natural enemies is one
to which special attention should be
paid, but it is quite useless to expect
very great benefit to accrue from any
except the birds. People who are ac-
quainted more with the laboratory than
| the field talk of the use of parasitic
| hyrnenoptera and of predaceous insects
as If they would do all that is requir-
/ ed. to check an insect pest. In a few
| cases predaceous insects have done enor-
1 nous good, under abnormal condi-
] lions, but in state of nature they
/ never appear in sufficient numbers to
make any impression until the pest in
question has increased to such an ex-
tent that the harm is all done When
people commence to talk OF stopping
spraying for Aphides or scales because
the beneficial parasites are killed also,
| 1t is sufficient evidence they know lit
tie of fruit-growing or the fruit-grow-
er's troubles
DR.. John b. Smith, president of the
American Association of Economic En-
tomologists, says: THE action of the
parasite is only to keep its host within
a certain fairly well defined limit, and
If that limit is at a point where the
host becomes injurious to the farmer,
he must himself take q hand in its
destruction to derive any benefit. do
not mean in anything say here. to les
sen the claims of parasitic and Dreda-
tory insects to our consideration They
have an extremely important function
in nature, and without them there
would be no possibility of an existing
vegetation. But, on the other hand, |
it is just as certain that unless there
was some check imposed upon the null
tiplication of parasites, etc., they would
in short time destroy the insects that /
they feed upon. and the destruction of
their host would, logically, carry with |
it their own destruction
PERKINS AGAINST AUTHORITIES.
have quoted thus at length from |
the recent works of three OF the fore
most economical entomologists of as |
many countries, England. Australia
and America to show that Professor
Perkins is mistaken when he would
sweep away as the thoughtless judg-
ment of the uniformed the arguments
by those who say to the
planters and farmers of Hawaii-do
not place all of your faith in para
sites.
Mr.. Alexander Craw, whose fame is
known to every planter in these ISL
ands, recommends, in Bulletin No. II
If the California State Board of Hor-
.iculture, active methods of control,
or every one of the insect pests treat
ID of in that publication with the sin
yIe and sole exception of the Cottony I
Cushion Scale.
The introduction into California of
he Australian Lady-bird beetle Vida
ia cardinals to combat the cottony {
cushion scale or f1uted scale as it is ]
.lso called is the only instance known
where a predaceous insect introduced [
or the purpose of control has complete 8
" succeeded. DR.. L. o. Howard, En- c
omoIogist of the u. S. Department of
Agriculture, says: 1.-THE first and sue
essful importations of this beneficial !
ady-bird were made by Albert Koe-