The above-water food webs of arthropod communities in irrigated rice fields on Luzon Island, Philippines, were studied over the growing season at five sites (Los Baños, Cabanatuan, Bayombong, Kiangan, Banaue) ranging in elevation from 22 m to 1524 m. Arthropod populations were vacuum-sampled at roughly weekly intervals from the date after seedlings were transplanted to flowering at each site. Site- and time-specific webs were constructed from a 687-taxa cumulative Philippines web and time-series of species present. Taxonomic composition, food web structure, and arthropod phenology were broadly similar across different sites. Arthropod abundance was inversely associated with altitude across the five sites, but numbers of taxa and links and six food web statistics showed no obvious increasing or decreasing trend with altitude. The rise of taxa, links and mean food chain length over the growing season at each site reflected an increase in plant size with age and, at some sites, an orderly accumulation of newly arriving herbivore, predator, parasitoid and omnivore species. At each site, herbivores built up faster than predators and parasitoids, and predators arrived faster than parasitoids; the difference between the latest and earliest sampling dates of first arrivals, averaged over the five sites, was 38, 63 and 73 days for herbivores, predators and parasitoids, respectively. Site-to-site consistencies in food web properties and first arrivals suggest that such patterns may be influenced more by crop age than by geography or altitude. Sampled predator, parasitoid and omnivore taxa potentially encountered only a subset of their lifetime prey and predator species at any particular time in the rice field. Prey lists cumulated over time may underestimate the temporal specificity of predation by potential biological control agents. Research opportunities linking rice food webs and integrated pest management with East Indies biogeography are proposed.

The relationship between abundance of Dolichoderus thoracicus (Smith) and damage to cocoa pods caused by Conopomorpha cramerella Snellen was examined in a series of experiments. Pods were harvested from ant-abundant and ant-scarce plots and categorized into fully extractable, partially extractable and unextractable, the last category reflecting the most severe degree of C. cramerella infestation. An abundance of D. thoracicus was associated with significant reductions in the percentage unextractable pods but had little or no influence on the other two categories. Mean percentage pods infested was generally kept below 50% in ant-abundant plots and mostly exceeded the 50% level in ant-scarce plots. Other studies were: a survey of individual pods relating rate of infestation by C. cramerella to D. thoracicus abundance, an experiment which examined the effect of D. thoracicus exclusion on the rate of C. cramerella infestation, and a count of exit holes made by emerging prepupae of C. cramerella in relation to varying degrees of D. thoracicus abundance. The results showed a clear negative effect of D. thoracicus abundance on C. cramerella infestation rate. The results also indicated that the protection conferred by D. thoracicus was largely confined to the particular pod on which it was present. Rat damage, monitored as a subsidiary study, was higher in ant-scarce plots throughout the study period.

A significant effect of moon phase on light-trap catches of Anopheles species was observed during a longitudinal study carried out in a forested belt of Madhya Pradesh, India, inhabited by tribal people. However, moon phase does not seem to have any effect on the proportion of adult Anopheles culicifacies Giles in the total catch, or the parity rate in this species, which is the vector responsible for perennial transmission of malaria in the area.

Brachymeria encarpaesp. n. is described from Malaysia. This species was reared from an important pest of cocoa pods, the cocoa husk borer, Cryptophlebia encarpa (Meyrick), and may be of potential use as a biological control agent.