About a couple of weeks ago I asked if anyone knew anything about the
dried bean weevil, Acanthoscelides obtectus, of which I've had an
outbreak in my store of dried beans. My last posting on the subject on
the 25th February was:

I had two phone calls as a result of my email to my friend at DEFRA,
one of which was from a plant health and seeds inspector. From my
description, particularly when I said we'd had a visit from someone
from
Zimbabwe, he took it seriously enough to ask me to send some of
these weevils to their lab.

This morning I had a letter back from the Central Science Laboratory at
Sand Hutton and they confirm my diagnosis - it *is* the Obtectus. Their
report was quite long but, to cut a long story short, they said that the
most likely source of the infestation was the friend from Zimbabwe who
stayed in our house over the summer. It is not an established pest in
the British Isles, the only record of it being in what they call
artificial conditions.

If anyone would like a copy of their report, do email me (correct email
address is below).

--
+-------------------------------------------------------+
| Internet: | writing from |
| Fidonet: David Rance 2:252/110 | Caversham, |
| BBS: telnet://mesnil.demon.co.uk | Reading, UK |
+-------------------------------------------------------+