177 



four cartridges of gelignite did not sullfice to do the work 



thoroughly, 

 three cartridges of blasting gelatine were not quite sutificient. 



The cost of thus disposing of coconut trees that have to be re- 

 moved, amounts to about half of what it costs to fell and subsequent- 

 ly to remove the stump by tediously digging it out. The two 

 operations can be done in one, for the hole for the charge should be 

 drilled in the standing tree and the trunk brought down by the 

 destruction of the butt end. 



The two beetles legislated against in the Straits Settlements are 

 Oryctes rhinoceros— Vat Rhinoceros beetle and Rhynchophorus ferru- 

 £meus, the Palm-weevil. The first is the commoner but individually 

 the less destructive. It feeds as an adult insect in the stems of living 

 palms, generally coconut palms, tunnelling into the softer parts of the 

 stem ; and it sometimes lays its eggs in these tunnels, but for the 

 most part it deposits them in decaying vegetable matter, sawdust, 

 rotting grass, old rotting thatch, wood which is soft enough, 

 ■especially the central parts of dead palm trunks, and as decay loosen-s 

 the bark, in the layer of tissue along the line where it and the wood 

 unite. It has been recorded as breeding even in rich vegetable mould. 

 It demands besides the decaying vegetable food, a considerable 

 amount of moisture. As it may happen that the tunnel made by the 

 mature insect in the apex of a palm tree collects rain water and rot is 

 set up, so even if these tunnels are not at first suitable places for egg- 

 laying, they are liable to become so after a short time. 



The Palm-weevil lays its eggs on the coconut trees, making for 

 ■each egg a small hole with its long characteristic snout, then turning 

 round and depositing it to the best of its ability in the hole. The 

 burrows of the Rhinoceros beetle give the Palm-weevil access to the 

 inside of the palm, and full advantage is taken of them, eggs being 

 ■deposited in or on their walls in preference to any other spot about 

 the palm tree. The eggs give rise to greedy fat white grubs, which 

 eat out galleries through the softest tissue, thereby doing the maxi- 

 mum amount of damage, for they destroy the heart of the palm- 

 cabbage. On the other hand without the aid of the Rhinoceros beetle, 

 they start life in superficial rather hard tissue, at a disadvantage 

 and somewhat exposed to enemies. 



The Rhinoceros beetle is a common insect from India to the 

 Philippine Islands wherever large palms abound. In Africa its place 

 is taken l)y Oryctes monoceros and O. boas, which attack palms in 

 exactly the same way as O. rhinoceros. In Madagascar six other 

 species of palm-attacking Oryctes live. In the Island of Reunion 

 there are two species. Tropical America has a closely allied genus — 

 Strutegus — which furnishes at least one species of similar habits. .Allied 

 genera — Piinelopus and Scapanes in New Guinea, Camelouotus in 

 America— attack young palms burrowing into their stems from the 

 ground. 



