i85 



Upriglit tall dead trunks commonly harbour grubs, for the v\ooci! 

 decays faster than the bark and a cup which catches rain is formed 

 just suitable to the beetle. 



Now it is not to be thought that the cconut stump is the only 

 one to be removed ; the beetle can live in many palms apparently as 

 well as in saw-dust of soft woods of trees that have no relationship to 

 the palms. It can live in manure heaps, and old tan heaps ; all such 

 heaps should be turned over (if it is necessary to keep them) at least 

 once within the period of the life time of a grub, viz., six months 

 /'which period it were better to reduce to three for safety). In turning 

 over the heaps, grubs exposed to the sun will be killed. Old decaying 

 thatch in which it can live, should not be left to breed the beetle. 

 When full fed the grub makes for itself a case in varying fashion ; it 

 seems as if it took to rotation and when lying in fil)rous material 

 thereby arranged the fibres more or less concentrirally, or if lying in 

 earthy material compacted for itself a wall. In this case it turns to a 

 pupa and from it emerges a matuie insect, ready to attack the living: 

 palms. 



The Palm-weevil — Rhyticlwphorus ferrugineus — also has been stu- 

 died by Ghosh, at Pusa in the Gangetic plain. He bred it in March,. 

 April and May and he found that it passed through a life cycle in 

 about two months. As well as from its more destructive habits as 

 from so rapid a course it is more dangerous as a pest than the Rhino- 

 ceros beetle; and when, as there has been recently in Singapore, an 

 outbreak of it occurs, we cannot afford to let three months go by as in 

 the case of the Rhinoceros beetle, but must pay constant attention 

 to the infected spot. It breeds at all seasons, and there is no evidence 

 that the cold weather of the Gangetic plain retards its growth, through 

 there is some evidence that egg-laying may be retarded as is the case 

 with the American Palmetto weevil Rhyuchophonis crucntatus* 



The mature beetle seeks the tops of the palms chiefly by night, 

 but also by day, and with its long snout makes a small puncture, into 

 which to the best of its ability it places an egg. If entry is to be had 

 to the inside of the palm by a ready-made hole so much the better for 

 the weevil and the worse for the palm ; full advantage is taken of all 

 such holes. In a hole, according to Banks, it does without making any 

 appreciable puncture, but push.s the egg into the tissue a little way. 

 The eggs are laid several up mi one tree, near together hut not in 

 contact, and if laid from the outside, not within one of the Rhinoceros 

 beetle's borings, -are placed H to 54 inch deep in the tissue, 

 right at the bottom of the puncture. Eggs were laid in Ghosh's 

 laboratory by day as well as by night. One insect deposited 276 

 eggs in a life time of 49 davs, another 127 in 46 days and four 

 kept together 213 in 24 days. The greatest number of eggs laid 



^Summers in Canadian Entomogolist, 



