Jul Y I, 1905.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



333 



^tl 



MOiQunO INDIANS. 



jiirious ia the West Indies. It works principally upon akte, 

 oleander, fig, and hibiscus. Mr. MaxwcU-Lefroy, the gov- 

 ernment entomologist to the West Indies, in pamphlet series 

 No. 7 of the Imperial Department of Agriculture for the 

 West Indies, recommends kerosene emulsion for the control 

 of this insect. 1 1 is formula and method of preparation is as 

 follows : " Kerosene emulsion : Dissolve one half pound of 

 hard soap in one gallon of water ; add two gallons of kerosene 

 to the hut liquid, and immediately churn with a syringe or 

 force pump until the mixture becomes creamy. This is a 

 stock solution. Make up to 33 gallons. Use only rain water 

 or soft water." 



The kerosene emulsion preparation can also be applied for .. castilloa " stem 

 the /.fciiniodiaspis, of which only a few specimens were found attacked by scale 

 on the twig which you sent. 



Yours truly, K. 11. ciiittendkn, 



Acting Chief of liureau, 

 Uureau of KntomnloKy. 



Washington, D. C, KL-bniary 23, 1905. 



Another possible enemy to the 

 Castilloa that the alert planters were 

 seeking information about was a 

 wood borer which attacked the tree 

 where the self pruning branches 

 broke ofl, and occasionally where 

 the bark was cut or wounded. The 

 larva' of the insect are large grubs 

 that after penetrating the outer bark 

 burrow upwards inside of the cam 

 bium, and then straight through the 

 wood, completely honeycombing it 



so that the trees break short ofT when very little wind comes. 

 This does not always kill the tree, but it sets it back appreci- 

 ably. These borers appear to be most active during the months 

 of June and July. The planters for a remedy were using a 

 mixture of tar, kerosene oil, black oil, and sulphur. This killed 

 the grub if it touched it. but it was very difficult to reach it 

 because of the length of the burrow. A suggestion for keep- 

 ing the borer out was to have a gang of men constantly going 

 over the trees and tarring all cuts and the sockets left by the 

 dropping off of the temporary branches. This, however, would 



^' 



STERN OF NAT, JR." 



be very expensive and hardly practical. I was able to 

 secure a number of specimens of the lar-'n-. and the 

 [), bureau of entomology at Washington decided that 



tiey belonged to one of the large moths, family Cos- 

 sidce. Their report was that they knew little about 

 the work of this moth, but that the best way to kill 

 the borer was to inject a few drops of carbon bisul- 

 phide into the burrow with an oil can, closing the 

 orifice with a little wax. The fumes of the solvent 

 would then penetrate the lower part of the burrow and 

 kill the grub. Professor John Barlow, of Kingston, 

 Rhode Island, however, reported that instead of a 

 moth it was probably a beetle. He suggested the 

 :-ame treatment for the destruction of the grub as the 

 liureau of entomology at Washington did. In this 

 I onnection it may be well to recall that sometime be- 

 fore this an anonymous writer reported that a beetle, 

 the Acottsymus longimanus. was troublesome in Nica- 

 ragua just in this way — that is, lay- 

 ing eggs in wounds in the bark of 

 the Castilloa, which developed into 

 borers and greatly injured the trees. 

 The fruiter on which we finally 

 embarked was a Norwegian of about 

 700 tons and carried 10,000 bunches 

 of bananas. As we were the only 

 three passengers, we took possession 

 of the bridge and also of the cap- 

 tain's quarters and lived high in 

 everything except food. We went 

 out in the face of a norther and ran 

 into one after another during the 

 whole passage. The boat had no 

 refrigerating apparatus, and to save 

 the fruit both the fore and after hatches were kept wide open, 

 and It was a constant matter of wonderment to me that some 

 of the big green seas didn't topple over our bow and swamp us, 

 but they didn't, and we sailed on by Cape Gracias a Dios, 

 through squall after squall, the temperature all the time in the 

 eighties, and finally, missing the delta of the Mississippi by a 

 wide margin, ran almost to Mobile before we got our bearings. 

 We finally got right, however, and went up the Mississippi 

 and landed in New Orleans just in time to enjoy the fireworks 

 with which they usher in Christmas day. 



LARVAE OF CASTILLOA" BORER 



