CHAPTER VI. 



PREVENTIVE AND REMEDIAL MEASURES. 



PREVENTION is better than cure, costs less to carry out and forestalls 

 the loss of crop. Most measures of this kind depend upon a kind of 

 commonsense that is practically non-existent in India and rare anywhere. 

 It is difficult to prove the value of preventive measures, which depend 

 solely upon a thorough knowledge of the conditions under which insects 

 live or upon reiterated experience. If our pests come regularly and at 

 definite times, the value of such measures can be clearly demonstrated ; 

 but since insects are not so accommodating and come at haphazard, it is 

 difficult to bring them within range of actual experiment. There are 

 several simple precautions which are sufficiently obvious to any one who 

 practises agricultm-e intelligently ; they are also general in their appli- 

 cation and should form part of every agriculturist's stock of maxims. 

 Clean culture is important ; many insects breed on common weeds, 

 become abundant and are driven by lack of food to attack crops. That is 

 a common way in which many insects become pests. An herbivorous 

 insect that increases beyond natural limits will attack a crop on which it 

 can feed, and it is folly to encourage pests by growing their wild food- 

 plants within reach of cultivation. Weeds are always a source of danger 

 and do no good. This applies equally to the strips of grass that border 

 on fields, to waste lands, jungle, etc. Good grass is safe and brings no 

 pests ; mixed weeds and low vegetation should be replaced by grass or 

 kept down. The ideal cultivator allows no weeds or plants to grow 

 other than crops and grass. 



Another precaution consists in removing crop plants when the crop 

 is harvested. Old cotton plants afford food to cotton pests, thus helping 

 them through critical seasons when food is scarce. Juari stubble har- 

 bours the moth-borer and enables it to hibernate. A crop plant that has 

 yielded should be removed and not allowed to breed pests after it is 

 useless. It is at all times necessary to weed out dead and dying plants 

 from a crop and burn them. The brinjal grower pulls out the plants 

 attacked by stem-borer and leaves them in the field. If he burnt them, 

 he would destroy his pest and check its increase ; as it is the calerpillar 

 completes its metamorphosis, comes out as a moth, lays its hundred eggs 

 and the loss of plants steadily increases. The same thing applies to all 

 refuse plants, dead wood, rotting fruit, etc. Even weeds should be 

 removed when they are pulled up and not allowed to rot in the field. No 

 vegetable matter should ever be allowed to decay in a field or anywhere 



