3i6 FAMILY CERAMBYCIDAE 



deposit them. If the sap does not flow freely at these places it is obvious 

 that a high proportion of the young larvae hatching out will die before 

 reaching the bast layer. In the case of a large wound the majority will 

 probably reach it with facility, and mature into fall-size grubs and eventually 

 into beetles. Observations have shown that it is probable that the most 

 critical period in the life of this hardy insect is the initiatory stages of the 

 larval life. 



It is therefore of the first importance that trees, whether grown in 

 gardens and avenues, or in copses and groves, should not be pruned or lopped 

 in the springtime. If pruning is necessary it should be done in the autumn 

 and winter, after the wood has ripened, and the pruned surfaces be thickly 

 coated with tar. 



If trees are blown down or branches broken off in the spring, under 

 the devastating effect of high winds and storms, they should, in the first 

 instance, be cut up and removed at once ; in the second, the point at which 

 the injury has taken place should be carefully trimmed and a thick coating 

 of tar be applied to it. In the case of garden and avenue trees injuries 

 to the bark between the end of March and end of June should be 

 immediately given a thick coat of tar. All infested trees form so many 

 centres from which the beetles maturing from them will carry on the 

 infection to trees as yet unattacked. Therefore such trees should be 

 felled in the autumn and cut up and burnt, or the material converted into 

 charcoal during the ensuing winter. 



Trap Trees. — These are trees which are selected to serve as lures for the 

 insect to lay in, the intention being that they should subsequently be 

 removed, cut up, and burnt as soon as they are full of larvae and pupae. 

 The selection of such trees depends upon circumstances, and whether they 

 are required for the protection of trees in a garden, avenue, or plantation. 

 In the great attack of A. sarta on the Quetta avenues between igoo and 

 igoy so many of the trees were found to be infested in 1905 that the selec- 

 tion of trap ones to leave over the following year was a comparatively easy 

 matter. Ordinarily the selection would be more difficult, but in the case of 

 an attack the partially infested trees should be selected, for additional 

 beetles will resort to them in the following year, as plenty of bast still 

 remains unattacked. Very badly infested trees should be cut out, cut up, 

 and converted into charcoal. 



Should all the trees infested be in a very bad state they should be 

 removed in the autumn, and a tree or two be partially (not totally) ringed so 

 as to lower their vitality and reduce them to a moribund and sickly condition. 

 The beetles issuing the following spring will resort to these trees to oviposit, 

 and the trees will then be felled and removed, as already prescribed, in the 

 following autumn. 



That the removal of infested trees in the autumn and their conversion 

 into firewood or charcoal during the winter will stamp out an attack of this 

 pest has been abundantly proved in the case of Quetta, where the appalling 



