,68 



FAMILY CERAMBYCIDAE 



shaped, orange. Elytra broadest basally, constricting apically, the suture being produced into 

 a short spine ; the shoulders produced, the basal fourth studded with a number of raised black 

 prominences ; six or more irregular-sized orange spots, three in basal fourth, four largest 



placed medianly on disk, live and six smaller 

 placed the one below the other in apical third. 

 Length, 57 mm. to 75 mm. 



The beetle makes its appearance 

 on the wing in Madras 

 Life History. about the middle of 



July and probably 

 throughout August. In the Southern 

 Shan States a specimen was taken by 

 Mr. Watson in September. The eggs 

 are laid at wounds on the trees or de- 

 posited so that the young grubs hatching 

 out can rapidly and easily reach the 

 cambium layer. The grubs do not, how- 

 ever, remain here, but soon tunnel down 

 into the wood of the tree and eat out a 

 long gallery parallel to the long axis of 

 the branch or stem attacked in a manner 

 similar to that already described for 

 Batocera rubra in the fig-tree. In order to 

 aerate the tunnels thus made in the wood, 

 branch tunnels of considerable size are 

 carried at right angles to the main one 

 until they pierce the bark. These bores, 

 from which wood-dust and excreta are ejected by the larva and from which 

 tell-tale streams of sap ooze down the bark, make the attack readih- 

 recognizable. The grub remains feeding in the wood throughout the re- 

 mainder of the year and up to March in the year following, the damage in 

 the last two or three months of the larval stage of existence being particu- 

 larly noticeable in the trees. In the main trunk of the tree the grub feeds 

 in the bast, grooving deeply into the sapwood, the whole of the cambium 

 layer of the tree being removed when the larvae are numerous. When full- 

 fed it tunnels into the heart of the tree and eats out there a large pupating- 

 chamber which is plugged up at either end with wood fibres and dust. 

 Mr. S. Cox, I.F.S., found the insect in all its stages, except the fully mature 

 beetle in the first week of March, the full-grown larvae being the most 

 numerous. The grubs, then, pupate at about this date. The pupal stage and 

 resting stage of the beetle must take from three to three and a half months, 

 as a beetle was taken crawling up the exit-tunnel from the pupating-chamber 

 by Mr. T. Reilly, I.C.S., on ig July. It may be considered as definitely 

 ascertained, therefore, that the life-cycle of the insect takes a year to pass 

 through, that the eggs are laid on the trees in July and August, and that the 



Fig. 246. — Batocera titaiia, Thoms. 

 Madras ; Southern Shan States. 



