CHAP. XV.] BUG PESTS. 147 



it is often accompanied by Oxycarenus iattis, a very small brownish 

 bug which is found chiefly in old bolls which have been left 

 unplucked after they are ripe : both of these bugs are easily collected 

 by hand and shaken into a pan of oil-and-water. 



irticularly attacked by Coptosoma cribraria, 

 .1 small rounded brownish-green insect which looks at first sight 

 like a beetle and which feeds particularly on beans and other 



iminosae; it is verj active on the wing and cannot be colli 1 

 by hand, but it is generally rather gregarious and can be caught in 

 large numbers by means of hand-nets. Aspongopus janus, a large 

 red-and-black insect, is sometimes a pest of vegetable plots ; it is 

 easilj caught by hand. 



In the Hills the mosl important of the active bugs are (1) Antestia 

 cruciata, an occasional serious pest of coffee which it damages by 

 sucking the berries. (2) Helopeltis antonii, the well-known " Mosquito 

 Blight" of tea, cacao and cinchona, (3) Cyclopelta siccifolia, a 

 stoutly-built dull black bug which is sometimes a serious pest of 

 Erythrina but is usually gregarious and easily collected by hand, 

 and (4) Anoplocnemis phasiana, a very large dark bug with 

 curiously-shaped hindlegs, which is sometimes a serious pest of 

 young Erytfwina when these are planted out as shade-trees. 



One bug, which deserves mention here because of its curious 

 habits, is Aphanus sordidus, an elongate dull dark-brownish insect 

 which sometimes congregates in large numbers on threshing floors 

 and similar places where oil-seeds or cereals, such as gingelly, 

 groundnut or cumbu, are collected, the bugs, which may be present 

 in very large numbers, running off with the seeds, which they suck, 

 in such quantities as to constitute a serious loss unless they are 

 nth swept back with the aid of a broom or branch. 

 In the second class, of semi-active bugs, reference must be made 

 to the various species of Psyllidae, Aphidae and Aleurodidae d 

 cribed further on ; but it may lure be noted that some of the Aphids 

 tnt-lice live on I I the plants they attack and special 



methods musl b< t tl 



fixed bugs, thi G : [Lecanium viride) 



is the most notorious, and incidentally it provides an excellent 

 example of the danger of the introduction of insect pests from 

 id. It is believed to have been originally a native of Brazil 

 whence (whether dip Mrical it was carried to Ceylon and 



then into Southern India where it has now spread practically into 

 all the coffee-growing districts in some of which it has absolutely 

 destroyed the whole of tl In appearance it is a small, 



inconspicuous, light-green, oval, flattened scale, which is found as ., 

 rule clustered along the veins and mid-rib on the underside of lea 1 

 10 A 



