PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECOND ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 113 
Bembax. It will add to our knowledge if any of you can discover addi- 
tional food-plants of G@. gossypiella in India. One use that we can make 
of such a knowledge is to use such alternative food-plants as trap-crops, 
but that is not a method which is likely to be of much use in India on 
any scale because there is a great danger that the trap-crop will not be 
destroyed either at all or at the right time. Another way in which 
such a knowledge will be useful is this—that if we find any wild plant, 
such as Seda or Abutilon, acting as an alternative host-plant when 
cotton is not in the ground, we can destroy such plants and_ thus help 
to reduce the numbers of the pest. With regard to this, however, in 
the case of G. gossypiella we must bear in mind the possibility of a very 
long resting period of the larva in cotton-seed. In my opening 
address I called your attention to Willcocks’ experiment im Egypt 
when larve from infested bolls collected in November 1913 gave rise 
to moths as late as the end of August 1915. These observations may 
not hold good in India but here again we are faced by our want of 
exact knowledge of the life-history of the insect concerned, and here 
again you can all help to fill up this gap in our knowledge. Mean- 
while we shall be on the safe side if we assume that the same conditions 
hold good in India as in Egypt and that the pest can be carried on from 
year to year, or even from one year to the second year thereafter, by 
resting larve in (a) the fields themselves, e.g., in old dropped bolls, 
fragments of cotton plants, etce., in the soil, (b) the newly-sown seed, 
whilst it is also quite possible that the insect may also carry on 
breeding in the off-season for cotton in Hibiscus spp. and hollyhocks 
and perhaps in wild malvaceous plants such as Sida spp., Abutilon 
indicum, and Thespesia populnea. 
Control must therefore provide for all these means of perpetuation of 
the pest, and may be divided up roughly into the following headings :— 
(1) Cultivation Methods. 
(a) Removal and destruction of all old broken, worthless bolls 
before and during the harvest period. Frequently these 
are left on the bushes as not worth picking, or if picked 
are thrown away, thus providing suitable breeding places 
for Gelechia, 
(b) Thorough removal and destruction of old bushes and all 
fragments of same immediately after harvest. Goats and 
sheep, if turned into the fields, will help in destroying any 
bolls left after last picking. 
(c) Removal from adjacent areas of all wild or cultivated malva- 
ceous plants which serve as alternative food-plants for 
K 
