Mr. Shroff. 
Mr. Fletcher. 
Mr. P. C. Sen. 
Mr. Fletcher. 
270 PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECOND ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 
young tobacco plants. Control by bag-nets is usually most effective. 
In Madras the Texas bait treatment gave good results, but this was 
not found to be the case at Pusa. 
Atractomorpha crenulata attacks young plants but we will take that 
later on. 
Brachytrypes portentosus (achatinus) [1. c., p. 536, fig. 430] is usually 
a minor pest of tobacco seedlings in Bihar and Bengal, but only very * 
young crickets are about at the time that the tobacco plants are small, 
so that little damage is done as a rule. 
At Bassein, in Burma, some damage was done to tobacco by Brachy- 
trypes in 1906. 
Gryllotalpa africana [l. c., pp. 534-535, fig. 428] sometimes does a 
little damage to young plants but this is probably incidental to its 
burrowing in the ground rather than due to deliberate attack. 
At Dacca a small amount of damage is done to seedlings by the 
burrowing of Gryllotalpa. 
The leaves of tobacco are eaten by :— 
Diacrisia obliqua. 
Heliothis assulta. 
Prodenia litura. 
Plusia signata. 
Plusia nagrisigna. 
Atractomorpha crenulata. 
Diacrisia obliqua is an occasional pest of tobacco, chiefly in Bikar 
and Bengal. The young larve may be hand-picked before they have 
scattered, if eggs have been laid on the tobacco. 
Heliothis assulta is described and figured in ‘‘ South Indian Insects,” 
p. 374, fig. 236, and we have just issued a coloured plate showing the 
lifehistory. This species is widely distributed in India (except in the 
extreme North) and Burma and is a minor, occasionally a major, pest 
of tobacco, the caterpillars eating holes in the leaves, as is clearly shown 
in the coloured plate. We have examples reared on tobacco at Pusa, 
Nadiad (Bombay), Anand, Madras, and Amarapura (Burma). It has 
also been reared at Pusa from larvee on tur (Cajanus indicus) pods, 
Physalis minima, Ph. peruviana and on a wild species of Physalis, but 
it is not a pest except on tobacco. The eggs are laid singly on the leaves 
and the caterpillars feed usually on the top-leaves, biting holes in them, 
Pupation takes place in the soil. As regards control, the bitten leaves 
are conspicuous and the fact that the damage has been caused by H. 
assulta is evident by the accumulation of frass on the leaves, the black 
pellets of excrement being quite conspicuous. The caterpillars may 
then be searched for and hand-picked. 
