6 THE JOLA OR DECCAN GRASSHOPPER 
to all these crops is, however, much less severe than that to 
the cereals mentioned above. It appears likely that it may 
feed to a slight extent on cotton also, but the damage to 
this crop has, up to the present, been quite negligible. 
The insects can, of course, be found in considerable num- 
bers on all these crops where they occur in infested areas 
and this leads the raiyats to suppose that the crops are be- 
ing seriously injured. This applies especially to cotton, 
chillies and togari, all of which are present in the fields in 
considerable quantity at the time of jola harvest. A 
careful examination, however, shows that very little 
actual feeding is taking place, most of the insects simply 
copulating or ‘resting on the plants. Avare, green gram, 
black gram and pigeon pea earlier in the season are 
more severely attacked. 
The damage to the pulses consists in the eating of 
the leaves and How ers; in no case have any pods or seeds 
been found eaten by this grasshopper. On the other 
hand, in the case of all the cereals mentioned, not only are 
the leaves eaten but also the grains in the heads, the result 
being that in a severely attacked field practically nothing 
is left but the stalks or stems of the plants and the empty 
ears. Plate V, Fig. 1 shows a field of jola which has been 
almost completely destroyed in this way. All that is 
left of the leaves are the stiff and hard midribs which stand 
out like needles from the stalks. Plate III, Fig. 2 shows 
the effect produced upon a head of jola. In this | particular 
case, almost every grain has been eaten. A few grains, ly- 
ing more or less hidden by the outer branchlets of the 
head, have been left while one grain is half eaten and thus 
shows up strongly with its white eaten surface against the 
dark background. Plate III, Fig. 1 shows a healthy head 
for comparison. ‘These two heads were photographed 
to about the same scale and a comparison of them 
reveals the fact that, in the case of the attacked plant, the 
erowth of both head and stalk has been creatly stunted. 
This i is, of course, due to the fact that the plant has been 
stripped of leaves and so has been unable to develop 
normally. 
In the infested areas the soil is mainly of two types, 
viz., the ordinary black cotton soil of the Deccan and red 
laterite soil. As a general rule the infestation on the 
black soil areas has been much more severe than that on 
