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THE RICE WORM {TYLENCHUS ANGUSTUS) AND 



ITS CONTROL. 



BY 



E. J. BUTLER, M.B., F.L.S., 



Imperial Mycologist. 



Recaived for publication on 26th June, 1918.] 



The area affected and the extent of the damage. 



In a previous publication^ an account was given of a new and exceedingly 

 serious disease of rice, called locally " ufra," in the great rice-growing deltaic 

 tract at the head of the Bay of Bengal. 



This tract comprises one of the main rice areas of India. The districts 

 actually known to be affected (Noakhali, Tippera, Dacca, Faridpur, and 

 Backergunge) contained, in 1916, nearly 6 million acres out of the 21 million 

 acres under this cereal in Bengal. Adjoining them are other districts so 

 similar in climatic conditions and agricultural practices that they are liable 

 to infection and indeed are likely to be, in some cases, already infected. This 

 threatened area adds another 6 million acres of rice in Bengal and over 2 million 

 acres in Sylhet. In all of this vast extent rice occupies over 70 per cent, of 

 the cultivated land ; hardly any alternative food crop is grown, and the great 

 bulk of the tract is totally unsuited to any other. Hence it is probable that 

 no plant disease hitherto observed in India, except the cereal rusts that periodi- 

 cally take heavy toll of the wheat crop in Northern and Central India, possesses 

 such potentialities for harm as ufra. The intensity of the attack no less than 

 the importance of the crop affected warrants this view. 



In most of the districts referred to, communications are defective and 

 agricultural intelligence is backward. While the paddy is growing, the fields 



^ Butler, E. J. " Diseases of Rice." Agric Res. Inst., Pusa, Bui. 34, 1913. 



