Vol. II, No. 3.] INSECT LIFE. [September, l §89. 



SPECIAL NOTES. 



Insect Pests in East India. — We have just received through the kind- 

 ness of Mr. E. C. Cotes, of the Indian Museum, Calcutta, a very inter- 

 esting paper, entitled " Notes on Indian Insect Pests," which forms No. 

 I of Vol. I of the " Indian Museum Notes," published by the trustees of 

 the museum and by the authority of the revenue and agricultural 

 department of the Government of India. This publication i^ to take 

 the place of "Notes on Economic Entomology," of which two numbers 

 have appeared. The present number is divided into three parts ; the 

 first part contains "Notes on Rhym'hota," by Mr. E. T. Atkinson, and 

 includes short articles ui)ou the Eice Sapper {Leptocorisa acuta), an 

 insect which considerably injures the autumn rice by settling upon it 

 when it is milky and sucking out the juice, leaving the husk dry ; as 

 many as to 10 of the insects have been seen upon a single ear; the 

 Chora-poka (probably Carhida biguttata), an insect which appears in 

 vast numbers when the sesamum crop is gathered and stacked on the 

 threshing floor and eats out the kernel of the seed, leaving only the 

 husk; the Green Bug {Xezara viridula), which occurs upon potato 

 halms; also several species of Capsidce, Jassidw, Aphidce^ and Coccida'. 

 A new species of GeratapMs and a new species of Pemphigus are men- 

 tioned as feeding upon Cinchona. The second part is by Mr. L. de 

 Nic6ville, and treats of a Butterfly injurious to Rice and the Ceylon 

 cardamom pest. The butterfly is Saustus gremius, and the larvje feed 

 upon the leaves of rice. The cardamom pest is Lamphides eJpis, the 

 larva of which bores circular holes into the capsules and destroys the 

 contents. The damage done by this latter pest is sometimes as great 

 as 80 to 90 per cent, to young plantations. Between from 5 to 10 per 

 cent, of the fruit capsules are perforated. 



In the third part Mr. E. C. Cotes gives us further notes on the 

 Wheat and Rice Weevil, on the Sugar-cane Borer-moth {Ghilo saccha- 

 ralis)^ the Sorghum borer (species not determined), a caterpillar in- 

 jurious to tea, cut-worms, a moth injuring a cultivated timber tree 

 known as Cedrela toona, Clothes moths, Hispa ccwescews injuring rice, a 



Gl 



