12 



were devoted to Sakellarides cotton which produces much smaller 

 second and third pickings than do the older varieties, and consequently 

 offers much less inducement to cultivators to leave their cotton 

 standing late. At the same time the increasing ravages of the pink 

 boll worm in the late cotton, as we have already seen, have tended to 

 cause earlier harvesting. The result is that whereas in 1911 quite 

 considerable quantities of cotton were picked in December and even 

 a little in January and cotton sticks were left standing all through 

 the winter, in 1919, in the southern part of the Delta at any rate, 

 picking was practically finished by the end of October and very few 

 sticks were left standing after the middle of November. 



The result of this on the common boll worm has been very marked. 

 In 1912 samples of bolls from various localities examined by Mr. Will- 

 cocks, Entomologist to the then Khedivial Agricultural Society, were 

 attacked to an extent varying from 11 to 44 per cent. In 1913 

 similar samples from the same localities showed a considerable reduc- 

 tion in the attack. No figures satisfactory for comparison seem to 

 be available for 1914 and 1915, but from 1916 onwards the regular 

 boll counts carried out by the Entomological Section show the following 

 averages for the percentage of bolls attacked by common boll worm 

 in the Delta during September : 



1916 4 per cent. 



1917 2 



1918 3 



1919 ... 3 . 



From these figures it is quite clear that in the past eight years 

 common boll worm has been reduced by changes in Agricultural 

 practice from the position of the worst cotton pest in Egypt to one 

 of very little importance. These changes are having a similar effect 

 on the pink boll worm, but in order to reduce the latter to the present 

 status of the common boll worm, it will be necessary, owing to the 

 presence of the long-cycle worms, to advance still further the date 

 of pulling the cotton sticks and to fumigate all cotton seed. 



It is therefore recommended that the pulling up of all cotton 

 sticks be enforced at as early a date as possible consistent with the 

 picking of the crop. The date should be fixed for each district every 

 year by arrete. 



TREATMENT OF COTTON SEED. 



The third measure for the control of the pink boll worm recom- 

 mended by the entomologists, was the treatment either by fumigation 

 with poisonous gases or by heat of all cotton seed immediately after 



