70 



Bhynchophorus ferruginetis or R. Schach. — The palm weevil or 

 " Red beetle " as it is known to planters is capable of doing much 

 more injury to the palm than the brown Oryctes. Unlike the latter 

 thif5 insect passes through all the stages in its life history on the 

 host plant. The destructive stage in the life history is the larva, 

 not the mature beetle as in the case of Oryctes. 



The insect is well known and need not be fully described. 

 Preventive measures must take the form of preventing egg-lying 

 and that of destroying the insects whether adult or in the larval 

 condition. All wounds should be tarred, no green leaves should be 

 pulled off as in this process wounds are obviously made, and the 

 burning or scorching of leaf bases and fibrous tissue at the bases of 

 leaves either intentionally or accidentally is particularly deprecated 

 as injuries so caused provide suitable means of entry for these beetles. 



Brontisjpa frogatti (Sharp). — This little leaf-eating beetle of the 

 family Hispid^ is quite commonly found on coconut plantations in 

 the Peninsula. It was described by Progatt as the worst pest of the 

 Solomon Islands in young plantations. This was reported in 1903. 

 Both adult and larvae feed on the leaves of the coconuts. 



Preuss states that it and two other species were known in 1911 in 

 New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, New Hebrides and the Celebes. 

 In New Guinea this beetle is known as the " Heart-leaf beetle." 

 It is a small beetle 7-10 mm. or -^ to f-inch long by 2 mm. 

 wide. The head is dark brown, the thorax and first legs orange in 

 colour and the rest of the body a shining blue-black." The head is 

 very small, the eyes project in the sides, the front is produced into 

 a lancet-shaped point standing out between the basal joints of the 

 stout antennae. 



The wing covers or elytra are covered with very fine and 

 regular pits arranged in parallel lines. These do not show except 

 under a lens. 



The larva when full grown is as long as the adult. It is 

 flattened and usually found closely adpressed to the surface of the 

 leaf. "The head is-small, lobed, with short jaws on the under side 

 of the head : the small legs are divided at the extremities, forming 

 two rounded feet. The abdominal segments, eight in number, are 

 furnished in the sides with, a slender, rounded, fleshy tubercle ; and the 

 anal segment has the tips flattened and produced into a pair of short, 

 incurved, flat calliper-like processes, which curving inwards, form a 

 perfect crescent between them." The beetles crawl into the folded 

 leaflets of young opening leaves and lay their eggs in this position. 

 The adults and larvae living in between the two halves of the close- 

 folded leaflets eat away the tissues, and as a result the leaf does not 

 open properly and when it does open partially it is malformed, the 

 leaflets have grey brown' spots or in bad cases the whole leaf is a 

 dirty grey black and dried up and has much the same appearance as 

 it would have had had it been burnt prior to opening. 



