THE AGRICULTURAL PESTS OF INDIA. 95 



lay concealed, burrowed in the ground all day, and at 

 night came out and nipped off the young plant a little 

 above the root, giving it the appearance of having been 

 destroyed by hares. The blights of the poppy in Chota 

 Nagpore are known as the lahai, moorka, and jureet. 

 The lahai was that of 1871, which in Fyzabad was 

 attributed to three insects called the ' gudarlah/ ' bhudo- 

 weah,' and 'jewriah.' A winged insect appeared in 

 Bustee called guduhilee, and two in Saharanpore, the 

 ' koongy ' and ' mahoo.' 



Among the diseases of the poppy crop enumerated by 

 him are : Aregnia, broom-rapes, cladosporium, dactylium, 

 gangrene, lecythea, mucor mucedo, orobranche,peronospora, 

 petechiae, phelipea, scleriasis, sporotrichum, sun-burning, 

 trichoderma. 



Scleriasis, a peculiar affection of the poppy, character- 

 ized by the hardening, so to speak, of the whole outer 

 tissues of the plant, and the utter arrest of the drug 

 secretions. Such cases of functional derangement are 

 very prevalent in the local crops from unselected seed, 

 and subsequently cause serious deterioration to the crop. 

 The disease or affection is hereditary ; that is, a large per- 

 centage of the progeny is similarly affected. All plants so 

 affected should be uprooted. 



Petechiae, another hereditary disease, is seriously 

 deteriorative to the secretion of drug. All affected 

 plants should be carefully removed. 



Broom -rapes, the 'thokra' of the natives, affect the 

 roots of the poppy, etc. The seeds of these plants are 

 so exceedingly minute that a breath of air will widely 

 distribute them. The tomato and the brinjal (Solanum 

 melongena) are affected by them! They should be care- 

 fully uprooted on making their appearance. 



