7 i8 ] 



CHAPTER CXIX. 



THE SUGAR-CANE BORER (CHIIvO SIMPLEX). 



'^PHE larvae of this moth bore into the stalks of sugar- 

 cane, maize, juar and probably also the kashia grass 

 (.Saccharum spontaneum). A brinjal stalk borer is also a 

 chilo. The borer attacking the sugar-cane, often results in 

 putrefaction, so that the whole stalk becomes worthless. Of- 

 ten the borer is followed by a fungus in the work of destruc- 

 tion, and the wholesale loss occurring in some districts to soft 

 varieties of sugar-cane, is caused jointly by the borer and the 

 fungus, the latter in fact doing far more harm than the borer 

 in giving rise to an epidemic. It is curious the borer and 

 the fungus have also gone hand in hand in the destruction of 

 sugar-cane plantations wrought in Barbadoes, in Jamaica, in 

 Mauritius, in British Guiana and in the United States. The 

 pest first showing itself by the drying of the middle of the cane 

 and the cane rotting away afterwards, the disease is known in 

 Bengal both as Mdjerd and Dhashd. The former name should 

 however be confined to the damage caused by the borer alone, 

 the name of the borer insect being Mdjerd-pokd. The name 

 Dhashd may be similarly properly confined to the damage 

 caused by the agency of the Trichosphoeria fungus as the 

 same name is applied to other fungoid diseases. Hard rinded 

 canes which are comparatively free from the attack of the 

 borer are also comparatively free from the attack of the fun- 

 gus. 



1,258. The parent moth lays her eggs upon the leaves 

 of the young cane near the axils, and the young borer, hat- 

 ching in the course of a few days, penetrates the stalk at or 

 near the joint, and commences to tunnel through the soft pith. 

 The growth of the larva is very rapid, and the full size is 

 reached in a month. The full grown larva is about an inch 



