616 PROCEEDINGS OF THE THIRD ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 



at tlie time of laying eggs, becomes restive, moves about for a time, 

 settles down and begins laying eggs. If again disturbed it moves about 

 for some time and again begins laying eggs. From close observations 

 made for a full year, it was found that in all the cycles the female lays- 

 eggs which take from 5 to 8 days to hatch according to the time of the 

 year. 



The female lays bright pinkish eggs which remain covered within 

 the ovisac. Each egg is bright pinkish, suffused at one end with bright- 

 scarlet. The eggs lie loosely within the ovisac covered with whitish 

 flocculent threads forming the ovisac. Each egg is 0-36 to 039 mm, 

 long and 015 to 0-21 mm. broad. It is cylindrical, rounded at both 

 ends. The chorion is covered thinly with meal owing to its being covered 

 with the flocculent material forming the ovisac. 



The nymphs on hatching move about the plants. They generally 

 gather together oQ the apices of branches, the leaf-stalks or the tender 

 stems below shoots. They are gregarious in habits and their presence 

 is known easily by the presence of the ants [Monomorium indicum) which 

 attend upon them for the sake of the honey-dew. In this case it was 

 observed that the amount of honey-dew exuded by the nymphs was not 

 so copious as to cause the development of the black fungus on the lower 

 leaves. When full-fed they either remain at the same place of feeding 

 or move about to establi.sh themselves on some other part of the plant, 

 and here too their presence is betrayed by the ants which find them out 

 soon. The male. nymphs shift their places and have been observed to 

 collect together on the lower surfaces of leaves, preferably near the midribs, 

 leaf scars on the stems and branches, any cavities or holes on the stem, 

 or the lower surface of malformed leaves. At times they have also been 

 seen to collect together near the gravid females and so near their ovisacs 

 that they might be taken to have pupated under the female ovisacs. 

 Prior to pupation the nymphs become covered with their whitish silken 

 threads and when several puparia coalesce together, the spot looks white 

 with the flocculent material enclosing the puparia. 



A fully-developed female before laying eggs is 2-52 mm. long from 

 apex to end of pygidial lobe and 2 70 mm. from apex to end of caudal 

 setae, greatest breadth over abdomen transversely dorsally is 1'47 to 

 1 50 mm., greatest breadth over cephalo-thorax dorsally is 111 mm. 

 Body deep red, antennae and legs stramineous, dorsum covered with 

 thin white meal, abdominal segments distinct dorsally, small hairs on 

 the perijjheral margin, pygidial lobes prominent, each with a seta, and 

 a pair of thick cretaceous white stump-shaped threads in the middle. 

 (The above description is of a female removed from an affected shoot prior 



