72b PROCEEDINGS OF THE THIRD ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 



storing purposes, of course on a small scale. The difficulty with them 

 however is that their openings can hardly be made insect-proof. 



Gunny bags are in universal use among all cultivators, grain dealers 

 and even big merchants, especially for convenience of handling and 

 transport. Bags filled with grain are piled up in large godowns up to 

 the ceiling. As storage receptacles they are extremely bad as they 

 expose the grain to insects all around their surface. 



Bamboo bins, etc. Bins are made of bamboo matting or wattling, 

 of stems of Saccharuin anmdinaceum, of sticks of leguminous plants, 

 etc. These are of the shape of ordinary cylindrical iron bins and of 

 various capacities. Their walls are plastered with cowdung both inside 

 and outside or only inside and usually they have solid bottoms which 

 are also plastered similarly. They are as a rule used for indoor storage 

 and sometimes have conical umbrella-like coverings which can be placed 

 on the top. Rarely they possess no bottom and are pitched on the 

 flat floor and made firm by means of sticks driven into the ground. In 

 such cases they are used for a rather coarse stufi like unhusked paddy 

 grains. Such bins are incapable of keeping ofi insects. They are not 

 in use all over India. As far as the writers know, they are found in 

 Assam, parts of Bengal and, as Mr. V. G. Deshpande, the Entomological 

 Assistant of the Konkan, informs them, in the Deccan. Even by being 

 well plastered with mud they cannot be made insect-proof. 



Straw pura (Plate 114). In West Bengal for storing indoors, and 

 at one place, say from about four to about 16 maunds usually of husked 

 rice or unhusked paddy grains, this piira is in common use. It is made 

 entirely of paddy straw. In this part paddy straw is in great demand 

 for thatching purposes and therefore all varieties of paddy are harvested 

 in sheaves, the grain being separated by beating the sheaves on sloping 

 planks. For the Pura as well as for the Mo7-ai to be described later on, 

 thick ropes about IJ to IJ inches in diameter are prepared with this 

 straw in the manner shown in Plate 115. For this purpose the loose 

 leaf-sheaths of the straw are discarded as far as possible by holding the 

 loosened sheaf at the top and giving downward jerks. The straw 

 is then moistened with water to make it pliable. In this figure (No. 2) 

 about two and a half bundles of such straw are lying in front of the 

 man who is sitting. He is feeding the rope with his hands, giving it a 

 twist at the same time by rolling it in the desired direction by means 

 of his right foot. The man at the other end continually twists the 

 rope. The ropes are usually made in lengths of about 50 yards. One 

 bundled-up ro^e is lying on the left side of the feeder. Fig. 1 shows 

 how the rope is commenced and Plate 114, fig. 2, how it is fed. Unless the 

 paddy is harvested before the straw becomes too dry and brittle no 



