44 Indian Insect Pests. [Vol. I, 



bamboos are well soaked in a tank and subsequently preserved with plenty of smoke 

 they will be rapidly destroyed by the cootee and other borers. The advice is excellent 

 and should be invariably adopted, but it would be interesting to know what actual 

 effect the moon has on the motion of the sap in growing trees. These insects also 

 attack the pod, or capsule, of cardamoms, and, I think, are propagated in the forest 

 rubbish ; but the fact that I have found the insect in the larval and perfect state 

 inside the capsule, suggests the probability that the female punctures the outer skin, 

 lays its eggs therein, and the grubs, having passed the pupal stage, emerge as perfect 

 beetles by the small round hole, leaving the cardamoms perfectly empty. ' Cotee ' 

 also attacks horse and cow-gram (Dolichos inflorus and lablab) and will utterly destroy 

 solah pith hats, bread, baskets, mats, &c." 



The insects which Mr. Anderson sends belong to a species of Bostry- 

 chidse Beetles (Apatides), which, however, it has not been possible to 

 identify precisely in Calcutta; specimens have therefore been sent 

 to Europe for comparison. 1 It may be observed that all the substances 

 which Mr. Anderson mentions, are not likely to be attacked by the 

 same species, though they may be attacked by species which are very 

 nearly allied to each other. The idea which prevails with regard to 

 the effect of the moon is a curious one, and would [really seem to have 

 some foundation of fact to rest upon, the writer having been told that it 

 prevails generally, both in Behar and also in the North-West. About 

 the only explanation that has been put forward is to the effect that the 

 ' cootee/ like most other wood-boring insects, prefers to lay its eggs in 

 wood which has commenced to wither, and which consequently has no 

 longer a healthy flow of sap to interfere with the insect in its burrow, 

 though still full of nutritive juices on which the insect feeds. If this is 

 the case, the time immediately after the bamboo has been cut down 

 would be the most likely one for it to be attacked; and moonlight 

 nights would give the insect a quiet time, with plenty of light, for 

 finding the bamboos and ovipositing in them. This explanation, how- 

 ever, is little more than a guess and requires confirmation. 



It seems to [be the generally received idea that soaking bamboos, 

 and also other timber, in water, for a considerable time, immediately 

 after it has been felled, makes it less liable, than it otherwise would be, 

 to suffer from boring beetles of all kinds. It is supposed that not only 

 does the water prevent the beetles laying their eggs during the time the 

 wood is immersed in it, but that it also drowns the larvae already at 

 work, and dissolves much of the nutritive matter on which they would 

 otherwise feed. 



It is notorious that bamboos suffer very considerably from the attack 

 of small boring Bostrychid (Apatid) beetles. The writer has found 



1 Specimens of this insect were submitted to Dr. Giinther, who had kindly undertaken 

 to have them examined. He has since reported on them as belonging to a species of 

 Sinoxylon which is unnamed in the collections of the British Museum. He also reports on 

 a second species that was obtained by Mr. R. D. Oldham, in Dehra Dun, from a tent pole, 

 which it had completely destroyed, as belonging to a species of Dinoderus, not in the British 

 Museum collection. 



