i66 Indian Museum Notes. [Vol. V. 



history of this pest. It probably takes some weeks to reach the 

 perfect state, or possibly some months. The perfect insect is 

 about half»an-inch in total length, the head produced into a long 

 snout upturned at the tip, the eyes black and prominent, coloration 

 pale wainscoat-brown, the fore wing with some small scattered black 

 dots hardly to be seen except under a lens, the hind wing transparent, 

 white, immaculate. The female has a large mass of white flocculent 

 material at the end of the body, with which she covers the eggs 

 when laying them. 



This insect, if it attacks the sugarcane in large numbers, must be 

 a serious pest, as it must greatly reduce the vitality of the plant by 

 sucking up the sap through its proboscis or beak, piercing the cuticle 

 of the leaf for that purpose. The remedy for it is simple if taken in 

 time. The egg-masses being so very conspicuous, it would be 

 extremely easy to collect and destroy them. Children could do it. 

 They should each be provided with an empty kerosine oil tin, and 

 made to go over the lines of young sugarcanes, examining the under- 

 side of each leaf carefully. Any leaf with an egg-mass attached to it 

 should be cut off and put into the tin to be subsequently burnt. As 

 the eggs drop off at the slightest touch, the collecting receptacle 

 should not be a basket or other porous article through which the loose 

 eggs can fall. If the children went over the fields once a week until 

 no more eggs were found, the pest would be eradicated for that season, 

 and with a little care and attention in subsequent years it could be 

 practically exterminated. Should it be found advisable to attack the 

 insect after it has become a hopper or larva, kerosine emulsion (made 

 from two-thirds kerosine oil and one-third soap, added to ten times 

 its bulk of water) should be sprayed over the plants on which the 

 insects are at work. 



At Muzaffarpur I found eggs commonly at Mr. Roland Hudson's 

 estate at Ottur. The insect is probably widely spread, and doubtless 

 is found on other plants besides the sugarcane. 



Mr. J. M. Hayman, Deputy Director of Agriculture, Experimental 

 Station, Cawnpore, has found freshly-laid eggs of this insect up to the 

 end of May, so that it appears probable that there are no well-defined 

 broods, but that the egg-laying goes on for a considerable period. 



2. Dinoderus minutus, Fabricius. Family Bostrychidse ; Lsemot- 

 ■metus ferrugineus, Gerst., Family Cucujidaz, and Sitophilus oryzse 

 Linnaeus, Family Curculionidge ; all Order Coleoptera. 



In June, 1900, Captain A. T. Gage, of the Royal Botanic Gardens, 

 Sibpur, near Calcutta, sent to the Museum for identification three 



