 — ононанд 
5 
or three hundred yards in columns a couple of inches wide. It 
Apparent feeds on dead leaves, twigs, etc., and is occasionally seen in 
situated near jungle, but does not do any h 
V.—NATURAL HABITAT AND SURROUNDINGS 
OF TERMES GESTROI. 
nder normal p e., on unopened land — Termes ела 
е mg white ant with which we are concerned as an agricultural pest 
is =e о means a common сте п the Federated Mala ay States 
t has been met with, but iis sporadically, in low-lying jungle in 
the Kuaha Selangor and Kuala Lumpur districts, and is fairly common 
in the neighbourhood of Rantau Panjang and behin ib. 
far as has been observed, it is scarce or does not occur on granite 
and limestone soils, nor at any great elevation. Low laterite hills, 
covered with small jungle, and older jungle growing on land with a 
vy clay sub-soil are the most favoured localities, but as it has been 
ourteen occasions it is unwise to dogmatise on the point. It is 
evident that wherever it exists some natural cause must keep it rigidly 
in check, as otherwise the trees on which it feeds would probably 
become extinct 
VI.— REASONS FOR PRESENT ABUNDANCE. 
Its present abundance is only an instance of what frequently 
happens when the balance of nature is interfered with by i opera- 
tions of man, and one has only to mention as a case in 
plague of voles which occurred some years ago in the South of Scotland 
d whieh was directly traced to high game preserving and the conse- 
quent. den of owls and hawks, the natural enemies of the 
insectivore. 
The heme too, originally an American insect, was never 
seriously dangerous to American vines, whose roots possessed the 
power 1 at But w 
accommodation to the insect : u 
merican vine stocks, and with them the deseen were introduce 
into Europe, the native vines, which had not acquired this resisting 
power, were rapidly attacked and destroyed. 
The == under which Para rubber is reputed to grow in its 
native ben ts are not such as would favour the co-existence of any 
great ber of termites. The tree, therefore, when transpo; 
this бейшин, has to contend with difficulties to which the native 
Malayan trees 
y immune, and the increase of an otherwise unimportant member 
of the local insect fauna is abnormally stimulated. 
VII.—NATIVE TREES ATTACKED. 
Among native trees T. gestroi appears mainly to attack species of 
the genus Macaranga, which, it is significant to note, belongs to the 
same natural order as Hevea brasiliensis. Jelutong (Dyera costulata) 
is also affected, but not to any serious extent, and so are various 
species of Mango, both wild с cultivated. 
Grown under artifical conditions tembusu (Тр fragrans) has 
been damaged, especially in [m neighbourhood of Seremban and near 
Tampin. On one estate, where Gr lon robusta has been planted as 
