636 
tHE TKOPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [MAfiCH I, 1904 
LEGISLATION FOE THE PKOTECTION OF 
COCONUT PLANTS. 
The attitude of the Kurunegala Planters' 
Association on the question of legislation 
for the protection of coconut plants fiom the 
depredation of Beetles, calls for some remarks 
at our hands, which we regret we have 
iiot offered earlier ; and in this connection 
the practical hints given by an experienced 
planter for combating beetles, should be 
carefully digested. We desire to associate 
ourselves with those interested in the coco- 
nut palm in the North Western Province, in 
their efforts to find a remedy tor a grave 
evil, and to offer them such help as it is 
in our power to give in combating a pest 
whose power for evil is boundless. The 
cause for which tlie Kurunegala Planters 
are fighting is not their own only, but also 
of the whole coconut industry throughout 
the Island. This may seem an exag- 
geration, seeing how long the palm has 
flourished in the Island, and how recent is 
the agitation which the Batticaloa Planters 
started, following the example of those in the 
Malay States. The conditions have, how- 
ever, vastly changed since the first establish- 
ment of coconuts in the Island. The trees 
were then planted in dwelling gardens, ant' 
were under the personal care of their 
owners ; but the attention which can be 
devoted to a limited number of trees, under 
one's own eye. so to speak, is impossible 
where vast tracts are concerned. Next the 
opening ot estates was gradual, isolated lots 
being planted up, with gardens and jungles 
intervening between them. Now, with the 
extension of plantations, the tracts under 
coconuts are more extensive and continuous, 
rendering easier the progress of pests from 
estate to estate. There is the further draw- 
back, that the cultivation of one product 
over a great area exposes it to special risks 
as the Island found to its cost with Coffee, 
and as it is beginning to experience in 
various directions with Tea and Cacao. 
A pest, whether insect or fungoid, can 
spread with amazing rapidity, and stalk 
unseen from one plantation to another ; 
and as the special danger of these pests 
is their rapid reproduction and quick motion, 
the best cared-for properties are exposed to 
danger from one neglected estate or garden 
in the neighbourhood. The principles of 
isolation and protection, which are enforced 
where human and animal life are concerued, 
should be equally applicable to agriculuire 
and to vegetable life. Hence, legislation 
is a necessary means for purchasing security, 
and to the principle of legislation no serious 
obeotion can be taken. 
This the Kurunegala meeting rightly recog- 
nised, under the wise guidance of its 
late Chairman, a veteran and observant 
Planter, and the energetic efforts of bis 
youthful sUdcessor. What the exact course 
Was that legislation shoiild take, its advocates 
widely declined to define. It was not for a 
district ttieeting like that which coUld hot 
bind other districts to enter into details, 
even if its members were fully qualified, to 
present a cutand-dried measure. It must 
jiebt with tlie Cioveinmeut to consult those 
best able to advise it, and frame a Bill 
which would effect the object in view— the 
jirotection of young plantations against a 
most destructive enemy— without unduly 
interfering with individual liberty and discre- 
tion. In other words, all that the meeting 
could rightly say, it did say— and, we are 
bound to remark, with considerable authority 
— i.e., that a law was necessary to compel 
land owners to destroy all red beetles found 
on their Und, and to exercise reasonable dili- 
gence in finding them - if not for their own 
sakes, for the protection of their neighbours. 
How this compulsion is to be exercised, how 
neglect is to be ascertained and punished — 
are matters of detail. There are precedents 
to guide the legislator and the administrator, 
in connection with infectious and contagious 
diseases where precautions necessarily inter-, 
fere with individual freedom to do as one 
likes with oneself or with one's own, for 
the good of the community. All that is 
known of the red-beetle — it is really a weevil 
— is against it. What good it does in the 
economy of nature remains to be disclosed. 
Armed with a stout wiry snout, it takes 
advantage of any wound or cut in the stem 
of a young coconut tree — often of the hole 
which the less destructive beetles proper may 
have made— and pierces its way inward, 
depositing eggs at the bases of the leaf- 
stalks. The footless grub completes the 
deadly work by bm^rowing into the soft cab- 
bage and working its way into the fleshy 
bases of the leaf stalks. Unless its presence 
is detected in time, and the insects and larvae 
are removed, the soft centre of the tree is 
hollowed out. and the tree collapses. Nothing 
can then be done for the tree. So the aver- 
age native does nothing, with the result 
that the fallen tree sends out scores of 
winged weevils to pursue their destructive 
work on other trees. It is heie compulsion 
must come in for something to be done to the 
tree. It must be cu^ up ami burnt with all its 
colony of beetle grubs. So experienced a plan- 
ter as Mr. W. H. Wright believes in cutting 
down all attacked trees at once and burn- 
ing them lest the weevils escape during the 
attempt to save the trees. Mr. Price, how- 
ever, has been successful in saving a larger 
percentage of trees than we thought possible. 
But it would be next to useless to carry on 
the work if his field j are to have accessions 
of the enemy from his neighbours. The fact 
that Mr. Wright not only preferred destruc- 
tion to attempts at saving the attacked tree, 
and that he paid hia tSinhalese neighbours, 
who had fallen trees, to allow hie men to 
cut up and des roy thoin, futher than that 
they &hould be nurseries for fresh broods of 
the enemy, pro7>'s how seriously one of the 
oldest and most experienced of our Plan* 
ters regarded the attacks of weevils. It be« 
hOVes the Island *:o take action before 
di'astic measures, such as have been adopted 
further East, be found necessary hefei 
Young plantations are on the increasei and 
every tree is exposed to attack until it iS 
eight to ten years old. While risk to yoUrtpf 
plants is gv6H,t, the fact that they are 
practically impervious to attack after a cer« 
tain age facilitates operations, and affords eo- 
couragemeilt to organised eflorts. 
