Sept, i, 1897.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
177 
NEW AREAS OF CULTIVATION IN 
SABARAGAMUWA. 
The rapid, perhaps too rapid, extension of tea 
plantations is remarkable. The area of the new 
clearings for all produce is stated by the headmen 
at ,S,80b acres, mostly for tea. The largest extent 
is 1,800 acres ill Kadawata and Meda korales, i.e., 
in the Balangoda planting district. In Atakalan 
korale the extension for tea is reported at 600 acres, 
chiefly at Madampe. In Nawadun koiale about 
600 acres have been cleared and in Kuruwiti korale 
about 300 acres. 
The advance in the cultivation of paddy is re- 
presented by 144 acres, of which 131 was land under 
the Uggalkaltota irrigation channel. — Mr. Moijsey's 
Administration Report Jor 1896. 
LEGISLATION AGAINST WEEDS. 
In Madras the State takes a benign concern 
in the destruction of weeds, namelj’, in the matter 
of cutting away the jungle-growth in the close 
precincts of villages, in which snakes are likely 
to find cover. The villagers are generally some- 
what inert to the procedure, and the weeds, as 
far as the people are concerned may grow at 
will. None the less, the Government continues 
forcibly to urge the destruction of the weeds, 
and, even though for some reason or another, 
the deaths from snakes are greatly increasing 
in number, in spite of the efforts to the 
contrary, the destruction of weeds should 
tell if the thing were really done properly. 
In some of the United States tlie law is 
in se>ious force against weeds, not on account 
of snakes, but in the matter of agriculture. 
A bulletin of the Washington Department of 
Agriculture mentions that laws against weeds are 
found upon the Statute-books of as many as 
25 States of the Union. In some cases, as in 
California, Delaware, and Kentucky, the law is 
directed against only a single species, usually 
the notorious Canada thistle. Other States, such 
as Minnesota and Ohio, proscribe as many as 14 
pecies of weeds. The Canada thistle is on the 
black list in 21 out of the 25 States, whilst six 
States legislate against the Russia thistle. This 
“ Canada thistle,” by the way, is interesting — 
Canadian in nothing more than in name. It 
belongs to Great Britain, where it is known 
as the creeping thistle, growing to a height 
of some three or four feet, with dingy 
purple flowers. In some form or another, how- 
ever, either in bales of merchandise, or other- 
wise, its seeds have followed civilisation round 
the world, all over Europe, into Asia, America and 
Australia. Weeds are peculiar things, and, like tlie 
rabit in Australia, most weeds are more prolific 
abroad than in their own home, and the creeping 
thistle is a much greater nuisance in Canada 
and in Asia than in its original home. The 
Washington Department has calculated that one 
per cent, increase in the crops of the United 
States, such as might be obtained by the des- 
truction of weeds at little cost, would represent the 
large total of $17,000,000, and it urges that there 
sliould be a common federal law against weeds in 
f eneral, though each State should necessarily 
e left to decide which are the particular 
weeds that need extermination within their own 
borders. 
In India our agriculture is not yet crowded 
out, and the agriculturist soon gets rid of weeds 
when they interfere with his returns of rupees, 
annas, and pice. The mortality in human lives, 
however, is so great year by year from snake- 
bite — and shows such a tendency to increase 
seriously — tliat it might be well perhaps if villa- 
gers were not merely ‘ persuaded ’ but could be 
‘ compelled ’ to cut away the snake- harbouring 
jungle within a certain area round their houses 
or their villages. — M. l imes, July 13. 
SOME INDIAN POOCHIES. 
The last volume of Indian Museum Notes relates, 
among other miscellaneous reprints and notes, to an 
exhibit collection of economic insects in the Indian 
Museum, to some new species of Indian beetles, 
aphids and other insects, to insect pests and Indian 
“forest flies,” and to the common crow of the United 
States as an enemy to insects and so as an aid to 
man. The notes are accompanied by three full page 
photo etchings of several of the poochies described, 
beautifully executed by the Survey of India Office 
in Calcutta. The exhibit collection has been pre- 
pared with a view to illustrate the life histories of 
some of the more important “economic ” insects, both 
injurious and useful, in the various stages of their 
development, the pests being arranged in accordance 
with the plants which they attack. Thus we find 
17 different insects which are harmful to tea bushes 
and three to coffee, either as defoliators or borers. No 
illustrations of these pests are given, which is 
to be regretted, as they would no doubt have 
greatly assisted planters in detecting these 
their enemies at a glance. Mr. C. Kerremans 
describes a new species of (Buprestid) beetle dis- 
covered in the Dehra Ismail Ehan District, which 
is very destructive to melons and cotton crops 
He has dedicated this “very beautiful species” tothe 
memory of the late Mr. Atkinson, and it will 
accordingly be known in the future as .Tulodis 
Atkinsoni. The beetle is minutely described, but it 
is not everybody who will be able to make much 
of the following Jnlodis Atkinsoni, nov, sp. — 
Oblonga, convexa, apice subattenuata, supra viridi 
obscura, nitida, elytrorum fossulis thoracisque 
puuciis aeneo-viridibus ; subtus viridiaenea, segmeuto 
abdominis 2°, 3°, 4°, que nigro coerulei cinctis, 
ultimo irregulariter nigro-vermicutato ; pedibus 
aeneis, antennis nigris ; — capite granuloso, fronts 
antice subrugosa, vertice longitudinaliter rugata ; — 
pronote convexo, transverse, grosse punctulato, 
punctorum, intervallis elevatis et irregulariter vermi- 
culatis . . .” and so on for several lines. True, 
a translation is given, but even that is more or less 
unintelligible to the uninitiated. Mr. Buckton 
descants on two new species of gall-aphids in 
the North-West Himalayan region, one a 
homopterous insect which forms smooth 
rounded galls on the twigs of poplars growing 
at an elevation of 9,000, in the Valley of the Yasin 
river, and one which forms large galls with a rough 
surface on aspens at Bunji, on the road to Gilgit. 
Mr. L. de Niceville has a note on the “Potu” or 
“ Pipsa ” fly which attacks men and beasts alike and 
whose bite generally causes intense irritation and 
sometimes death. It attacks the ears and eye 
orbits, and it is reported that when the Chakrata- 
Saharunpur road was being constructed, numbers 
fo the work people died from the effects of being 
bitten by these flies. Tea planters will appreciate 
Mr. B. Barlow’s careful descriptions of certain tea 
pests, accompanied as they are by a plate showing 
five different species. As regards miscellaneous tea 
pests, Mr. Barlow says that four species of moth- 
caterpillars, one species of beetle and two species of 
soa'e-insects have been reported during the past year 
as doing extensive damage to growing tea-plants in 
India, none of which are mentioned in Mr. Cotes’s 
“ Insects and Mites Destructive to Tea.” Mr. Barlow 
adds : — “ As regards remedial measures, in the case of 
the caterpillars, drawings of the parent moths and of 
the cocoons were forwarded to the parties interested, 
in order that the pest might be searched for, re- 
cognised and destroyed. In the ships of the Indian 
Marine, it is, we believe, found possible to keep down 
even such nocturnal animals as cockroaches, oy set- 
