272 
SPICES 
CHAP, 
occasionally to be found attacking pepper plants, and 
I have seen vines in Singapore quite denuded by these 
animals, which are almost omnivorous. The caterpillar 
is easily distinguished by its great size and its pale 
sea-green body, powdered with white and armed with 
thorn-like processes, which, however, are not poisonous. 
It is a most voracious feeder, very soon eating up every 
leaf on its food plant, and stripping it quite bare. It 
pupates in March in a tough, egg-shaped cocoon which 
is attached to a leaf or twig. The moth is of great size, 
often over 9 in. across the wings, and of a variegated 
rufous brown and grey colour, with a small angled 
transparent '‘window” in each wing. The' caterpillars 
are best destroyed by hand picking. 
The flowers and fruits of the pepper plant do not 
escape attack by various pests. On a plant cultivated 
in the Singapore Botanic Gardens I found a number 
of fair-sized bugs, sitting upon the pepper spikes, and 
apparently sucking them. The bug was ^ in. long, 
with slender antennae about as long as the body, black, 
with the base of the last joint emerald green, head 
small, green, thorax four -angled, wedge-shaped, back 
margin broadest, with two short points at the angles, 
greeu, entirely punctate, upper wings greenish olive, 
strongly ribbed scutellum green, punctate, under wings 
dull red, visible when it flies, abdomen pale-green, legs 
long and green. There were a number of pepper fruits 
destroyed, black, dry, and shrivelled on the plants on 
which this bug was settled, but whether this was due 
to the attacks of the insect or a fungus, I could not be 
sure. The bug belonged to the group Coreidae and 
apparently to the genus Pendulina. 
Mr. Hewitt mentions a number of insect pests which 
attack the flowers and setting fruit in Borneo. The 
worst of them are the small plant bugs [Hemiptera). 
When the flower spikes appear there may be seen a 
number of small black insects, each armed with a long 
spine on the back and one on each shoulder. They 
settle on the flower spike and feed on the flowers. 
