AGRICULTURAL BULLETIN 
OF THE 
STRAITS 
AND 
FEDERATED MALAY STATES. 
No. 12.] DECEMBER, 1905. [Vol. IV. 
RUBBER PESTS. 
Dr. LlM Boon Keng writes that he finds two enemies very 
destructive of seedlings a few days old. The first of these is a kind 
of slug^ which gnaws off the skin of the seedling which generally 
breaks off at the point. 
This is doutless the brown slug which has been lately giving a 
good deal of trouble at the Botanic Gardens. The animal is about 
r| inch long, light brown and very slimy. It only appears towards 
dusk, concealing itself in the herbage near during the day. It 
attacks the young plants as described by Dr. LlM BOON KENG, 
and also gnaws the green parenchyma and the epidermis of the 
leaves away leaving only the skeleton of the leaf. It attacks too 
the young plants up to six or more feet tall nibbling the bark and 
biting away the buds as they appear checkipg seriously the growth 
of the young tree, and causing it to put forth many small buds at 
the top, which being destroyed as they grow- by the slugs, give the 
tree a stunted and diseased appearance. The only remedy seems 
to be to collect these animals in the evening by hand and destroy 
them. Keeping down the weeds near the nursery wall doubtless 
have a good effect, so as to leave no hiding place for them, but a 
number of seedlings in boxes on a stand raised above the ground 
in a place bare of herbage were on one occasion badly attacked 
and many destroyed. They do not seem to attack trees of full 
size unless the leaves of the lower branches touch the ground, and 
do not seem to climb up the trees except in the cases of the young 
stumps referred to. 
The second enemy Dr. Lim BOON Keng refers to is a large 
cricket probably a Gryllac'ris , and thought by Dr. HANITSCH of the 
Museum to be G. tessellata. “This insect saws the seedling right 
through leaving a stump 1 to 3 inches tall and carrying off the 
tender shoot or pulling up the seeds which it carries to its deep bur- 
rows. A couple worked in a nursery bed unnoticed and in a couple 
of nights did a lot of damage. I opened up all burrows and captured 
the insects in their lair.” 
