16 
Indian Forest Records. 
[ VOL. vii 
ACANTHOPHORUS SERRATICORNIS, OLIV . 
Oliv., 1795, Ent. IV., no. 66, p. 14, pi. 9, fig. 33. 
Stebbing (1914, p. 278) says of this species “ In 1897 I discovered 
that the insects lived in the tree \_8korea robust a ], the larvae tunnelling 
into the bast and sap-wood. ” He does not refer, however, to an interest¬ 
ing account of the larval habits published by M. H. Lucas in 1854 in the 
Bulletin Fntomologique , Seances de la Societe entomologique de France , 
pp. XLYII—XLVIII, of which the following translated extracts are 
worth noting. 
This beetle is “fairly abundant in India and its larvae cause to the trees in which 
they live truly incalculable damage. This larva, 14—16 cm. long and 3 cm wide, is 
of a testaceous yellow, with the head, the mouth parts, the antennae and the horny part 
which protects the spiracles, of a dark blackish brown. When this larva has attained 
to the desired size in order to change into a chrysalis, it forms a flattened oval cocoon 
16—17 cm. long, by 8—9 cm. broad. When one examines this cocoon, destined to 
serve as the chamber for the metamorphoses both of the larva and the chrysalis, one 
notices that the materials which have been used in the construction of this habitation 
are long filaments of wood, packed one above the other, strongly interlaced, maintained 
and bound together by a sort of mortar composed of earth and which seems to have 
been previously moistened. Such is, in a few words, the exterior aspect of this habita¬ 
tion, but when one divides it into halves, one sees that the interior is the more elabora¬ 
ted of the two, and that the inside face instead of being rough like the exterior, is 
on the contrary, smooth.The inner walls are smooth, polished, present no roughness 
and are so disposed that, not only is the larva not incommoded in its transformation, but 
also, the chrysalis meets with no obstacles when it arrives at the moment to change 
into the perfect insect. 
“ It is stated that these larvae and cocoons are not rare at P ondiche'ry where they 
destroy mulberry trees [muriers] *; they make their way into the roots, which 
they bore in all directions, so that the latter are entirely destroyed and the tree finally 
perishes. The perfect insect, after having emerged from its shell by means of an 
opening which it makes in the lower part, pairs in the soil, and the female lays her 
eggs in the same cocoon. The larva lives 6 or 7 months before pupating. When 
breaking up one of these shells to examine the structure, I found a female of which the 
abdomen was filled with eggs : these latter are 8 to 9 mm. long and about 4 mm. broad ; 
they exhibit the form of an elongated oval, and are lightly acuminate at both 
extremities.” 
In view of the above it is desirable to record the following descrip¬ 
tions of prionine larvae found boring into the roots of S/iorea robusta and 
Dalbergia sissoo, and constructing earthen cells for pupation as, in all 
probability they are the larvae of Acantkophorus or allied genera. 
* A popular publication, “ The Marvels of Insect Life ”, 1913, states, p. 196, that the 
(t grub is of enormous size and bores into the trunk of the mango tree.” Fletcher “ Some 
South Indian Insects, ** 1914, p. 320, states that the “ larva is said to bore into mango. ” 
[ H2 ] 
