756 
RHYNCHOTA. 
enormous destruction may result if the conditions remain favourable to 
the spread of fungoid disease. With all these foes, one may imagine that 
even the enormous reproductive powers of this group are called upon 
to maintain their numbers and the curious way in which species become 
abundant in a locality and then disappear would be fully explained 
if we could observe the working of these enemies. Ants are not destruc¬ 
tive to Coccids as is so frequently believed, but visit them to obtain their 
sweet excretion or to strip them of their mealy covering ; in many cases 
ants build shelters for them, care for them, carry them about and treat 
them just as man does his domestic animals. 
Few species are really destructive in India at the present time and 
the family has not the same importance it has elsewhere. It is chiefly 
to permanent crops such _ 
as tea, coffee, cacao, fruit, 
that these pests are injuri¬ 
ous in other countries, and 
in India, the green bug 
(Lecanium viride), the brown 
bug ( Lecanium hemisphceri- 
cum) and the Mealy bug 
(Dactylopius citri) are in¬ 
jurious to coffee, while a 
number of species occur on, 
but are not injurious to, 
tea. Monophlebus has been 
known to do damage to 
mango, jack and similar 
trees but this is a one-brood- 
ed species and is injurious 
only once every few years. 
Aspidiotus aurantii on 
orange, the species attack¬ 
ing sugar-cane (Dactylopius sacchari , Ripersia sacchari, Aclerda yapon- 
ica), one species found on rice ( Ripersia sacchari), and the potato 
Mealy bug (Dactylopius nipce) are the sole recorded cases of any 
importance. (See Mem. Agric. Dept., India, II, No. 7.) 
Fig. 530— Chionaspis the.®. Male and Female 
scales on leaf; Female (above), male (below) 
scale, all magnified. (I. M. N.) 
