CYPHICERUS SP. 187 

In Berar the beetles were noticed pairing on July 26th, the 
insects being very numerous on the teak trees, both young and 
old being infested. 
In the middle of August the weevils were foundin a similar 
condition in the Damoh forests. On the 2oth of the month 
I noted the beetle as equally numerous in the Jubbulpore 
Division between Jubbulpore and Luckneedown. Here, as in 
the portions of Damoh visited, the beetle was far more plentiful 
during this month than either of the teak leaf defoliators, 
flyblza puera or Pyrausta macheralis, which were present 
with it on the trees. 
In Berar (in the Melghat forest) the weevil had an additional 
companion in the larva of the hawk moth Pseudosphinx dis- 
cistriga and was in parts very much more abundant than the 
latter, although it was’ not noted as ascending quite so high 
into the hills as the sphinx, In these forests both the latter and 
the weevil were much more abundant than the Wydlea and 
Pyrausta. Its method of defoliation is as equally distinct from 
that of the hawk moth (described in No. 1, p. 52 of these notes) as 
from that of the Hyb/ea and Pyrausta (described later on inthis 
number). The weevil attacks the leaf in two ways: either by- 
eating out patches from somewhere within the Jeaf, avoiding the 
edges, so that the leaf becomes full of irregular-shaped holes, the 
larger veins being always left untouched, or it eats out irregular 
portions from the edges, the latter having thus a ragged and 
frayed appearance. In both cases the edge left by this beetle 
always has this frayed and ragged appearance owing presumably 
to the very small portions of leaf tissue it is able to take out at a 
time in the case of so thick a leaf as the teak leaf. The patches 
eaten out by this weevil can thus be easily distinguished from 
those of a caterpillar attack since the latter’s bite when it goes 
through the leaf is always a clean cut: a frayed edge is never 
left. So.marked is this jagged appearance of the leaves that it 
caught the eye and told me of the presence of the beetle as I was 
riding along a road in Damoh bordered with teak trees before 
I had been into a forest in that district. 
Neither the eggs nor larve of this pest have yet been found. 
