Cocoa-nut Beetle in Zanzibar.—

Dr. Kirk has sent us specimens of a beetle whose larva is very destructive to cocoa-nut trees from two to five years old. Until the time of the hurricane the plantations suffered little, but after the scope given for their development by the thousands of rotting and fallen palm trunks, they became a serious danger, and plantations often lost 25 per cent, of their young trees. These may be saved by cutting out the larva when the chewed leaf seen on the outside of the shoot shows that the plant has been attacked. If the central shoot is destroyed by the larva, the plant either dies or puts out a lateral shoot; this only happens when the plant is very young.

The beetle sent by Dr. Kirk was identified by Mr. M'Lachlan as Oryctes monoceros. O. insularis destroy cocoa-nuts in Reunion, and another species is very injurious in Penang. He suggests that all fallen trees should be burned, and that infected trees should be cut down and destroyed as soon as possible.