PRICKLY PEAR PEST

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 113, 3 August 1927, Page 13

PRICKLY PEAR PEST

AN ENEMY MOTH SUCCESSFUL INTRODUCTION By Cable.—Press Association. —Copyright BRISBANE, Tuesday. The Government’s efforts to copo with the prickly pear pest by utilising the services of the cochineal insect and eatablastus caterpillar are being attended with hopeful results. In February, 1926, 20,000 eggs of the eatablastus moth were Imported and placed on leaves of the pear trees at Emerald. These hatched well, and now millions of caterpillars have spread themselves over an area exceeding a radius of two miles from the place of their release, and within that area there are evident signs of their destruction. The caterpillar does its work thoroughly, and never leaves its clump of pear till it reduces it to a mass of fibre, which can easily be destroyed by fire. The insect also leaves behind it a substance which has a poisonous effect on the pear, preventing its regrowth. This, it is hoped, may be utilised as the basis for a serum, from which a cheap spray for destroying the pest on a large scale may be obtained. The caterpillar is proving more effective than the cochineal insect. The former does as much destruction in a day as the latter does in a month.— A. and N.Z.