enforced
in my shade section--the prompt filling up of every spot in the plantation
that called for more shade. For it is in such spots that the Borer first
locates itself, and then it spreads to other dried up trees in the
plantation. There is little use, I think, in removing the affected trees.
You must remove the cause of their being affected, because, if you do not,
the _sound_ trees that are insufficiently shaded will in time be affected:
and then it must be remembered that the Borer is a winged insect which, as
long as you leave suitable ground for it, will be sure to make its
appearance. Out of curiosity I lately cut down and carefully examined a
coffee tree which I could see, from the appearance of the bark, had once
been heavily bored, but which I felt certain had no Borer now, nor any
recent attack of it. The tree I found, after a careful dissection, had not
a sign of Borer present in it, nor any sign of a recent attack, and yet in
years gone by it had been heavily attacked and bored literally from end to
end of the stem. The explanation was that the land had formerly not been
sufficiently shaded, while now the shade is ample. The Borers had then
left the trees, and their descendants had either not thought it worth
while to lay any eggs on them, or the eggs had, from the lowered
temperature caused by the shade, become addled. Many years ago I remember
cutting down a fine coffee tree, when the round gimlet-made looking hole
through which the insect makes its escape was plainly to be seen, when I
found that a single Borer had drilled a hole down a part of the centre of
the tree, then passed into the fly state and left the tree. It was a fine
succulent and nourishing tree, and would, in all probability, have not
again been attacked. To remove, then, all attacked trees, as some planters
do, seems to me to be a great waste. To do so will not prevent other
Borers arriving from some quarter or other to continue the deadly work;
but shade, if it does not prevent their arrival, either prevents the
insect from laying its eggs, from instinctively feeling that the ground is
unsuitable for their being hatched, or causes the eggs to become addled.
But whatever the cause may be, it is certain that succulent trees in well
shaded land will not suffer from Borer, while it is equally certain that
coffee trees in a dried up state, and with either insufficient shade, or
shade of bad caste trees over them, are certain to be attacked b