J. G. Meyers. 1935. An entomological investigation in Grenada. Tropical Agriculture (Trinidad) 12 (8): 216-220.

Abstract: This record is prefaced by a short outline of the general ecological conditions. The extensive planting of bananas, which was begun about December 1933, was followed in many places by severe infestation by Cosmopolites sordidus, Germ., which was probably spread by the importation of infested plant material. As the borer has no wild food-plants and no parasites in Grenada, the outbreaks were controlled by systematic trapping. The most important control measure is the selection of clean planting material. Suckers are sometimes treated with 3 % Sulphemulsol before planting,

but experiments in Jamaica have proved that this treatment is not efficient. Dead pseudostems, stumps and infested material should be gathered into a pen and converted into manure. On one estate the material was dumped into a shallow trench, where accumulated rain water drowned most of the borers, and the whole was sterilised with weekly applications of crude oil. The stumps should be cut low, and covered with a layer of soil. Pieces of split pseudostem make effective traps. There was no evidence that balisier (Heliconia bihai) which is botanically allied to the banana, is infested by this weevil.Sugar-cane is at present grown in small patches separated by wasteland and other crops. Diatraea canella, Hmps., and D. saccharalis, F., infested about 42 per cent. of the stalks and 9 per cent. of the joints of representative examples of cane. They also fed on several wild grasses. None of the parasites in Grenada is of much importance. Telonomus (Prophanurus) alecto, Cwfd., which is recorded for the first time there, and Trichogramma minutum, Riley, attack the eggs; and Microaus stigmaterus, Cress., and Ipobracon grenadensis, Ashm., attack the larvae. No trace was found of Microbracon (Bracon) femoratus, Ashm., which has been recorded in Grenada. Of 49 larvae of D. saccharalis, 12 per cent. were parasitized by M. stigmaterus. Tomaspis saccharina, Dist., is widespread in Grenada from sea-level to 2, 000 ft. and is occasionally and locally abundant on sugar-cane. Among pests of cacao, thrips [Selenothrips rubrocinctus, Giard] was apparently less injurious than usual.Keywords: banana weevil borer Cosmopolites sordidus, biological control, insect parasitoids, egg parasitoids