The Leavenworth weekly times. [volume] (Leavenworth, Kan.) 1870-1880, 1875-05-27
To ARMS! TO ARMS!
Will We Have Anything Left
When They Leave!
Or Course We Can't Say; but If
SO, Why Not!

They are the topic of conversation every
where they are found on the streets, in the
alleys, in the houses and yards, and on the
vegetables in the gardens. Millions are
slaughtered daily, ard millions Immediately
spring forward TO take the places of the
dead. Nothing seems to stop their onward
march, and green lawns and thrifty fields
are soon laid bare and desoiate. Nothing
seems to kill them, and all the so-called
remedies prove useless as soon as tried. In
the town some Of the citizens have kept
them away by using coal tar, coal oil, and
digging bitches, but in the majority Of
cases as soon as they appear devastation
and destruction follow. In the country the
ruin can hardly be estimated.
1t seems that their Matching grounds are
confined to small tracts, and the hope of
the farmer lies in killing the young pests
before they get large enough to fly. The
ways Of working this destruction are vari-
GUS, and some Of them quite unique. A
favorite plan is to crush them under large
roller drawn by horses but this is only
effectual where the earth is thoroughly
hardened. Another plan is to dig ditch,
drive them into it, and bury them. In
fields adjacent to the prairie, they are fire.
quently driven out into the dead grass and
consuming fire kindled at their heels. A
X ansas genius has invented a canvas trap
something like fsh-net, which he haul.
over field, and gathers them in like
minnoYs. OF all the method,
vet devised, however, We give
our preference TO what is known a.
the "fencing" process, which consists in
inclosing a tract occupied by young hop
peH with boards placed edgewise and
thus securely imprisoning the iledgline
ravagers and holding them there until they
starve to death. This is not so rapid a.
the crushing and burning plan, nor so ex
hilarating as the trapping device, but il
offers solid ard satisfying intellectual en-
10 -ment which must commend it to the
special fa,O. o; all thoughtful persons. A
farmer, OF clever perceptions, could hardly
fail to find many hours OF "stern Joy" il
watching the gradual decline and fall o.
his hungry captives through a process Of
starvation; and the poetic justice OF thu.
sacrificing the frisky pests to theil
own inordinate appetite could not for a
moment be disputed.
We are glad to learn, from correspond
ence, and fIom our exchanges, that the va
rious schemes of killing which We have
mentioned are likely to prevent any seri
GUS damage to crops in Missouri and Kan
sas, and to do considerable towards giving
the grasshopper over to what the anti-slav
cry platforms used TO call a process of ul
innate extinction" In some localities thu
gardens have been destroyed and the grain
fields partly devastated here and there
but there has not been, and is not likely
to be any really calamitous ravage. Tn,
situation is altogether different from thai
presented by the visi alton Of last autumn
in Kansas and Nebraska Then the farm
ers were practically helpless to arrest or di
vert the scourge now they have the mat
ter very much in their own hands. tn,
insects can do but little harm until thei
wings develop; and while that growth i
going en-, a man of ordiI airy intelligenc,
and industry can get away with ninety pc
cent. of them, and so discourage the remain
der that they will skip the country at tn
earliest opportunity.