The Dalles daily chronicle. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1890-1948, 1894-06-26
A NEW HAMPSHIRE PEST.
The Grasshopper Crop Is One
That Never Fails.
Farmers Get One Dollar Bushel from
the State for Harvesting the Live
1y and Destructive
Insects.

New Hampshire has a new crop.
Grasshoppers. The state pays the
farmers for the product. The price is
one dollar bushel. Mr.. A. I. Bur-
leigh, of Franklin, last year gathered
ninety bushels, for which he received
ninety dollars. OF course the state
does not pay for the cultivation of the
insects. They, are plague, and
bounty of one dollar per bushel is pro-
vided by law for their destruction.
A Boston Herald writerimet Mr.. Bur-
leigh the other day, and was led by
curiosity to inquire how ninety BUSH
els of the lively little fellows could be
captured.
1.-THE farmers have been troubled by
the grasshoppers more or less for the
past twelve years. said Mr.. Burleigh.
''We do not know where they orig.
mated or how they came, but they are
here, and it seems that they have come
to stay. They are worse some years than
others. In 1855 l caught one hundred
and nineteen bushels. My best catch
was thirty-nine bushels in one day.
In an area two miles long and one
mile and a half wide five hundred
bushels were caught and destroyed,
besides those plowed in when too small
to hop out of the furrow. These grass
hoppers hatch about the first of June,
and are so small one would not notice
them were it not for the rustling noise
they make hopping in the grass. At
this period you can destroy them only
by blowing them in
''Pardon me, but this process would
bring you no bounty. What 1 wish to
know is how you catch them.
oil 70 hot ia11
are not plowed in we endeavor to
catch. In order to do this they must
be about half grown and able to jump
or fly. We have constructed a machine
which carries two pans of galvanized
iron eight feet long, sixteen inches
wide, four inches deep, and having
back eighteen inches high. These pans
are divided into three sections and
fastened to wooden shoes, into which
they are set about one and one-half
inches from the ground. This ap-
paratus is attached to pair of wheels
with long aXle-one that runs
through the wheels about eighteen
inches being the best. The pans are
filed with an emulsion-either kero-
sene and water, soft soap and water,
chloride of lime and water, or any of
the soap powders are good. Each sec
tion of the pans holds about three gal
Ions of water, and has to be refilled
for each catch. To catchi the grass
hoppers to advantage one should take
them early in the morning or at sunset,
when they are on the grass feeding.
Two men and two horses are needed
for each machine, as one horse could
not stand it to drag the heavy ap-
paratus through the grass for one must
drive fast to catch the little pesJs.''
''What is the extent of the injury
they are capable of infiicting?''
ITO tell how much damage they do
is like valuing something you do not
have. In three days they will spoil
piece of grass that would cut two tons
per acre, and in one day they have de-
stroyed half acre of onions
''Have you endeavored to get rid of
the intruders by other methods?''
Yes. The grasshoppers hatch ev-
cry season. You can easily find their
eggs in September or October, or in the
spring. We have tried burning, roll
ing and drowning, as well as blowing.
but the grasshopper machine is the
only thing that will conquer them.
There is but week or ten days that
you can catch them, this being when
they can fly far. The bounty of one
dollar per bushel, which we receive
from the state, just about pays for the
time and expense of catching
Il suppose the farmers generally are
waging war on the hoppers?''
ITO greater or less extent all of
them are fighting them. A neighbor
of mine caught sixteen bushels last
season."
What was your loss last year?"
''They destroyed more than half of
my hay crop, spoiled six acres of
oats, ruined half an acre of onions,
and damaged my carrots to the ex-
tent of forty or fifty dollars, besides
clearing out an acre of beans so clean
you would not know that anyth ing had
been planted on the land.''
The New Hampshire law, Offering
bounty for grasshoppers, was passed in
1891. At the Office of the secretary of
state in Concord it was learned that
sin 1914 there appeared on one or two
farms in Franklin and one farm in
Canterbury certain species of grass
hopper, or locust, that was very de-
structive to vegetation. The insects
did not move around much, but ate
everything clean where they located,
and became so thick that they could be
collected in large quantities. They
differ from the common grasshopper
in that they are not SO lively and come
in much<greater numbers. 1t was to
cause their determination that the law
was passed. OF the common kind of
grasshoppers a bushel could hardly be
collected in a season. but these locusts
are SO plentiful that they can be gath
cred by the bushel, and farmers rig up
machinery for the purpose
GEORGE HELM broke the worlds rifle