The Portland daily press., 1895-11-09
DEALING DEATH TO BUGS.
Inc Warfare Which Men of Science are
Waging Against Noxious Insects.
Especial correspondence.l

ouoW OF the University of Kansas, located
a' thls place. Panoplied in sclentinc
knowledge he went forth against the
chlnch bug, and the chinoh bug is MS
And now while he holds in check with one
hand vast armies Of that foe of the farmer,
WIN the other he brings scientific tactlcs
to bear upon hop lice, bedbusA and other
insect enemies to the peace Oh 1.nan'
1t all seems very simple, as important
things always do after they have once been
done. And Chancellor Shows work has
already proved its vast Importance TO the
farmer and through him to all the rest OF
the world. For to the western farmer the
chinch bug is scourge whose unhindered
visitation means poverty, mortgages and
despair, and the stopping of it's rayages
an increase of hundreds of thousands OF
dollars in bis income prosperity and hap
piness
But it is all exceedingly simple. Watch
ing some chinch bugs in field one day
some seven or eight years ago, Professor
Snow, who then held the chair OF entomol-
ogy in the state university, decided that
some Of them looked i'll. So he took some
OF the sick ones to his laboratory, and after
long and patient watching, experimenting
and testing of results he found that a
fungus, Sporotrichum globuliferum by
name, fastened itself upon them penetrat-
ed the substance of their bodies, covered
them with its spores and finally caused
them to burst into powder. And this
powder flying through the air, carried the
infection to other bugs in the ne1ghbor-
hood.
Now there is 'schinch bug bureau, F"
supported by it's own special Legislative
appropriation, connected with the ento-
mological department of the university, IN
which Chancellor Shows corps of half a
dozen assistants are kept busy attending
to their chnch bug pesthouse, sending
out boxes OF Infected bugs and travelling
about among the farmers of the state, Civ
ing directions, making observations ana
experiments. During the summer OF 1888
25 900 farmers were furnished with boXo.
of info jted bugs, and last summer the
boxes each containing a dozen or more
sick bugs, were sent out at the rate Oh
Q, 500 per week. s3
Professor Snow experimental long and
lovingly with his Sporotriohum globulifer-
um and found that by taking much care
it could be artifcially propagated upon
potatoes, turnips and such things. Then
he turned his attention to the hop louse,
which Is as much of a pest to the hop
grower as the chinch bug is to the farmer.
AS the hop is not grown in Kansas, he hac
difficulty in procuring enough of the IN
sects to make his laboratory experiments
of value. But he found that the body OF
the louise offered congenial resting place
to the spores of the fungus and that the re-
suits were the same as they were in the
case of the chinch bugs. The fungous
growth penetrated the entire bodily sub
stance of the little insect, which soon
died, and its body exploded into powder.
But it was practical results and not mere
laboratory success that he desired, and SO
he made some hop lice sick unto death
with sporo, as the fungus is dtsrespectfully
called in the chinch bug bureau, put them
In box and sent them to certain hop
growers in Washington and Oregon.
There they received glad welcome, for
the hop louise had been making deep in
roads into crops and profits. The growers
gave the infection careful trial and have
written to Chancellor Snow that 1T has
been entirely successful. They are en-
thusiastic over its results and were able by
its means to keep their hopfelds clear OF
this costly pest.
Chancellor Snow has found that in car
rying on war against insects by this method
his tactics do not work well unless the en-
emy is present in large numbers. The
| bug population must be dense one OF
| the plague will not spread with sufficient
| rapidity to make it's use of value. Accord
| ingly when he came to experiment. With
| bedbugs the results were rather discour
| aging. The bugs which be put in the in
| fection box sickened and died and flew
| into powder, according to programme, but
| when tried for practical results the bugs
| could beat the plague. Then farmer
came along who thought he knew OF Z
| house in which the conditions were all
| that could be desired. He took with him
| liberal quantity of the plague and at last
| accounts was dancing a wardance oyel
| heaps Of tho fallen foe. He wrote tt
! Chancellor Snow that the experiment hac
| proved successful and that he had cleareo
| the house of the bugs, from which 1T ap
| pears that sporotrichum can be depended
| upon to kill bedbugs only when there are
enough of them.
| Chancellor Shows success in dealing
| with chinch bugs started scientific wal
| against them in the surrounding states
| and plague factories have been set going
| in Nebraska Missouri, Iowa, Illinois
Minnesota, Texas, Wisconsin and the In
dian Territory.
| Men of science in Europe have also beer
moved to try the same tactics in warfar
against insect pests. M. Giard of the Sor
bonne Paris, has been paying particula
| attention to the May beetle, which il
Europe is SO great pest that the annua
damage which it inflicts is estimated a
many hundred million francs. Professo
| Giard has made havoc among both tn
beetles and their grubs by means OF fun
gus closely related 60 the chinch bug dis
ease. But he has found difficulty in exper
imenting with and disseminating the in
fection on sufficiently large scale and il
published pamphlet laments that Franc
does not follow the example of Kansas ant
give him the necessary aid.
NJ. Jean Danysz Of the Pasteur institut
turned his malevolent attentions towart
mice instead of insects and thinks he ha
found much better way of dealing will
them than setting dead fall over waite
pail or batting trap with cheese ID
has discovered a bacillus that has deadl,
ofFao+ ,,,,o,, I'll sy,oo;oc of roOlaS domestic