The Minneapolis journal., 1903-04-25
nine TILE BUGS
When They Get Busy They Cost Us
Close to $3.50, 600, 900
a Year.
Something About the Chinch Bug,
Potato Bug and Some Other
Beasts
Drovers', Journal.

Dispatches from Washington call attention to
nine insects which will cost the United States
$3.50 600 900 this year. According to this esti-
mate the chinch bug, if 1t goes to work at all,
will draw $100O0O,000 of this amount; the
grasshopper will take SOC, 900, 900 in busy sea-
son, and the Hessian fly will call for at least
500, 900, 900 more. Three worms that attack the
cotton plant will assess the farmers for total
of 100000, 900, and the potato bug Will eat
SIS, 100000 worth of its favorite kind OF garden
produce. Ten millions of dollars Is Il moderate
estimate Of the injury that will be done by the
| apple worm and the caterpillar that makes
| cabbages its speciality will destroy $5,OO0,OOO
worth OF crisp green heads ,.E..@
The west has been nearly free of the grain
pests in the last few years, and there are hopes
that the scientists and farmers together have
learned how to light them. Neither the chinch
bug nor the Hessian fly has done great damage
for years. s.-. -. f -4s...5 + F. ...s. b.
The chinch bug is disgusting little .'beast,''
only third of an inch long. Originally it fed
| upon wild grasses, but when civilized man ar
rived and planted wheat the cereal suited its
taste exactly, and it soon became what 1T is to-
day-the worst foe Of the most priced Of bread
| producing crops. 1t gets into the funnel-shaped
part of the leaf, where it joins the stalk and
| sucks the sap until the plant dies. The bugs,
| multiplying at rate almost inconceivable, at
tack wheat field in armies which literally
carpet the ground, and when the wheat has been
harvested they fly to the autumnal corn. q
Everybody knows the grasshopper, which In
! the east is familiar but harmless insect. In
| parts Of the west however, it is a serious men
h
easily do more than $10O, 900 worth of dam,
age It is the true locust celebrated in biblical
| and other history. and in the Unitedb States
| ranks the worst enemy of man, barring only
| the chinch bug. 1t is a foe most dreaded by
| farmers over extensive 1-
In the year l776 the Hessian troops, engaged
! by the British as auxiliaries, landed on Long
| Island. They brought lot of straw with them
for their horses, and in it, almost undoubtedly,
We're eggs of the insect which has since become
| known in this country as the Hessian fly. Three
years later the pest began to make itself trouble
some in the neighborhOOd of the landing place,
and since then it has gradually spread west
ward. Barring the chinch bug, it is the worst
| enemy of the wheat. making its first appearance
and sucking its juices. Eventually the plant is
weakened and destroyed and the maggot is
transformed into fragile dark-colered gnat
| closely resembling small mosquito-the destined
parent of maggots yet to be.
The army Worm which is of the most
| dreaded of the insect foes of the farmer, is a
| naked striped caterpillar an inch and a quarter
! long. In May and June 1t makes its appearance
| in immense numbers, deYouring wheat, oats
| and other grains and grasses. 1t climbs up the
| seed stalks and cuts off the heads.
The potato bug seems to have been originally
| native to Colorado and New Mexico. Various
wild plants furnish it with food. but nothing
| seems to have been exactly suited to it's re
quirements as the potato =, -, .
! The San Jose scale gets its name from the fact
that 1t first appeared In the San Jose valley
| California, having been imported, probably from
Austria Hawaii. 1t is the worst of all enc
| mics of fruit trees. Almost microscopic in size
| it will spread through orchard in half dozer
years, and, in place Of green leaves and bios
| SONS. leave nothing but dead trunks and branch
| es a fruit raising district attacked by it is
destroyed as effectually as If overrun by fire
| The insects. millions of them together, suck the
sap of the tree, each one Of them covered Will
a waxy scale, which forms sort of grayist
| scurf on the bark.
I The cabbage worm, which does more or les:
l tr11ot afa1, ic
| pillar an inch and half long. 1t is the off
spring of common white butterfly. The apple
worm (whose parent is likewise a moth), liz
a reddish worm half an inch in length and is un
| pleasantly familiar to everybody. There are
many other destructive insects in this country
| of course. but those here mentioned are thu
ones that do the bulk of the damage and which
are most dreaded by the growers of crops. Vi
to date the government with all its power, ha
been almost defenseless against these tiny bu
unrelenting foes.