The Taney County republican. (Forsyth, Mo.) 1895-1992, 1906-11-29
MIssOURI's INSECT ENEMIES.
She Spends More to Feed Them Than to
Educate her children.

Euuchte ner OutkuFeu.
BY Walter Williams.
The department OF agriculture hal
been gathering data and making care
| full estimates, among other things, o.
the average annual loss to agricultural
products In the United States due TO the
ravages Of insects. They place the av'
erage annual loss to all agricultural
products due to insect ravages at seven
hundred million dollars, which includes
loss to field and forage crops, live stock
fruit and truck garden, forest product;
and stored goods. In one year single
insect, the chinch bug, caused loss ot
sixty million dollars, and the Hessiau
fly caused loss OF twenty.four million
dollars in only two states in one year
A careful estimate OF the average an
nual damage caused to the apple crop
by the codling moth shows it TO be TWEEN.
ty million dollars. Millions of dollars
of damage is caused each year by the
San Jose scale, the exact loss being i'm
possible TO estimate because it attacks
so many different kinds Of fruit trees
and bushes and not only ruins or Injuries
the fruit production, but kills the plants
outright. st. Louis county is one Of
the sections suffering most OF late,
Millions Of dollars are lost each year in
Missouri by corn or boll.worm, attack
ing corn and cotton; corn root-worm;
cotton-worm; wire-worm; cut-worm;
plant lice; web.worm: plum curculio,
especially to the apple; scale insects;
canker-worm q; apple.magot;bark- beetle;
warble.hy: and hundreds of other spe.
cies.
1t costs Missouri more each year to
feed its 5000 insect foes than it does to
educate its million children.
The department OF agriculture shows
that the annual tax paid to insect dep.
relations exceeds the entire annual en-
pendituro Of the national government,
including the pension roll and the
maintenance OF the army and navy. U.s.
ing the same methods as are employed
by the statisticiaus OF the department OF
agriculture in making their estimates
of insect ravages, in the state of Missou'
ri the average annual loss to agricultur.
al products caused by insect depreda-
tions is found to amount to twenty seven
and half million dollars. But suppose
it is said that their methods are not
accurate and these figures are therefore
reduced one-half, which economic ento-
mologists who have studied this matter
would say is ridiculous, there is, at the
lowest possible estimate, a loss Of Sl3,
$50, 900 for Missouri alone caused by
insects; nearly fourteen million dollars
annually.
| Missouri spends less than twelve mil.
lion dollars annually for all school pur.
poses, including salaries TO teachers
and equipment for all schools, from the
district schools up through the grade
and high schools, to and including the
state normals and the state university.
1t costs more to feed Missouri insect
foes than it does to educate Missouri
children.
Besides direct annual loss In insec,
ravages, time and money are spent il
lighting them. Some commercial Or
chardists spend five hundred dollars
annually in spraying for single insect
the codling moth. California spen
over million dollars in trying to figh
the San Jose scale; Massachusetts ap
propriated out Of the state treasury ani
spent more than million dollars IL
fighting the Gypsy moth, and congress
recently appropriated quarter OF q
million dollars to fight the boll-weevi
and other cotton insects.
II Is the immense loss by injurious In
sects that has given rise to the CONF par
atively new science of applied or eco
nomic entomology. In the United
States are some two hundred and twent!
| five workers in this new field, who spent
about quarter OF million dollar
each year In trying 10 devise method
to prevent this immense loss. New
York state alone employs fourteen en-
tomologists, who spend thirty-6v'
thousand dollars annually. Missouri
employs only two entomologists, VIII,
spend only S970 annually Of Missouri
money.
| The university OF the state OF Nilsson
ri at Columbia maintains the only de
partment Of chronological instruction