Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-11
WOMAN'S VANITY
TAX ON COUNTRY
LOVE OF GAUDY HEADGEAR
COSTS DEARLY
CAUSES LOSS OF EIGHT HUNDRED
MILLIONS ANNUALLY
Wholesale Slaughter Of Birds with
Which to Trim Hats Responsible
for Enormous Amount OF
Damage to Crops

That the women of the United States
are taxing this country $S00,000,0O0
year for hats, says the Pittsburg Ga
zette-T Times; that this tax is not levied
on the husbands as they sign checks
for milliners' bills, but that it is PAID
by the people in general and the farm
er in particular; that, in short, 1t is
due to fashions use, for decorative
purposes. of birds which protect the
crops-that is the amazing statement
made by Reginald Wright Kaufman
and he declares that the result of the
use of feathered creatures for hat TRIM
mings is a rise in the price of food.
Mr.. Kaufman bases the startling as
sertions on figures gathered by govern
ment experts. AS he says, when great
bank is robbed of few hundred tnou-
sand dollars, the news is placed before
you in startling headlines in every
newspaper in the land; when gigantic
trust raises it's rates to point Where-
by it will squeeze a million or two per
annum from the purses or the con-
sumers, your suddenly united husbands
raise a popular outcry that rings all
the way from San Francisco to Bos-
ton. Yet, though it is an admitted
fact that if our birds were properly
protected against indiscriminate slaugh-
ter. the loss to our crops through IN
sect pests would be reduced to an al
most imperceptible figure, there IS
scarcely a word uttered IN protest
against the permission of that slaugh-
ter and the consequent annual loss OF
almost $500. 900 900, an amount nearly
equal to the total capitalization OF al
the national banks in the Unlteo
, States.
Amazing as such a statement at first
appears, it is readily demonstra bic;
The insects kill the crops, the BIRDS XIII
the insects and we--for the most part
in order to trim women's hats-kllI me
birds. The entire economic phase or the
question is thus divisible into three por-
tions. the second depending on the first.
fhe third depending on the second, and
the trio leading to an inevitable con-
clusion. In other words, we have put
to consider the crop depreciation natur
ally wrought by birds, and the plrd
depreciation most unnaturally wrought
by man.
Figures are dull things, but we shall
soon be done with them. Those which
are given are, in any event, not ram
dom. They have behind them the
authority of the national department OF
agriculture, and as the birds grow less
the figures grow larger. Just why this
is so we shall presently see; here and
now the point to be enforced is that OF
insect ravage, and a study of the gov
ernment reports will show that crop
losses from insects are rarely less than
10 per cent of the crop affected, and
sometimes as high as 30.
C. L. Mariatt, assistant entomologlst
of the department of agriculture at
washington, has seen clearly what this
portends. "In no country in the
world" he has said, "do insects i'm
pose a heavier tax on farm products
than in the United States. These
losses resulting from the depredations
of insects on all plant products OF the
soil, both in their growing and In their
stored state, together with those on
live stock, exceed the entire expendt-
lures of the national government IN
cluding the pension roll and the main
tenance of the army and navy
Cost Nearly Eight Hundred Millions
Between the first of last January
and the 31st of next December the
farmers of the United States will have
lost 1885, 100, 900. Mr. Kaufman, in
Hampton's Magazine, says there is
loss of 5000 0O0000 in cereals; S53, QUO
in hay; 100000, 900 in cotton; $5,300,000
in tobacco, and $53,000,000 in truck
crops. Sugar loses $5,000,000 and the
rest of the vast loss is about evenly
divided among the other products of
the farm.
You lIllnk lIldI d llC1fy lOiA' LilSiit
says Mr.. Kaufman, you do not know
the amount of destruction which sin
gle insect can effect in the pursuit of
its living. The Hessian fly, for exam
pie, has far outclassed the busy bee
as a model of industry, for in the in
stance of this insect alone the damage
done to grain in America, since we be-
gan to keep account Of it, has amount
ed to considerably over $20,000O00.
Far better, however, is the record of
the cotton leaf worm, which, though it
is less troublesome than of old-and
for that you may thank the birds-still
exacts a yearly tribute of from $5,000,
900 to $10,000,000 This and other in
sects make the cotton losses aggregate
$50 1000, 900, and make you madam, pay
more than you used to for your batistes
and lawns. On the other hand insect
eggs, which the birds on your hat
would ordinarily destroy. are when de-
posted in grains Matched among the
stored products and cost us $1o0,0OOO0O
a year.