Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1910-09-27
BOIL WEEVIL THREATENS US.
Secretary Rice Urges Crop Diversifi'
cation and Bird Preservation.

cation and Bird Preservation.
To the Editor of the News and Cou-
rier: In a recent editorial you called at
tention to he work of the Mexican
Cotton Boil Weevil, congratulating
South Carolina farmers on being able
to reap advantage from the reduced
cotton production in Texas, Louisiana
and Mississippi; Alabama being also
| invaded.
| ALWAYS regretting the necessity of
] differing with you on any subject,
must sharply dissent from your con-
clusions. Following them will only
lead South Carolina into trouble.
To begin with the farmers manifest
duty is to save his birds, cut down the
hunting season all along the line to al
low birds to become sufficiently tame
to feed at will in the fields, ana rig
idly enforce bird protective laws.
This is sufficiently understood by the
majority of the farmers and they have
expressed their opinion all over the
state. The only thing within human
control is the bird supply. The insect
paradise operates according to laws
that are but imperfectly understood,
and although more effective than any
thing else in the world in checking in
sects when he does operate, is still far
outside the bounds of any control or
direction, that may he exercised by
man.
I believe that the coming general as
sembly is friendly to bird protection
and that the crops of the state are go
ing to receive consideration. If that
is the case then all that can be done
will be done to protect the birds-at
least the only check on the spread of
| insects.
In a future article shall explain the
exact relation of birds to the boil Wee
vii; how they have checked him and
retarded his progress and why they
have not done more of it.
But just a little further, If you
please. If the farmers of South Caro-
| lima stampede to cotton, as they will.
if convinced of getting fancy prices
| for it, they will do so at their peril.
| The farmer, like every other man, Is
hard to convince of an unseen danger;
but the danger is there and its results
are becoming more and more manifest
| each year.
DIR. c. L. Goodrich Of the bureau of
plant industry, Washington, D. c., tells
me that numbers of farmers in differ
ent parts of the state have been COM
PEELED to discontinue planting cotton
already because their lands have be-
come thoroughly saturated with fung-
Gus and bacterial diseases. The only
remedy is diversification and rotation
of crops.
Not to pursue this plan from now on
is to invite disaster from the boil Wee
vii. It would be far better to begin
the diversification right now and get
used to the change before being fore
ed to do so on the advent Of the boil
weevil.
Travelling in every part of the state,
and mingling freely with farmers and
with scientific men who are teaching
farmers modern agriculture, am con-
vinced that the two things most need
ed are, first, more live stock on the
farm and second, a better, more uni
form and more intelligent rotation.
The farmers of this state should be
warned in time The boil weevil, like
the budworm, bollwOrm, bullbug, and
other pests, is neither a respecter of
persons nor of states.
1t is easy to forget that the year the
boil weevil first appeared in Texas,
twenty odd carloads of prairie chick
ems were shipped in a single day to
New York city; the nighthawks were
shot by the million, just for the sport
of it: that of all states Texas shot
most and shot everything that flew;
this saw with my own eyes for years.
1t would have been just as easy to
convince a Rockey Mountain goat, as
the ordinary Texan, of the evil Of such
a course.
NOW llldl III liiii'
doubled him up, sent him bowling for
help, he has become in a day the most
advanced believer in bird protection in
the south. He has done well.
With such an example before our
eyes, shall we repeat that folly?
Speaking in all seriousness, our
hunting seasons are all too long-we
invite disaster and court calamity.
With the boil weevil in Alabama and
heading this way, it seems high time
that our great agricultural interests
should assert themselves and demand
protection; for game and fish, while
nice things to have and to enjoy, are
as nothing to the agricultural inter-
ests of the state.
The birds of South Carolina are
about 40 per cent of what they were
we could increase to almost normal
abundance within six or seven years,
which is the time the boil weevil Is eX-
pected to reach South Carolina.
lneN must nOt Oily De dDuludIt,
but the birds must be permitted to get
over their fear of man.
For example, in insisting on driving
deer during summer the fact is lost
sight Of among other important things,
that in this way the woods are ripped
wide open and the bird population in
the vicinity thoroughly demoralzed.
These are the two things to insist
on: The art of diversifying crops by
rotation and rigid care of birds.
That is the moral to point. the lesson
to draw, from the invasion of the boil
weevil. James Henry Rice, Jr.
Summervile, September %.