The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1911-07-26
SUBDU|NG Mr.. B. WEEVIL
IN SOME LOCALITIES AS MUCH
COTTON is PRODUCED AS BE-
FORE HIS APPEARANCE.
PRESENT STATUS OF THE PEST

Was Exterminated in Sections of
Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas
Last Year. Travels by Flight in
NIid-August, and Will Be 10 Years
Before Eastern Limit of Cotton
Belt Is Reached.
A bulletin just issued by the Bu-
reau of the Census on cotton produc-
ton gives some very interesting in
formation concerning the boil wee
vii. From it The News makes the
following extract:
Cotton growers are becoming more
and more successful in subduing the
disastrous ravages of the boil wee
vii. The federal and state depart
ments of agriculture have given in
valuable assistance in this work.
They have proved that the cotton
plant can be bred to have low fruit
limbs and to throw most of it's life
force into it's lower and middle por-
tons, and that by better methods of
cultivation and fertilization the ma
turing of these parts of the plant
can be so fastened that large per-
centage of the crop may be so far
advanced that the weeYil will not
have multiplied early enough to do
much damage. For the following
information concerning the status of
the boil weeVil this bureau is in
- 49, II,
of the United States department of
agriculture:
AS a dry season retards the adj
vance of the boil weeviI more than
any other one factor the summer and
winter preceding the 1910 crop were
exceptionally disastrous to it in all
the territory infested, except a strip
running along the gulf coast from
southwestern Mississippi through
Louisiana to southwestern Texas; in
fact, west of diagonal line drawn
from Paris, in Lamar county, Texas,
to KerrvilIe, in Kerr county, the in
sect was exterminated. In a strip of
land forty miles wide running across
the state of Arkansas, and in Wash
ington and Sharkey counties, Missis-
found on July 5, 1910, and the same
conditions which exterminated the
pest in this territory reduced it's
numbers greatly in other regions.
This applied to two-thirds of the
territory infested in 1909, to all in
Arkansas, to three-fourths of that in
Louisiana, and to all but six coun-
ties in southwestern Mississippi. AS
is well known, the spreading of the
weevil is almost entirely by flight
about mid-August and continuing
into November if conditions are IA
yorable. An early and most unusual
movement north4aStWard in Missis-
Sippi occurred in July, the probable
explanation for this being that a Sc
ries of storms of great severity car
ried the weeVil into this territory
before the normal time for disper-
sion. A late October freeze Destroy
ed many weevils and terminated the
dispersion movement, which was I'M
der such Roadway that it would
probably have taken the insects into
much additional territory. AS a re-
suit of unfavorable conditions, es-
pecially in the western portions of
Oklahoma, the infested territory in
that state in 1910 was $500 square
miles less than in 1909. In Arkan-
sas there was a considerable in
crease. In Mississippi a belt about
80 miles wide, extending diagonally
across the state from the north CEN
trail to the southeastern part, became
infested for the first time. The in
Vasion passed on, entering into Ala
bama for the first time, and covered
more or less of the five southwestern
counties of that state.
During 1910 the weevil was
found in nearly 80 per cent of the
cotton acreage of the United States.
1t was evident in 100 per cent of
the cotton acreage of Louisiana, 80
per cent in Texas, 80 per cent in