The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1915-09-14
|gaE WEEVIL GOING
SIX NILES A DAY
.n,s IS RATE MAINTAINED BY
THE COTTON PEST FOR
FIFTEEN DAYS.
,HF SITUATION IS ALARMING

, ImnOrtant That Every FARMER
~ infected Section Get His Cotton
nnt of Feds as Quickly as Posi-
HE" Says MIR. Worsham.
,TrANTA.-The situation is be-
Ming alarmingly serious for the
,tton farmers of this state.
WI, Tho boll weevl is invading Georgia
more rapidly than the German
~ over invaded either France or
r n.,sio and by the next cotton season
w. going to be more serious men
y. than even the war in Europe was
~. roar-so far as the cotton crop is
B Concerned
Tbo information is that the prog
Of the weevil into Georgia terri
law has been more rapid than it ever
~. boon anywhere else with one ex-
4 ceptiOn.
30 Miles in Is Days.
Right after the Galveston flood, in
,OOO the progress recorded was 100
niles In this state the weevil has Gov
orod 30 miles of Georgia territory in
tho alarmingly brief period of 10
dovs It has aleady reached limit
toward the interior of Georgia be-
vord where it was expected to have
come by the end of next season, and
4 vot there can be three or four more
generations of the weevil between
This time and the first frost, which is
I tbe only thing that will stay their
progress.
State Entomologist r. L. Worsham
is inst back from trip to and care
fnI inspection of the weevil-infested
territory and he says the people there
are iustly alarmed over the condition
Of affairs. Mr.. Worsham says eight
or ten counties are infested now, in
the eastward progress of the pest,
and the rapidity with which the wee
vii is moving demands the immediate
and very earnest attention of the ag-
ricultural people of the state.
Decatur. Grady, Brooks and Thorn
as counties were visited by him, the
cotton fields in each were personally
nspected-and the weevils have got
ten the cotton crop. He says from
what he found he will not hesitate to
say that Southwest Georgia is going
to be in pretty bad fix next year;
that the question of just how bad it
will be depends largely on how read
lily and how vigorously the farmers in
the infested section take hold of
things right now
Must Burn Stalks.
1T can't be too forcibly impressed
upon them" Mr. Worsham said, that
it is of paramount importance that
every farmer in that section get his
cotton out of the field just as quickly
as possible and chop down and burn
the stalks. This will have to be done
before the cold weather comes, in or
der to catch the weevils in the cotton
and destroy them before they go in
for winter. The abundance Of Span
iSh moss in that section makes an
ideal winter place for the weevil, and
once they get into that the situation
is going to become mighty serious.
The crop as a whole in that Sec
ton is pretty well open and, Ordinarl-
~, it would have been gotten out or
the fields by the first of October. I'm
der the existing conditions the farm
ers need to do even better than that.
They should get every bit of their cot
ton out at the first possible oppor-
tunity, and then Immediately turn at
tention to destruction of the stalks.
Ihey could be turned under very
deeply, but it would be better to burn
them
All Are Hard at Work.
Mr.. Worsham says it is particular
y fortunate that Georgia just now is
able to have gotten the assistance OF
Dr. W. A. Pierce, of the United States
bureau of entomology, who has gone
as actively into the situation as any
oody In the state could have done. He
and DR.. Geo. d. Smith, the state
agent, stationed at Thomasville, have
taken hold of the situation just as
Inough it were a physical epidemic
attacking people, and, figuratiyely,
nave pulled their coats off and gone
20 IT, Mr.. WOrsham says the gov
eInment cooperation with the state
5uSt at this time is the biggest tnlno
5or Georgia it has ever been since the
federal government enterd into the