The Washington times., 1922-07-02

bTSHE United States Bureau Of Hnto-
mology has Just summed up what
losses this country may expect
from bugs during 1922. The total is
1855, ,S69. 300!
This enormous figure is conservative,
1t is declared. It is $5OO,O0O,0O0 more than
the estimated losses of ten years ago.
At the same time the Bureau OF Ento-
moIogy announced that because Of the
increasing number Of insects and conse-
quent increasing damage, 1t had been de-
termined to use against them the most
advanced methods Of warfare developed
during the World War. Aeroplanes are
already in use scattering poison dust
down upon bug infested fields and for.
ests. The laboratories have developed
gas which will kill bugs. but not injure
foliage, birds or animals. This, too, will
shortly be in USE And where migrations
Of insects appear. such as the hosts of
locusts that stripped hundreds Of square
miles Of territory in Illinois recently,
hame throwers will be put to work.
And while our Government was rue
fully summing up what the nation might
expect to be eaten out OF by its bugs this
year, Professor Pierre Latourney, of the
Sorbonne, Paris, was sending out an an.
nouncement that unless the whole civil
lied world soon got busy with better and
more efficient ways OF bug killing. it
might wake some fine day not far away
to find itself crowded of the world by the
bugs. Careful analysis of statistics Of
losses through insect pests, said Professor
crease of damage during the past ten
years.
Mans battle with the bug, warned the
scientist, was now almost an even nip
and tuck struggle A little more strength.
ening Of the bug armies, or little weak.
ening on mans part would give the bug a
strangls hold which. conceivsbly, might
end in the extinction of the human race
and leave the world to the insects!
"Maeterlinck has written" says Profes.
sor Latournay, that the insect does not
belong to our world. One would say tha:
he comes from another planet, more
monstrous, more energetic, more atrocious,
more Internal than ours. He seized upon
life with fecundity which nothing equals
here below. There Is an instructive and
profound inquietude inspired by these
creatures SO incomparably better armed,
better equipped than ourselves; our most
mysterious enemies, our rivals and, per.
haps, our successors.
fhnco fhroo Ie
Professor Latournay. "Maeterlinck years
ago foresaw. what Is actually happening
to-day. The insects are steadily forging
ahead in their fight against humanity for
possession OF the earth. II would not take
much for the scales to be so profoundly
altered and the insects to increase In such
overwhelming numbers that humanity
would starve to death. The margin be.
tween the food supply Of earth's peoples
and their necessities Is now dangerously
small. Practically no country In Europe
can feed itself from its own land. The
mouths are too maryland this despite
the war. 1t will not be long before tha
United States, II she continues to increase
in population as she has during the last
thirty years, will be in the same situation
The South American countries will follow
suit.
with what may be called the food cap.
ital OF the world steadily being drawn
upon more and more, the food that goes
into the hungry mouths Of these millions
upon millions Of insects becomes q drain
that natures bank csrpot honor iudea
nitely. II cannot feed insects and man
alike. And unless man proves that he Is
stronger than the bug he must Inevitably
disappear from the face Of tho earth, jnat
as weaker forms OF life have diEarpe ared
before stronger ever since lie began Oh
the world.
"And the truly terrifying truth Is that
up to nov man has not proven himself
the stronger"
The cause for the increase 10 the
strength Of the bug armies seems to be
mainly mans own criminal eturiditr In
his battle against the insect world he has
had two great sides--each one Of which,
by the way, destroys many times moro