Evening star., 1948-05-02

over three billion dollars annually because of insect pests
Now bug-hnting teams of enomologss roam the earth
like detectives tracking down pests natural enemies rear
ng them in nsectaes and ooonizng them infested crops
The parasites fatal affection for the pest restores Natures
balance In ideal biological control the bad bug eliminated
the parasite dies of starvation More commonly both bugs
survive reduced to harmessness And the beauty of all is
this the first cost the only cost Once attained biological
control lasts forever Savings: perhaps billion year.
Prime mover in this global bug game is the u S. Depau-
ment of Agriculture of Foreign Parasite Inroduc
ton headed up by Principal Entomoogst Curtis Clausen
With over 80 years experience in battling bugs Casen ranks
as one of the top generals in the insect
Clausen figured many phenomenal parasite inttoduc
tions.
Back in 1916, before effective plant quarantine the
dreaded Japanese beetle stole New Jersey on the roots
of fancy Oriental stock Unhampered by parasites the
beetles multiplied like mad, and by 1920 numerous
that they deoated thousands of fruit trees and shrubbery
and virtually the turf off nearly every lawn and golf
course in the Philadelphia None of the insecticides then
available could halt the shiny green courge Aided by wind
they crossed Delaware and New York Bays and crawed
lenessy the East ravagng they Farmers
desperate.
OFF for the Orient
CAusEN and associate, Dr. Joseph L. King set sail for
the Orient 1t took two years of vgant collecting and testing
before the bug hunters found what they wanted slim
wasps of the 7bha one from Japan, the other from
Korea
thousand Tpia shipped back to the Departments
newly established insectary at Moorestown N j. Dr. King
and an associate Lawrence B. Parker first made elaborate
tests themselves that the Tbhia wouldn't harm
plants livestock or humans.
Hundreds of colonies of wasp rushed
the infested centers. What the wasps saved during a
single year paid the of their finding and
planting a hundred times
But just link doesn't make chan parasite
like the Tbhia doesn't always complete control King
and his other Japanese beetle parasites They hope
build parasite chain which will encompass the life cycle
of the pest completely that it will be whitfield down to
utter harmlessness
Biological control tricky business Sometimes the life
cycles of pest and parasite fail to snchonze In that
the parasites have to be recoonzed every time the pest
eappears Sometimes the good bugs do such thorough job
they eat themselves completely of food and aren't around
strong enough numbers to halt later pest outbreak.
Gift Was Unfortunate
answer to these problems the ability mobilize para
site striking forces quickly.
While at Moorestown, hundreds of thousands of tiny
brown wasps being produced and their sole mission
is to purge the Oriental fruit moth which No.
peach pest
native of the Orient the fruit moth entered America
1910 on some Japanese cherry the Mkado sent to
President Taft 1t turned out to be most unfortunate gift
In 20 years the moths infested almost the entire half
of the country often running SO cent of growers
The utmoh was as tough as any Clausen and his