Year: 1874

What the State EntomolOgist of MS

 sOurl Says About Them,

 | Professor Charles V. Riley, Stat, Entomologist, in conversation with reporter, expressed his views in regart to the invasion of the western country by the locusts, which have already caused so much disaster and suffering

 He said: There is great deal O. alarm expressed about these locusts

 8 fear that they will come to this par of the country. I wish to allay tha fear. l do not think there is any req son to believe they will get any nearer than they have. Within the last sixty years they have not extended beyond { certain tier of counties in Missouri. have got 8 good many letters like this (holding up one from Cole county. ] got word from MT. BroadLead, State Geologist, that the locusts or grass. hoppers are at Pleasant Hill, but not doing much damage. I said that would be the eastern limit. They will not go beyond. I am going to see if they ex- tend beyond that point, and will spend few days in the district. It is few miles from the western limit of the State. On reference to our chronicles, find that they have never passed the western tier of counties of our State, and there is every reason to believe they never will. There is 8 limit to the extent of the flight of these insects, consequently can tell the farmers of Missouri and others over the State that there is no need of apprehension. They are bad in Kansas City, and some of the northwestern counties. but they need not fear them tc the east. I have records of these invasions-such as have attracted any attention-during the last sixty years. In 1866 they came as far as Pleasant Hill, but did not do much harm, and did not go beyond. All these letters are respecting the grasshoppers (pointing to a package of papers).

 The reporter asked the man of science how he explained the cause of these in- vasions. He said, briefly: These in. sects are natives of the canons of the Rocky Mountains. They breed by na- ture there at great altitude. Every few years in their native habitat they become so prodigiously multiplied that by the time they acquire their wings they are forced from there by necessity. They have cleaned off every green thing where they hatch, and they are forced by hunger to take flight, and they swarm on the plains below in large numbers. In the course of year they are not capable of extending beyond certain limit, and that point have in- dicated to you.

 Another point: When they get to the plains of the East the greater density and humidity of the atmosphere does not suit them. The change is such that instead of multiplying in geometri- cal ratio, as some insects do, they be- come sickly. The first generation hatch their eggs deposited in this low coun- try and die, many of them before they can do much injury. They are seldom fertile, and become intestate, so that there is no second generation. A great deal can be done to guard against the injury next year. In Minnesota the in- jury by grasshoppers was caused by the progeny of those that came last fall, and that might have been prevented by proper efforts.

 In reply to further inquiries, Profes- sor Riley said that the insect is proper ly termed the locust, and is the same creature that is mentioned in the New Testament Scriptures as to the means of doing away with the locusts' eggs, he suggested deep ploughing and irri- gation of the land. They never lay their eggs in moist lands, and they soon rot where there is moisture.