Il8 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [April, 



DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY, 



Edited by Prof. JOHN B. SMITH, Sc. D., New Brunswick, N. J. 



Illinois Entomology. The iSth Report of the State Entomologist on 

 noxious and beneficial insects of the State of Illinois for the years 1891 

 and 1892 is at hand. This is the yth Report by Forbes, and it is certainly 

 no worse than any that have preceded it. Practically, the Report is taken 

 up by a treatise on insects that are injurious to corn; and this subject is 

 handled more fully and more practically than ever before. A decidedly 

 marked feature in the Report is the frequent recommendation of farm 

 practice to prevent injury by the insects, and this is fully in line with the 

 conclusions that i have been forced to more and more during the past 

 years. Insecticides unquestionably have a very great range of usefulness, 

 and for some purposes it will be impossible to do without them ; but, on 

 the other hand, I think there is as little doubt that in a great variety of 

 cases we can reach the desired end, not so much by poisoning the insects, 

 but by simply preventing their propagation by reasonable methods of 

 farm culture. It is rather interesting, and it marks a somewhat new phase 

 in handling the subject, that as against the corn aphis the destruction of 

 the nests of certain ants is recommended. Of course, there is nothing- 

 very new at the present time in the relation of ants to plant lice ; but I 

 believe that this is the first time the practical possibilities involved in this 

 relation have been taken advantage of for the benefit of the farmer. A 

 somewhat interesting feature of the Report is the fact that the sensory 

 pittings of antennae and legs of the plant lice are figured. I believe I was 

 the first of recent date to draw attention to the usefulness of these pit- 

 tings, and the pictures published by me in Bulletin No. 75 of the New 

 Jersey Agricultural College Experiment Station were the first ever pub- 

 lished in any economic work where plant lice were treated. 



A Benighted Country: That is what Mr. Edwin C. Reed calls Chile, and 

 the following experience, which he details, goes far to support him. He 

 writes: "In 1891-92 I was commissioned to stop an invasion of locusts 

 that passed the Andes and laid some forty tons of eggs in Southern Chile. 

 There was great alarm and a vote of |2oo,ooo. I found that the climate 

 w >ukl kill them off, except in a few snug corners, where I did what was 

 needtul. The locusts were exterminated, and less than $5000 spent ; but 

 I got no thanks." Now, with all due regard to Mr. Reed, he should have 

 taken some lessons in the United States in order to have managed this 

 matter properly, to the advantage of economic entomology, and to make 

 a great man of himself. After he discovered that the climate would kill 

 off all the locusts, except in a few snug corners, he should have kept this 



