234 



THE AGKKT LTL'KAL NEWS. 



July 27, 1918. 



INSECT NOTES. 



ENTOMOLOGY IN RELATION TO DISEASE, 

 HYGIENE, AND SANITATION. 



l>uring May last, a very important and interesting 

 movement was started by members of the Stati" of the 

 Uaited States Bureau of Entomology at Washington, D-C. 

 This was the formation of a class for the study of the 

 Kntomology of Disease, Hygiene, and Sanitation. The 

 object of this class, and the method of procedure were 

 explained in a memoiandum prepared at the re<juest and for 

 the approval of Dr. L. O. Howard, Chief of the Bureau. 

 In the minutes of the first meeting of the class these were 

 summarized briefly, as follow.^ 'There is a possibility of the 

 Army here (in the United States) and abroad calling upon 

 the "entomological profession to furnish before long a large 

 number of men informed on the subject of disease tran.^init- 

 ting insects, and the methods of controlling these insects. 

 It is intended, therefore, by means of this cla.ss, and through 

 corre.spondence with field men, to prepare as many as are 

 willing to undertake such woik.' 



It was arranged that the cla>s should meet for one hour 

 per wetk, or oftener if conditions warranted it, and that a 

 collection illustrating tie various aspects of the work should 

 be made. A class leader and a secretary were chosen. The 

 duties of the leader are to ^ive or to provide for a twenty 

 minutes talk at each meeting, which should be followed by 

 discussion, all of which was to be recorded and mimeographed 

 fi.r subsequent reffience and use. 



This class organization has met with favour, the 

 attendance at the meetings has increased, and the members 

 who have joined by correspondence have also increased in 

 numbers. 



The problems to be dealt with relate particularly to the 

 iliseases of army camps and their surroundings, and includ,? 

 the hygiene and sanitary conditions of towns and cities, 

 especially tho.'e which are in any way connected with such 

 camps, either by their pro.ximity or because they are sources 

 of food supplies for them. 



Dr. W. Dwight Pierce, the clats leader, recently visited 

 the Marine Camp at (^uantico, Virginia, and his account of 

 this visit is likely to be of interest to readers of the jlxr/V///- 

 lural A'ftvs, since be record.s some simple and apparently 

 efficient devices for mosquito control. A review of the 

 subjects dealt with at the cla.ss meetings would akso be of 

 interest, but as tbei-e aie intended, first of all, for the u.se of 

 Army and Municipal .sanitarians, rather than for ;ipplicatioi. 

 to conditions .such as those e.xisting in the West Indies, they 

 will not be further dealt with at the present time, but will 

 probably be referred to later. 



Dr. Pierce found at Caujp (^uantico an excellent ento- 

 mr.logical organization attached to the Post Surgeon's 

 office, the work of sjinitation having been organized by 

 Lieut. Kbert who is directly in charge of this work. 



The largest problem in the sanitation of this camp was 

 found to be mofquito control, on account of the fact that 

 there are boggy places in the camp, and large swamp> 

 Adjoining, along the 'PSto'mac Kiver. 



The work of mosquito control falls under three heads: 

 ditching, clearing vegetation from the banks of the ditches, 

 and the application of insecticides. 



The most interesting of these operations were those 

 concerned with the application of insecticides, and it is to 

 this phase of the work that attention might be directed in 

 the West Indies. 



Crude oil is the larvicide used at the camp. It is not 

 applied by spraying on the surface of the water in the usual 

 way. Dry sawdust is saturated with crude oil, the propor- 

 tion being about 30 per cent, of oil and 70 per cent, of 

 sawdust. 



This mixture is used in a variety of ways. The detailed 

 squads in charge of insecticide application carry with them 

 on their rounds quantities of this oil saturated sawdust, sprink- 

 ling a handful of it on each small breeding hole they find. 

 Even a few sawdust particles dropped in a smill puddle of 

 water will quickly form a film of oil which will remain for 

 a long time. 



In streams of running water, cross booms consisting of 

 two small boards or sticks fastened together, and anchored 

 to form a V on the surface, are used to hold up a quantity 

 of saturated sawdust. These are arranged so that the oil 

 which is liberated from the sawdust passes between the ends 

 of the sticks in the middle of the stream, or around the 

 ends towards the stream bank, and a film of oil is thus pro- 

 vided on the surface below the boom. A series of these 

 booms placed at intervals has been found to check mosijuito 

 breeding almost altogether. A modification of this idea, which 

 was also successfully used, consisted of a box filled with oil- 

 saturated sawdust. Two sides of this box were screened, 

 and it was fixed in the .stream. The water flowing through 

 the box carried with it a small quantity of oil. 



This idea would seem to be capable of a[)[)licatiou iu 

 the West Indies in many places where mosquitoes have beea 

 found difficult of control. 



Sawdust saturated with crude oil would be easy to 

 transport and to ai>ply, and by means of the booiu or 

 screened box it ought to be possible to treat small or 

 even fairly large streams of running water; and ia 

 the case of swamps and large bodies of water it ought 

 to obviate largely or entirely the difficulty which arises 

 from the crude oil not spreading properly when sprayed on, 

 and to overcome satisfactorily the drawback due to the rapid 

 evaporation of the oil on the water under the influence of th« 

 tropical sun. 



In many places .sawdust is available for trials of this 

 idea; in others, substitutes will be found by anyone who 

 really wishes to carry out an experiment. It would seem 

 that coco-nut husk might be uselul iu this connexion, and 

 there are probably many native substances which need only 

 to be tried in order for something to be found in ;iny locality 

 suitable for the purpose. 



II.A.B. 



CAMPAIGN IN JAMAICA AGAINST 

 HOOKWORM. 



A leading article in the .lamaica (.il,-iinc>\ June 14, 191)i, 

 draws attention to the arrival in Jamaica of Dr. M. E. 

 Connor, one of the otiicers of the Rockefeller Foundation, 

 which has been combating the hookworm disease in the 

 I'nited States and neighbouring tropical countries. 



One of the first efforts made by the recently founded 

 Jamaica Imperial As.sociation was to bring to the attention of 

 the local (iowernmeut the need of taking advantage at once pf 

 the ivockefelloer foundation's offer to treat hookworm in tb» 



