102 



tainly no hope of securing a strain of upland cotton that 

 will prove resistant to the boll weevil, or to any other in- 

 sect. 



Cultural Methods. 



It has been demonstrated that improved methods of 

 cultivation will, enable one and does enable many Texas 

 planters now to grow cotton at a fair profit in weevil 

 infested areas. If the weevil can force cotton planters 

 throughout the cotton belt to adopt more civilized and 

 modern methods of cultivation we mav be forced to look 

 upon the weevil as a ''blessing in disguise." 



It is impossible better to present the desirability and 

 certainty of results from the cultivation methods recom- 

 mended by the Division of Entomology, United 

 States Department of Agriculture, than to quote the 

 recommendations given by W. D. Hunter;, the official 

 agent in charge of the cotton boll weevil investigation. 



"1. Plant early. If possible plant seed of the va- 

 rieties known to mature early, or at least obtain seed 

 from as far north as possible. It is much better to run 

 the risk of replanting, which is not an expensive ope- 

 ration, than to have the crop delayed. The practice of 

 some planters of making two plantings to avoid having 

 all the work of cliopping thrown into a short period is 

 a very bad policy from the weevil standpoint. 



Under identical conditions early cotton if improved 

 varieties has invariably yielded from two to three times 

 as much as native cotton under the same conditions, 

 and in many cases much more. Planted at the same time 

 the earlv varieties begin to bloom from twelve to eight- 

 een days sooner than native cotton. 



Early planted fields of either native or improved va- 

 rieties have almost invariably yielded twice as much as 

 late planted ones. 



The early varieties in general, having a small stalk 

 and a short tap root, are adapted only for rich soil. They 

 also fail to grow well in the very light sandy loams of 

 many of the river valleys of Texas which, in long sea- 

 sons before the advent of the boll-weevil, often produced 

 the largest vields. In these situations earlv varieties 



