162 TRANSACTIONS OF TEE 



abundant in the Sacramento Valley and the Sierra foothills. The 

 Sacramento Union o£ September 19th, 1855, states: "For about three 

 hours in the middle of the day, the air, at an elevation of about 200 

 feet, was literally thick with locusts. They could be more readily 

 perceived by looking in the direction of the sun. Great numbers fell 

 upon the streets, absolutely taking the city by storm. A wholesale 

 destruction was made of everything green in the gardens and orchards 

 of the neighborhood. Their flight en masse resembled a thick snow- 

 storm, and their depredations the sweep of a scythe." The distin- 

 guished observer, J. W. A. Wright, communicates much pertaining 

 to this invasion, derived from William Johnston, of Richland. "About 

 the middle of June the swarms appeared like clouds, darkening the 

 sun. I heard of them all up and down the Sacramento. In some 

 parts of the valley entire fields of grain and vegetables were eaten 

 within the space of a single day, leaving the ground like a wilted, 

 blackened desert. Often, it is reported, they annoyed passengers and 

 horses on the public stages to such an extent as to cause the greatest 

 inconvenience — in some cases to have positively endangered human 

 life. The insect was light brown, and about one and a half inches 

 long." Another account is given by an eye-witness — George Rich: 

 "About the middle of July, 1855, locusts came in immense numbers 

 from the southern direction. Reaching the foothills, they covered 

 their sides in multitudes, gnawing the bark from the shrubs, devour- 

 ing the leaves, and eating the grass even down to the roots. They 

 arrived about midday, and took their departure the same evening." 

 From the ferocity of these insects, "gnawing the bark of trees," 

 their brief stay, noted on the Sacramento as "two weeks," the great 

 height of their flight, together with the single line of description, 

 "light brown color, and about one and a half inches long," the Locust 

 Commission, of whom Professor Riley is chief, concluded, first, that 

 the depredator was not the ccdoptenus sjjretus, as, if the Rocky Moun- 

 tain locust should succeed in crossing the Sierra barrier from its near- 

 est home on the Shoshone River, it could not reach Shasta or the 

 Sacramento Valley before the last of July or first of August; and, 

 second, that, most probably, the species was either caloptenus feimer- 

 rubrum or C. atlanis, the "red-legged" and "lesser" locust described 

 in former paragraphs. And we may add, the marauder could hardly 

 have been the present scourge, oedipoda atrox, for this locust has never 

 been reported so voracious^t is too short-winged to maintain itself 

 at high altitudes; the males are light yellow or straw-color, the females 

 ashy brown ; the length being only one and one-half inches. 



LATER LOCUST RAIDS. 



In 1856 locusts appeared and were very destructive in Lower Cali- 

 fornia, and in the San Joaquin Valley. Ate grain, vegetables, fruit 

 trees, and even a man's coat. In 1859 locusts devastated the Pit and 

 Fall Ptiver Valleys, and were destructive in Yuba County. In 1862 

 or '63 locusts visited Hornitos f rom the south "like a glittering cloud." 

 They ate the bark of peach trees. In 1866 or '67 locusts came from 

 the north in a swarm fifteen miles wide near Stockton. So numer- 

 ous that "they filled a well." In 1869 locusts invaded Tulare County 

 for three weeks, eating grapes, corn, and wheat. Came the last of May. 

 In 1873 they again migrated to Lower California, doing great damage. 

 Also raided into Southern California. The year 1877 is noted as a 



