The Army-worm. . 257 



in their wanderings, readily tumble into these holes and cannot 

 get out. Bushels of them have been trapped in this way, and 

 then killed with a little kerosene or by burning some straw scat- 

 tered along the furrow. The holes or pits in the furrows are very 

 essential to the success of this preventive method. It has been 

 aptly said : ' ' To one who has never before seen the army-worm 

 in its might, the sight of the myriads as they returned thwarted 

 in their endeavors to cross a ditch or furrow, or of the living, 

 moving, and twisting mass which sometimes fills a ditch to the 

 depth of several inches, it is truly interesting. ' ' In some soils 

 a little extra work will be necessary to keep one side of the fur- 

 row perpendicular and to keep the earth loose and friable in the 

 furrow ; some accomplish the latter by dragging brush along the 

 furrow. A ditch or several furrows well taken care of in this 

 way will afford an almost impassable barrier to the worms, as 

 man}^ who followed the directions carefully last year, can testify. 

 It is such an easy matter to make a furrow and as one is not so 

 effectual a barrier as a ditch, we advise that two or more parallel 

 furrows be made, so that the worms which may scale the first one 

 will be confronted by another. 



A strip of coal tar will effectually stop the worms as long as it 

 remains sticky, but it has to be renewed once or twice a day and 

 is thus expensive. There were some reports that the worms 

 world not cross a strip of salt, and that when sprinkled with salt 

 the> die. Mr. Wm. R. Huntington, Rome, N. Y., reported to 

 us tl^e following experiment with salt : " After hearing that salt 

 would kill them, I took a pailful and went into a corn field where 

 there were lots of worms. I found some on the ground and put 

 salt all around them and on them. They would curl up and after 

 a short time, a minute or two, would crawl away as lively as ever. 

 I next went to some hills of corn that were badly eaten and cov- 

 ered with worms. I put at least a handful of salt on a number of 

 such stalks, covering up many of the worms, but I could not see 

 that it had any effect upon them. The next day I found the same 

 worms, apparently, eating close to the salt. I had already put a 

 ditch around this piece which held them where they were, so I 

 did not experiment any farther with salt, not having any faith in 

 it." Whenever practicable, it is always a good plan to make a 



