REPORT OP THE SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE. 41 



are much more serious on account of their intensity and the wide 

 area involved. 



Very few damaged bolls were found at Hearne and Beaumont. 

 The cotton in the fields in the vicinity of the mills at these places 

 was quickly uprooted and burned. In some cases the ground was 

 subjected to blasts of fire. The cotton already picked was so handled 

 as to prevent any insects it might contain from escaping. Similar 

 steps are now being taken in the fields referred to 15 or 20 miles 

 from Beaumont. 



In the Trinity Bay region the insect was first discovered at Ana- 

 huac. The latest information indicates that it has spread along the 

 northern and eastern shores of the bay for a distance of approxi- 

 mately 100 miles. One thousand acres of cotton are involved. Many 

 of the fields are somewhat uniformly and heavily invaded. While no 

 definite information is available as to the origin of the outbreak here, 

 it is suspected that the infestation is of several years' standing. The 

 community is remote from Mexico, has no railroad connections, and, 

 so far as can be determined, has received no seed direct from Mexico 

 or from the mills which had imported seed from that country. It is 

 not impossible that the presence of the insect is due to seed imported 

 several years ago from Egypt. Fortunately, cotton culture in this 

 section is limited in the main to the area near the bay, between which 

 and the great cotton-growing sections of the State there is interposed 

 a stretch of country in which little or no cotton is grown. The crop 

 is usually moved directly to Galveston and Houston, where it is 

 ginned and where the seed is manufactured into oil and cake. The 

 isolation of the region will facilitate the eradication of the insect, but 

 the task will be a work of great magnitude, and will compel resort to 

 the full powers of the recently enacted Texas law authorizing the 

 establishment of cotton-free zones and the destruction of infested 

 cotton. It is proposed to establish similar zones near Hearne and 

 Beaumont. 



The pink bollworm, so styled on account of the color of the larva, 

 is perhaps the most serious known enemy of the cotton crop. It de- 

 stroys not only the bolls and lint but also the seeds and greatly reduces 

 the yield of oil. It hibernates in the larval stage in the seed and has 

 been carried to practically all the cotton-producing countries of the 

 world. The damage it is causing in Egypt, India, Hawaii, and other 

 countries indicates the seriousness of the menace to cotton culture in 

 this country. 



