58 The Bulletin. 



Control. 



Preventives. — Fields intended for tobacco should be plowed a 

 week or two before the time to transplant and the ground thoroughly 

 cultivated so that all signs of vegetation will be removed. In this 

 way the cricket will be forced to seek new fields for food. Un- 

 doubtedly, too, the cultivation will disturb the crickets in their tun- 

 nels, thus causing many of them to leave the field intended for to- 

 bacco. If this measure is resorted to it will be absolutely necessary 

 to keep down the growth of all vegetation, otherwise the crickets will 

 secure enough food to keep them alive until tobacco is transplanted, 

 when they will turn their attention to the tobacco, doing, perhaps, 

 all the more damage because they have been starved. 



Remedies.— After the fields have been thoroughly cultivated as 

 recommended above, they should be thoroughly covered with poisoned 

 green bait as recommended under Cutworms. (Page 41.) The 

 crickets, being deprived of their normal food, will be forced to eat 

 the poisoned bait, which will kill them. 



The Spined Tobacco Bug. 1 



(Order Hemiptera.) 



Frequently in tobacco fields it will be noticed that the tops of 

 plants, single leaves or whole small plants often wilt down in a 

 single day. The knowing ones say, "tobacco wilt"; but a careful 

 search reveals none of the characteristic marks of the true tobacco 



Fig. 45.— Adult of the Spined Tobacco Bug, enlarged. 

 (Photograph by the author.) 



wilt, but a drab-colored bug nearly half an inch long. This is a true 

 sucking insect and secures its food by sucking the juices of the plant 

 through a slender beak which it inserts beneath the bark of the plant. 

 Frequently on young plants it works just at the surface of the ground. 



1 Euchistus servus. 



