The Bulletin. 13 



generation of insects in the fall is in this way enabled to find suf- 

 ficient food to carry them over until they are ready to go into 

 winter quarters. The writer made this a special point for investiga- 

 tion last fall, and he was greatly surprised at the enormous number 

 of insects which were found feeding upon the suckers. Horn Worms, 

 Flea Bugs, and Cutworms were especially abundant. Besides, there 

 was a vast host of lesser pests. The effect of the destruction of the 

 suckers would be to either starve these insects or force them to find 

 new food plants in other fields. This is largely a matter for com- 

 munities to take up. One farmer practicing it alone could not expect 

 perfect results. Yet the writer in the course of his investigations 

 saw a striking illustration of the results which might be expected 

 from this practice. A farmer who had been in the habit of keeping 

 the suckers down on his farm sold it to another man who did not do 

 so. It was our good fortune to see the field of tobacco the first year 

 the suckers were allowed to grow, and much to our surprise there 

 were few Horn Worms, fewer Flea Bugs, and scarcely any Cutworms, 

 though the usual bevy of lesser pests were present in about normal 

 numbers. Yet all about this field were other fields of tobacco which 

 were greatly injured by these common tobacco pests. Directly across 

 the road from this field, for instance, was a field which was riddled 

 by insects. Another farmer told us that the year previous he had 

 been prevented from cutting all of his suckers, and that he could tell 

 in his tobacco the next year almost to the exact row where he had 

 finished cutting down the suckers, because the insect injury was so 

 much less in that portion of the field where the suckers had been kept 

 down. It would be good general practice to plow under all stubble 

 and remnants as soon as the crop is harvested and put the land in 

 some crop which will keep the ground covered during the winter. 



Destruction of Weeds. 



Weeds are such a well-known pest to cultivated crops that we 

 need not urge their destruction on that account. It is necessary, 

 however, to call attention to a special group of weeds, that is, the 

 weeds which are closely related to the tobacco plant. Nearly all 

 the insects of tobacco noted on the following pages were formerly 

 (that is, before the cultivation of tobacco became extensive) enemies 

 of the weeds which are closely related to tobacco. Most of these 

 insects still feed upon these same weeds in localities where tobacco 

 is not grown, and in localities where tobacco is grown these same 

 weeds act as harboring and breeding places for some of the worst in- 

 sect enemies of tobacco. The farmer who permits these weeds to grow 

 in or near his tobacco field is inviting destruction to his tobacco 

 crop. Most of these weeds are perfectly, familiar to all farmers and 



