8 



The History of the Pea Weevil in Ontario. 



Until recently it was the general belief that the pea weevil was a 

 native of America ; but there is a strong reason in favor of its foreign 

 origin. It is not known to feed on any other plant than the culti- 

 vated pea, of the genus Pisum, which is an introduced plant of 

 Eastern origin. It is likelj'', therefore, that it came from the East, 

 whence came so many of our cultivated plants, and their insect 

 enemies as well. 



The earliest published record of the depredations of the pea 

 weevil in Ontario, so far as we are aware, is that made by the Rev. 

 Geo. S. J. Hill of Markham, in 1857. This gentleman won the second 

 prize (£25 ) offered by the Legislature of Canada, for an essay on the 

 insects injurious to the wheat crop. Incidentally, in that essay, allu- 

 sion was made to the pea weevil, which was stated to be one of the 

 most injurious insects to the farm. It is very probable, then, that the 

 weevil even in the fifties was an old offender. 



About 1860, the weevil was very injurious in Wentworth county. 

 It is stated that the farmers, almost to a man, at that time gave up 

 growing of peas for two years with the result that the weevil was 

 destroyed. The south-western counties have nearly always suffered 

 most severely; for frequently when the remaining portions of the 

 Province have been entirely free from the pest, the pea crops in the 

 south-western counties have been badly injured. 



Rev. Dr. Bethume, editor of the Canadian Entomologist, writes 

 us that the weevil has been a familiar insect to him for nearly forty 

 years, and that while he was editor of the entomological column of the 

 " Canadian Farmer, " published by the late Hon. George Brown, from 

 1865 to 1873, he frequently had occasion to give correspondents in- 

 formation regarding the insect. During this whole period of nine 

 years, the weevil was very injurious, especially in the south-western 

 part. In 1870-71, few peas were grown in Essex, Kent, and Lamb- 

 ton, while good crops were common and the weevil was not abundant 

 in the neighborhood of London. Gradually, however, and year by 

 year, the weevil spread north-eastward ; and about 1878-1880 most of 

 the farmers in that part of the Province, south of a line drawn from 

 Newmarket to Goderich, were compelled to give up, to a laige extent, 

 the growing of peas. 



During the years 1885, '86, '87, the weevil did very little injury. 

 The acreage devoted to the pea crop in south-western Ontario was 

 gradually reduced during 1882, '83, and '84, and this may account for 

 the partial disappearance of the weevil during the following years. 

 ( Fig 3, c ) A few farmers, however, neither stopped growing peas 

 nor fumigated their infested crops ; and this was a great mistake, as 

 it prevented a general eradication of the weevil. Along with the in- 



