120 KANSAS Academy of Science. 



give the following letter from Mr. M. F. Mattocks, of Wauneta, Chautauqua county, 



Kansas: 



Wauneta, Kansas, July 7, 1890. 

 Prof. Snow, Lmvrence, Kansas — Dear Sir: I received from you a few days since a box of diseased 

 chinch-bugs. I treated them according to instructions, and I have watched them closely and find that 

 they have conveyed the disease almost all over my farm, and the bugs are dying at a rapid rate. I 

 have not found any dead bugs on farms adjoining me. I here inclose you box of healthy bugs that I 

 gathered VA miles from my place. I do not think they are diseased. Yours, M. F. Mattocks. 



I also quote the following clipping from the Cedar Vale (Chautauqua Co.) Star: 



" Infecting Chinch-Bugs. — There is no longer any need of having our crops destroyed by chinch- 

 bugs. A remedy that is as sure as death and which costs nothing has been discovered, and is used in 

 this county with comjilete success. jNIr. j\l. F. Mattocks, living a mile and a half east of Wauneta, on 

 the H. P. Moser farm, is entitled to the credit of demonstrating, in this part of the State, the efficiency 

 of the remedy. He was about to lose his corn crop by the bugs that were swarming into it from the 

 stubble. He sent to Chancellor F. H. Snow of the State University, at Lawrence, and received from 

 him a box containing a half-dozen diseased bugs. With them he exterminated a forty-acre field full 

 of the pests. They have died by the millions; in fact, they have about all died from the infection of 

 *"hose six bugs. A little circular of instructions, which he followed out, came with them. The six 

 bugs were placed in a bottle with three or four hundred from the field, and were left together thirty-six 

 hours and then turned loose, both the living ones and the dead, in the field. Devastation followed, 

 and Mr. Mattocks will be troubled no more with chinch-bugs this year. If your crop is iu danger you 

 can save it by the same means of getting the diseased bugs in your field. It will cost you nothing, and 

 is a dead-sure remedy. He has been sending dead and infected bugs to others in the country, and to 

 Prof. Snow, whose supply was running down." 



I personally visited Mr. Mattocks's farm and verified the above statements. 



The diflSculty of obtaining enough live bugs to experiment with in the laboratory 

 led to the sending out of the following advertisement, which was forwarded to twenty 

 prominent papers, with requests for its publication: 



"Wanted I Chinch-Bugs 1 — Prof. F. H. Snow, of the University of Kansas, is in great need of 

 some live and healthy chinch-bugs with which to carry on his experiments in chinch-bug infection. 

 Anyone who will send a small lot of bugs to Prof. Snow, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, will 

 confer a favor on the investigator, and, it is hoped, on the farmers of Kansas." 



This request for live bugs was given wide circulation, and resulted in keeping 

 the laboratory fairly well supplied with material for experiment. 



Before the close of the season of 1890 it became evident that there were at least 

 three diseases at work in our infection jars: the "white fungus" {Entomophthora 

 or Eminisa), a bacterial disease (Micrococcus), and a fungus considered by Dr. Roland 

 Thaxer to be Isaria, or perhaps more properly Trichoderma, 



The following report, which describes the bugs as "collecting in clusters,"' points 

 to the bacterial disease as the cause of destruction: 



Piqua, Woodson County, Kansas, July 12, 1890. 



Prof. Snoiv, State Unirersity, Lawrence, Kansas — Dear Sir: Since writing you from Humboldt, 

 Kansas, the 6th inst., have made the happy discovery that the germs of contagious disease sent me 

 were vital. On Sunday last, upon examination of the millet field, I found millions of dead buys. They 

 were collected in clusters. My idea is that dampness facilitates the spread of the contagion. The first 

 distribution of diseased bugs, two days after I received the package by mail, apparently produced no 

 results. A part of them were retained in the infection jar (quart Mason fruit jar). A half-pint of 

 bugs were collected from the field. Three days later a foul stench was found to emanate from the jar, 

 and a part of the bugs in it were dead. On July 3, I took advantage of the cool, damp evening, and 

 took a few buckets of cold water and sprinkled the edge of the millet, and distributed more infected 

 bugs. On the Gth I found millions of dead bugs. I think the night, and sprinkling the millet, 

 caused the disease to spread. We have had no rain in this neighborhood since June 17, if I remem- 

 ber correctly. The depredations of chinch-bugs are always more serious in dry, hot weather. 



You have conferred a lasting benefit on the farming interests of the United States, the value of 

 which cannot be estimated in dollars and cents. It was estimated that, during one of the visitation 

 years of this insect, the damage in the Mississippi valley amounted to ten millions of dollars. I have 

 no doubt that by a proper manipulation of the contagious disease, in the hands of intelligent persons, 

 it will prove an elFective remedy. I think the contagion should be introduced among them early, to 

 prevent the migration of the young brood. In my case I received it too late. Early-sown millet pre- 



