Februar}', '21] fracker: pest reporting service 51 



county, a blank can be sent to one each week. The result is a series of 

 weekh' reports while each correspondent makes one out onl_v once a 

 month. 



While the entomological report form did not refer to plant diseases, a 

 considerable number of reports were received concerning rusts, smut, 

 potato blight, and fire blight in apple trees, as well as occasional reports 

 regarding other plant diseases. The reports in regard to rust are of 

 particular interest with respect to the accuracy and promptness which 

 can be expected. The first week in which rust was referred to by the 

 correspondents sending crop reports, such information came from five 

 counties confined almost entirely to the southern border of the state. 

 The next week seven additional counties were included, onlv two of 

 which were north of the center of the state. A week later, of the seven 

 counties reporting outbreaks of rusts, five were in the extreme northern 

 part of the state. This was followed by a series of weekly reports in 

 which no reference to grain rust was made as harvest had been completed. 

 The reports of the grasshopper epidemic were somewhat similar, altho 

 the progress from south to north was not a feature of the grasshopper 

 outbreaks, the epidemic being confined largely to the northern half of 

 the state. 



In all, twenty-five insects and half a dozen plant diseases were re- 

 ported. Those of general farm crops were the grasshopper, army worm, 

 and cutworm epidemics, and the usual annual injury from white grubs, 

 wheat -joint worms, and wireworms. In the case of both army worms 

 and grasshoppers immediate and timely assistance can be given. 

 For the other insects the information was of greater permanent than 

 immediate value. 



Of potato insects the Colorado potato beetle was of course reported 

 everywhere from June to the middle of August. Leaf hoppers were 

 reported in about fifteen counties, the counties being grouped from week 

 to week in almost the same way as those reporting rust outbreaks. 

 Flea beetles were reported more rarely. 



Of the insects reported attacking fruit, namely, the codling moth, the 

 plum curculio, chern* slug, and canker worm, the most interesting was 

 the cherr}^ slug which appeared for the first time in a commercial cherry 

 producing section (Ba\^eld county) and did a great deal of damage. 

 Most cherry orchards in the county had never been spra\'ed with arsenate 

 of lead, as it was not necessary until this season. No representative of 

 the department being in that vicinity, adequate assistance and informa- 

 tion would probably not have been available to the large number of 

 cherry growers in time if it had not been for the pest reports which 

 began to come in at the very beginning of the attack by the slugs. 



