30 PAPERS ON CEREAL AND FORAGE INSECTS. 
was of little value. The ground was badly cracked, exposing the 
wheat roats to the hot sun and drying winds and these, together 
with the bugs, killed a great many plants. Wheat was so badly killed, 
mostly by meteorological influences, that by May 1 thousands of 
acres had been abandoned and corn planted in its stead. The young 
bugs and eggs were little molested by the operation of corn planting 
and as soon as the sprouting corn pushed through the soil hundreds 
of bugs were ready for every plant. Some such fields were even planted 
the third time only to furnish food for these hungry insects. The 
bugs would crawl from beneath several inches of loose soil and be 
ready to attack the young plants as soon as they appeared. 
Such wheat as was not abandoned made a poor growth on account 
of drought and was severely damaged by the chinch bugs, great 
numbers of which were on every plant, so that by June 10 they had 
sapped the life from them. As the wheat and grasses were killed 
by the drought, the bugs were forced to abandon wheat fields and 
hunt for food elsewhere. The corn, which had made very poor growth 
up to this time on account of the lack of moisture, was very small 
and weak when the bugs reached it, and this early attack by the young 
chinch bugs resulted in the devastation of thousands of acres before 
the bugs became mature. On reaching maturity they abruptly 
dispersed and their depredations were brought to an end. 
Young bugs of the second generation became numerous the first 
week of August on the cornstalks under the sheaths and under the 
outer husks of the ears. Corn leaves, stalks, and husks of ears were 
dry by the middle of August and bugs were moving out of these into 
fields of kafir and sorghum, both of which suffered under their 
attack, many fields being laid waste by September 1. Owing to 
the continued drought throughout the fall the Indian corn, kafir, 
cane, and grasses died leaving the chinch bugs without sufficient food 
supply, with the result that of the vast horde of bugs hatching in 
August comparatively few survived to go into winter quarters. 
During September and October a few young chinch bugs matured on 
volunteer wheat, later depositing a few eggs for a partial third genera- 
tion. No damage was done to wheat by these few insects, although 
some of them remained on or about the wheat plants till cold weather 
set in. ‘There were not nearly so many chinch bugs in the bunches 
of grass in the fall of 1910 as in the fall of 1909. 
KANSAS, 1911. 
As previously indicated, the fall of 1910 was very dry and wheat 
failed to sprout in Kansas and Oklahoma. The winter of 1910-11 
and the spring of 1911 continued dry, very little rain falling during 
the entire period till the last of May, 1911. This extended drought 
