STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. J 41 



another and afford a singular spectacle when migrating, their 

 armies being composed of little red larvae, large brown larvae, still 

 darker pupse with wing pads and mature males and females with 

 black bodies and white wings. 



The second brood appears in full force in August, and as small 

 grain is then nearly ripe, this brood is most destructive to corn. 



As to remedies, nothing very new has been discovered. The 

 careful clearing up of rubb ish, burning straw and cornstalks that 

 harbor the insects during winter ; rolling the land as late in the 

 spring as is practicable, are among the preventive measures most 

 highly recommended. 



The migrations of this insect from one field or part of a field to 

 another are often prevented by a strip of tar poured on the ground 

 or on boards set on edge, about one gallon of tar being used to a 

 rod. One or two deep farrows through which a stone or bundle of 

 brush is dragged every day to keep the soil loose will also intercept 

 the march of the chinch bug army, and vast numbers of them will 

 be killed by the stone and the brush. As this bug is very fond of many 

 other grasses besides wheat and oats, many farmers practice sowing 

 Hungarian grass, or millet, with their small grain to divert the 

 bugs somewhat from the latter ; or they surround their fields with 

 a border of these forage crops, on which the bugs which usually 

 begin on one or more edges of the held, will feed until the choicer 

 grain is sufficiently well grown to resist, in a measure, the attacks 

 of the insect. Corn is sometimes saved in the same way by a belt 

 of sorghum. I am informed by our secretary that many of our 

 farmers sow clover with wheat, as the clover keeps the surface of 

 the soil too cool to suit the habits of the bug. If this really has the 

 effect claimed, the discovery is a valuable one, and the knowledge 

 of it should be widely disseminated. 



Prof. Forbes, State Entomologist, of Illinois, read a very inter- 

 esting paper before the Biological section of the American Associa- 

 tion for the Advancement of Science in our city last summer, in 

 which he gave an account of a disease that had swept off a large 

 proportion of the "chinches" that appeared in the spring. This dis- 

 ease was caused by Bacteria, and he was of the opinion that it could 

 be widely spread by means of the germs of this Bacteria which could 

 be multiplied to any extent in beef-tea and other infusions. This 

 is, as yet, a mere theory, but it may lead to the discovery of a 

 remedy. 



As far as this bug is concerned the farmer's main reliance will 

 continue to be in the occurrence of heavy rains in the fall and late 



