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favorable to them in their winter quarters will result in a correspond- 

 ing increase in their ranks during the succeeding summer. That 

 such conditions existed in an exaggerated degree during the past 

 winter has already been stated above, and the unusual increase in 

 numbers the present season was therefore only what might have been 

 expected under the circumstances. With a return to the normal con- 

 ditions of weather the coming winter, we may reasonably expect that 

 they will again be reduced to their usual, not particularly destructive, 

 numbers. 



Xatural enemies. — The absence of insect-eating birds within the 

 infested district was very noticeable. During the four days spent iu 

 that district not a single bird of any kind was observed to feed upon 

 the grasshoppers. Barnyard fowls fed sparingly upon them, but 

 whenever one of the red-legged species appeared u^jon the scene, the 

 fowls at once ceased pursuing the larger ones and went in search of 

 the former. Turkeys were reported to feed greedily upon them, and 

 when the latter did not appear in excessive numbers the turkeys 

 succeeded in preventing them from injuring the corn-fields to any 

 great extent. Ducks also fed upon them, and several cases were 

 reported where ducks had died, apparently from having partaken too 

 fi'eely of them. The only insect observed feeding uj)on the grass 

 hoppers was a large black beetle, Harpalus caliginosus Fab., which was 

 caught in the act of feeding upon a half-grown specimen. These 

 beetles were quite numerous in the infested district, and doubtless 

 destroy large numbers of the unfledged individuals. A medium-sized 

 black wasp, Priononyjc atrata St. Farg., which was also rather common, 

 confined its attention solely to the red-legged species, which she would 

 render helpless with her sting, then get astride of it, sieze it by 

 the antennae and drag it to her nest in the ground. It was somewhat 

 curious that, although other kinds of grasshoppers were present, this 

 wasp always selected a red-legged specimen for her victim. This 

 same kind of wasp also occurs in California, and there it also confines 

 its attacks to one kind of grasshoi)per, the Melanoplus devastator Scud., 

 which is very similar, both in size and color, to the red-legged species. 



Remedies employed. — A short time after the wheat had been cut, the 

 young grasshoppers which had hatched out in these fields began to 

 migrate into the adjacent fields of corn, where their i^resence was soon 

 made manifest by the large holes which they gnawed in the corn leaves. 

 When this was first observed many of the farmers spread dry straw 

 along the side of the infested corn-fields and drove the grasshoppers 

 upon it, then set fire to the straw ; in this way many thousands of the 

 young were destroyed, and in cases where they did not occur iu too 

 great numbers the corn-fields were protected by an occasional repetition 

 of this method. In the worst infested districts, however, this means 

 was found to be wholly inadequate, owing not only to the excessive 

 numbers of the grasshoppers but also to the lact that their coming was 



