Second Annual repobt. 



rows on the side next to the wheat field. He said the bugs were not nearly 

 so numerous as when he began putting in the infection, but he did not know 

 what had become of them. We began turning over the clods, and there in 

 large quantites were bugs of all ages swarming, and masses of empty skins, 

 and a large number of dead bugs covered with the white growth of Sporo- 

 trichum. Mr. Hyde had attached no importance to these white bugs, in fact, 

 he did not recognize them as bugs. My magnifier, however, made this fact 

 clear to him. We found, these white bugs throughout the part of the field 

 attacked by bugs. Mr. Hyde had worked diligently with the infection. His 

 infection box was a thin cigar box! In our own experience boxes with 

 thick sides retain moisture longer and give better results. 



We visited Mr. Mendenhill's field, which adjoins Mr. Hyde's. Here the 

 bugs had not been so numerous as at Mr. Hyde's, and no infection had been 

 used. I could find no skins in this field, while at Mr. Hyde's they were in 

 patches at the base of every hill. By diligent scratching about, I found the 

 Sporotrichum bugs. At Mr. Hyde's white bugs were plentiful. Mr. Hyde 

 stated that the wind had been blowing from the east a few days previously, 

 and the infection might have been brought in this way. Mr. J. S. Morton 

 had obtained infection from our laboratory, and I visited his field. He said 

 there was hardly one bug now where there were 10,000 before he put in the 

 infection, and indeed there were few bugs in his field at the time of my visit. 

 I could find white bugs here and there, and some empty skins scattered about 

 in the soil. Mr. Morton said the corn had been literally covered with bugs. 

 These were the only fields in this vicinity that had been attacked by bugs, 

 and corn was everywhere in prime condition. 



At Hutchinson I saw Wm. E. Hutchinson, president of the Valley State 

 Bank, and he gave me a striking account of his last year's experience. He 

 said the bugs were making a rapid and clean sweep of his corn, and when he 

 read in your directions that it might take a week or more before the infection 

 began to work, he had no hope of saving his crop. But after he put the in- 

 fection in the field, the bugs ceased their ravages and died in masses, turning 

 white. He had just started an infection box for this year at the time of my 

 visit, but with no immediate evidence of success. 



Mr. Briggs, living near Nickerson, had obtained infection from Moore & 

 Chrisman at Hutchinson, to whom you had sent packages for distribution. 

 Mr. Briggs told me nearly an acre of corn had been devoured by the bugs 

 when he got the infection. I found only a few bugs in a limited locality in 

 his field. If the infection was instrumental in thinning out his bugs, as ob- 

 servations in other fields seemed to evidence, the recent rains had obliterated 

 all traces of it. Mr. Hoath and Mr. Wiley, not far from Mr. Briggs, had 

 like experiences^- the bugs remaining in their fields, when I saw them, were 

 very few, and doing no noticeable damage. Mr. Morris, whose field adjoins 

 Mr. Briggs's, had just started his infection, and the disease was showing its 

 eflfects in his box. It is worthy of note, here, that while the bugs had practi- 



