﻿OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 155- 



from the plains to the northwest as they did last year, that they are 

 considered an unavoidable calamity. As a rule these fresh accretions 

 come so early in the season as to pass on to the south or southwest 

 without laying eggs ; but very often they come late enough to lay 

 their eggs — the progeny from which is much more to be dreaded than 

 with us, because it is more healthful and vigorous and does much 

 more damage. 



Dakota. — This Territory was also overrun in 1873 as well as 1874. 

 From the meagre data at my disposal, the settled portions were 

 almost completely ravaged, and in the southeastern half scarcely a 

 wheat-field escaped destruction. The late lamented M. L. Dunlap,in 

 his "Rural" correspondence to the Chicago Tribune^ gives the fol- 

 lowing picture of affairs in D. T. : 



The Grasshopper has proven a burden, and the sound of the grindino: is low, and 

 the emigrant wagon with its white cover is traveling East instead of West. A letter 

 before me from Dakota says: "If the grasshoppers scourge us another year, Dakota 

 will become desolate, and be remanded to her ancient solitude. This is the fourth year 

 of bad crops, and almost every farmer has a mortgage on his goods and chattels, to 

 tide them over the past. Many have left, not to return, and others are to come back in 

 the Spring. At the best, the outlook is blue with despair." This will turn back an 

 army of laborers ; for all those people, when they turn back, will need work, and this 

 they should have, if possible. These people are returning from an immense belt of 

 country, and the vanguard is already here, with the main army to follow. A little 

 marauding insect, born of the mountains, has driven them back, and may hold the 

 country for a long time. The pleasant dreams of the homesteader have been brought 

 to a close, and unpleasant images have usurped the place. Even without the grasshop- 

 pers, pioneer life is a great struggle that none can fully appreciate until they have 

 passed its exacting ordeal. 



From Montana and Wyoming, where these insects are at home, 

 and where, from the nature of the country, settlements are very 

 sparse and agriculture scarcely has an existence, the reports of injury 

 are meagre. 



Manitoba. — Their injuries in 1874 were severely felt in Manitoba. 

 The shores of Manitoba Lake were reported as at one time strewn 

 three feet thick with their dead carcasses, where they had been driven 

 into the lake and cast ashore ; while in the South, from Pembina to 

 Stinking River, at Palestine, Boyne Settlement, Portage la Prairie, 

 Rat Creek, Rockwood and Winnepeg, they were reported as utterly 

 destroying oats, barley and other crops. From Mr. Geo. M. Dawson, 

 of McGill College, Montreal, who, as Geologist and Naturalist of the 

 N. A. Boundary Commission, has been collecting information as to 

 the limits of the insect in this province, I learn that the usual eastern 

 limit is formed by the edge of the wooded country, which crosses the 

 forty-ninth parallel about Ion. 96° 30', and runs thence to the south 

 end of Lake Winnepeg. A line drawn from Fort Garry to the forks 

 of the Saskatchewan river; thence to Fort Edmonton, and thence to 



