﻿OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 69 



DeKalb County. — I clip the following from the St. Joseph Her- 

 ald of June 3, from correspondence from Sherman township, May 31 : 



As assertions prove nothing' I will g'ive you the names of some responsible gentle- 

 men who have been injured by the hopper. Capt. S. H. Varner has been run over by 

 them for a week. They have eaten his oats and one hundred and twenty acres of 

 meadow. As yet they have not troubled his corn, but may before night. Mr George 

 Lowe, near Union Star, went to St. Joseph last week and bought him a new cultivator 

 to plow his corn. He returned next day and had not a hill of corn to plow. Adam 

 House went to St. Joseph last Tuesday and returned on Wednesday and found his corn 

 field as bare as the day he planted it. It was six inches or more high. Of course he 

 will plant it over again, but what surety has he that the young hoppers that are now 

 hatching (and they are numerous) will not eat it? Judge Williams, Frank Bowen and 

 numbers of other farmers have been injured by them, while some farms are as yet un- 

 touched. 



Gentry County. — As a whole this county was favored, though in 

 many localities the ground was made as bare as in Winter. Mr. Levi 

 Long, of Island City, writes : 



They ate all the wheat that was on high land, also oats and corn ; all garden veg- 

 etables and a great portion of the fruit. Imagine everything green on the face of the 

 earth eat entirely up; the meadows and blue grass pastures as dry and bare of vegeta- 

 tion as the centre of a State road that is traveled a great deal, and you can probably 

 form some idea of our condition at the time. 



Hickory County. — The same may be said of this as of the preced- 

 ing county. 



Holt County. — In 1867 this county suffered more severely than 

 many others, and I have several correspondents who retain a very 

 vivid recollection of that experience. Last year the county suffered 

 less than many others, and the pests were quite successfully fought. 

 Many crops were saved by ditching, and in one instance a Mr. Walker 

 is reported as saving his crops by ditching around a whole quarter 

 section, on a place called Hackberry Ridge. [ — St. Louis Repuhlican., 

 July 5. 



Since our last these insects have developed their endurance beyond question. 

 They have established a reputation for perfect inditference to storms and cold weather 

 that is truly astounding. They are now going lor garden stuff" with an avidity that is 

 rather discouraging to the planter. They went for our cabbage patch, and devoured in 

 a few hours, wliat we had been several months in developing; others have been more 

 unlucky, losing everything, cabbage, peas, raddishes, lettuce, all swept away in a few 

 hours. Some of the farmers in this vicinity have had their wheat, oats, barley, timo- 

 thy and other crops greatly injured by these pests. 



Out on Hickory Creek the hoppers are not so numerous as here, and as a conse- 

 quence are not doing so much injury; near Craig, Judge Van Wormer reports they 

 are destroying the wheat. Near Forbes they are more numerous than here, and have 

 destroyed about all the gardens; only one piece of wheat is reported as injured yet. 

 Some other parts of the county report none, while others have enough to supply several 

 counties. 



All accounts show, however, that we are not as bad off" as some of our neighbors. 

 — l^Holt County Sentinel, May 15. 



Henry County. — A correspondent of the St. Louis Republican., 



under date May 26, thus describes the devastation in Henry County : 



The locusts have already destroyed a large portion of the crops in sections of this 

 county, and stdl continue their work of devastation. The western and northern part 



