﻿OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 85 



the sky east and west a space 20 or 30 miles wide, while they move in 

 a body half a mile deep. They consume about two hours in passing, 

 and one can estimate from this statement how much ground they 

 would cover if they should all alight. * * * * 



"Colorado has something like half a wheat crop of most excellent 

 quality, and it is sufficient to provide bread. The deficiency arises 

 wholly from the destruction of crops by the locusts, which hatched a 

 month earlier than common. If they had hatched out at the usual 

 time, the crop would have been a full one, because the wheat would 

 have been too far advanced in growth to have been injured. Thou- 

 sands of acres of corn were planted in the ruined wheat fields, and 

 the earliest planted is likely to yield well, but with these millions of 

 locusts around us everything is uncertain." 



In November a correspondent of the Colorado J^aryner wrote that 

 " the young locusts were hatching out in great numbers, and that the 

 eggs deposited during the present season were so far advanced toward 

 hatching that large numbers would be destroyed by frost during the 

 Winter and Spring." 



Signal Service observations made at Denver show that from the 

 20th of July to the end of August, swarms repeatedly passed and in- 

 variably from the north and northwest, notwithstanding that the pre- 

 vailing direction of the wind was from the south. 



Dakota. — Observations made at Pembina and communicated 

 through A. J. Myer, chief signal officer, show that the young locusts 

 began to make their appearance, or to hatch from eggs laid the pre- 

 vious Fall, about the first of June. They matured in about six weeks. 

 The general movement of the winged insects was south, though at 

 times southeast. 



About the 10th of August they were seen in incalculable num- 

 bers going south, the atmosphere being thick and clouded by them as 

 far as the eye could penetrate, seeming miles in height. 



Long before this, however, the insects which left the country to 

 the southeast early in June, passed over the territory in a northwest 

 direction, as the following special dispatches to the Sioux City (Iowa) 

 Daily Journal^ kindly furnished by Mr. Wm. R. Smith, of that place, 

 will show : 



Four Thompson, June 28. — Large clouds of grasshoppers passed over this place 

 to-day, but did no daniaofe. They came from the southeast, and if thej' maintained 

 their course would bring up in the bad latuls of northwestern Dakota and Montana, 

 where their presence wiil hurt nobodj\ It is to be hoped they will not lij?hl short of 

 that locality. 



Yankton, June 28. — This section is still free from injury by grasshoppers, 

 although many of our people lost heart to-day on seeing the myriads of pests carried 



