﻿OP THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 87 



Fort Sully, June 15th, — [Direction of wind, as ascertained by the records : 6 a. 

 M. to 7 A. M northeast, then east till 10 a m., then south till 3 p. m.; southeast remain- 

 -der of day] Several days previous to this date I had been hearing of the approach of 

 locusts along the line ot telegraph from Omaha upward to northwest, and at 4 p. m. of 

 the 14th the operator at Port Thompson (85 miles south, 25" ea«t from Fort Sully) re- 

 ported their advance Hying northwest and northwardly. At noon a large cloud of the 

 insects passed over until night when they were no longer visible. Roughly estimated 

 the swarm may have been about 50 miles long, 25 wide and J to J mile in height. A 

 hail storm the following day may have dispersed them. 



June 23. — [Direction of wind: 6 a. ji., southeast; 7 a. m., southeast; 10 a. m., 

 southeast; 2 and 3 p. m , east; re<t of day calm.] Large flights of locusts passing 

 over during the morning, going north and northwest at an estimated elevation of about 

 •50 feet to as high as they were visible with held glasses, possibly a mile ; none alighting. 

 This swarm, as near as could be ascertained by telegraph at the time, came from the 

 Minnesota infested region along the line of the Sioux City and St. Paul Railroad in a 

 "Continuous cloud, probably 1,000 miles long from east to west, and 500 miles from north 

 to south. How much farther north of this post, unascertained, and'not conjectured. 



June 24. — [Morning calm ; west wind at noon, followed by southeast in evening 

 and night] Straggling locusts began to fall, the flight still continuing northwest. 

 During the afternoon they commenced to alight and the post garden vanished from 

 the earth. Their increasing numbers resembled smoke at a short distance, many think- 

 ing there was a large prairie Are, the resemblance being very close. 



June 25. — [Wind north until night, then southeast.] Locusts so thick along the 

 bottom land as to hide the ground in places. Prairie also covered with them- Large 

 numbers still flying. In some places they drifted into disgusting heaps, from six inches 

 to a foot in depth, and where trodden upon by horses, etc.; they rendered those loca- 

 tions very uninviting in appearance and odor. 



June 26. — [Wind east till 3 p. m.; then northeast, and at night north.] Remain- 

 ing as the day before. 



June 27. — [Wind north till 3 p. m.; southeast at night.] Began arising. 



June 28. — [Wind southeast till 10 a. m.; west at 2 p. m.; north at night.] Disap- 

 peared from ground and by night none were seen in the air. They flow away north- 

 west. 



August 6. — Large numbers passed over but less than on previous occasions, 

 (stragglers fell) passing northwest. 



August 7. — Still passing northwest. 



August 8 — Same swarm going northwest. A severe thunder storm arose and 

 about 8 p. M. hailstones fell. When this storm passed the last locust seen this year had 

 Hed northwest. 



IVEoNTANA. — I have been unable to obtain any satisfactory data 

 from the editors of any of the journals published in the Territory, all 

 of whom I addressed with stamp enclosures. The tendency is so 

 great among such to depict the Territory an Eden with no drawbacks, 

 that they invariably claim to be out of the line of the locusts. The 

 following observations were recorded at Virginia City in the extreme 

 southwest of the Territory, and received from Mr. IVIyer. After stat- 

 ing that the insects moved west on the 18th of July ; a little south of 

 west on the 19th ; southwest on the 20th, 21st and 22d, and southwest 

 ■on the 7th of August; and that the wind was from northeast and 

 southwest on the 18th, west and southwest on the 19th, southeast and 

 northwest on the 20th, east and northeast on the 21st, southwest and 

 west on the 22d and northwest and west on the 7th of August, the 

 observer continues : 



The locusts were thickest on July 20th and 2lst, giving the sun a hazy appear- 

 ance. 



These "emigrant" locusts came from the plains of Dakota, and were here, the 

 largest bodies on the above mentioned days, at lea<t half a mile in thickness, and, as I 

 learn from reliable authority, they presented an unbroken width of twenty miles, be- 

 ing even more numerous on the wings than here, near the centre. 



