WHEAT. 283 



some varieties are more readily affected than others. Like smut, it is more liable to attack 

 the weaker plants, which is an added argument in favor of always sowing the best seed, 

 since these will produce the most hardy plants, and consequently crops less liable to disease of 

 any kind. It affects the stalks of wheat while the grain is forming, the minute plants making 

 horizontal ridges along the stalks of the wheat, which are of a russet orange tint. It is sup 

 posed that the spores, or seeds of the fungus, are constantly in the air, and when they fall 

 upon the stalks and leaves of some plants, quickly germinate, and subsist upon their sap. 

 Rusts of different species affect the leaves of many plants; wheat, oats, the bean, strawber 

 ry, raspberry, pear, apple, quince, hawthorn, mountain- ash, oak, beet, cabbage, clover, fern, 

 flax, barberry, rose, sorrel, thistle, and many others, both wild and cultivated. It is a ques 

 tion if one kind will not affect a plant of another variety; it is known that some rusts infect 

 other plants than their own native sort. 



There seems to be no remedy for this disease when it once makes its appearance in the 

 field, and the grain should be harvested as soon as admissible. The only remedy is in pre 

 vention, by selecting the most hardy varieties, and sowing the most perfectly-formed and ri 

 pened seed of such varieties. Sowing on elevated lands where the air has a free circulation, 

 and the abundant use of fertilizers that contain salt, lime, or gypsum is thought by some to 

 be in a great measure a preventive. The evil may be largely remedied by treating the seed 

 before sowing as directed for smut. This process has a tendency to destroy the germ of the 

 disease. The use of a solution of bluestone in the proportion of one-fourth of a pound to a 

 bushel of wheat, is recommended by Prof. Pendleton for both rust and smut. 



Chinch Bug. The insects that are destructive to wheat are very numerous and for 

 midable, embracing many varieties of flies, weevils, bugs, worms, caterpillars, &c., the most 

 destructive of which are the Chinch-bug and the Hessian-fly. The Chinch-bug, (Blissus cu- 

 copterus Say) is one of the most formidable and destructive pests with which the farmer 

 has to contend, as it attacks not only the wheat crop, but also indian corn and the various 

 kinds of other grains, besides grass, garden vegetables, &c. This bug is about three-twenti 

 eths of an inch in length and has white fore- wings, each having a black spot in the middle of 

 its edge; the body being usually black. The wingless young are at first red, with a white 

 band on the back, and, aside from this latter characteristic, somewhat resemble the bed-bug. 

 It is slow in motion, and possesses no other weapon of destruction than its tiny beak, with 

 which it attacks the tender parts of the plants, sucking the juices, apparently poisoning the 

 part that is bitten ; yet although small, it makes up by numbers for the lack of individual de 

 structive capacity, being very prolific. This insect is not uncommon in New England and 

 other parts of the eastern portion of the United States, but there its ravages are not as con 

 spicuous as in the extensive grain-growing sections, the valley of the Mississippi having suf 

 fered extensively from its ravages. The female lays her eggs in the ground, about five 

 hundred in number, and there are often two broods of the larvae in a single year. The first 

 brood begins its attack upon the wheat crop generally about the middle of June, and does 

 not always disappear before the middle of August. The second brood appears in Autumn. 

 In the year 1864 about one-half of the corn and three-fourths of the wheat crops in many sec 

 tions were destroyed by this pest, the estimate in loss to the country being about a hundred 

 millions of dollars. After that they seemed to nearly disappear for a time. They are now 

 quite common again, and very troublesome in certain sections. Prof. Cyrus Thomas states 

 that two successive dry years are necessary to the development of them in large and injurious 

 numbers, and that wet weather has a tendency to destroy both eggs and larvae. Various 

 remedies are resorted to in order to accomplish the destruction of these insects. As they seek 

 hiding places in the stubble, weeds, corn-stalks, and all the rubbish that can accumulate in a 

 field, many are destroyed by clearing the field of everything, including weeds and grass of 

 the fence corners, by burning, as soon as the grain is taken from it. Another practice is to 



