CHAPTER II 



INSECTS AND THE FOOD SUPPLY 



IT is a widely recognized fact that insects consume much food 

 material that might otherwise serve for human consumption. 

 The truth of this assertion has been repeatedly brought home 

 to all who have attempted in a modest way to supply their 

 own household needs by means of vegetable gardens, as well 

 as to those engaged primarily in agricultural pursuits. Fol- 

 lowing the spirit of the times, the home vegetable garden has 

 become successively the war-garden and the conservation- 

 garden, and agricultural production in America has grown 

 apace. These immediate changes have not affected the 

 fundamental relations existing between insects and food- 

 plants, nor have they influenced their economic expression 

 to any noticeable extent. They have, however, served to 

 impress upon the entomologist his responsibility as an inter- 

 preter of insect activities in so far as these relate to the pro- 

 duction of human foodstuffs. 



The matter is far less simple than might appear at first 

 sight. In the first place, it depends upon many of the factors 

 which determine the so-called "balance of nature," and sec- 

 ondly it involves the abnormal and rapidly changing environ- 

 ment which has resulted from agricultural development. 



The extent of the loss occasioned by insects to growing 

 agricultural crops, and to edible products in storage, can be 

 estimated with some degree of accuracy by persons familiar 

 with agricultural practice and with insect depredations over 

 wide sections of the country. Several times the Federal Bu- 

 reau of Entomology has gathered together statistics which 

 give an adequate idea of the proportion of vegetable food 

 products actually lost through insect injury, and the conse- 

 quent monetary loss to the people of the United States. From 

 their estimates it appears that fully 10 per cent of our agri- 



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