658 MISCELLANEOUS FARM SUBJECTS 



deposits her eggs in horse-manure when possible but if this is not 

 available seeks other manure or even human excrement. As it takes 

 only 10 to 15 days for the eggs to mature into full grown flies, there 

 can be five or six generations in a season. The reason they are so 

 very abundant about September is due to the fact that no care what- 

 soever is taken to have all the piles of horse-manure removed during 

 the summer so that there will be no substance on which the female 

 flies can lay their eggs. (Cornell Sch. Leaflet, Vol. Ill, No. 2.) 



The adult fly visits all sorts of filth, manure, slop-pails, pig- 

 pens, decaying animals and plants, among which it finds its food. 

 Unless windows and doors are properly screened, flies are constantly 

 passing from the filth to the kitchen and dining room, walking over 

 the food. In passing over the filth, thousands of bacteria cling to 

 the hairs on their bodies and legs and to the pads on their toes. A 

 part of these bacteria are left later on our food or washed off in the 

 milk that we drink. If there should be among the bacteria those 

 producing typhoid fever, tuberculosis, or any one of the numerous 

 bacterial diseases to which man is subject, the possibility of his 

 taking the disease would be very great. The house-fly is so important 

 a factor in the carrying of typhoid fever that an eminent entomolo- 

 gist, L. 0. Howard, urges that in the future this insect should be 

 known as the typhoid-fly. It is significant that the smaller round col- 

 onies from fly tracks are often flies of a kind of bacteria regularly 

 present in human excrement. There are a few other flies which 

 are attracted to and which may breed in human excrement that also 

 have to be guarded against. The care of human excrement, how- 

 ever, will prevent the carriage of typhoid germs even by these species. 

 The little fruit flies which breed in overripe or decaying fruit, are 

 the principal species in this category. Therefore, fruit storehouses 

 or fruit receptacles should be screened, and overripe fruit should 

 not remain in dining rooms or kitchens for any length of time. 



Mosquitoes are of several kinds. They breed in swampy re- 

 gions, still pools, irrigation ditches, sometimes in old horse-troughs 

 and rain-barrels. These places may be drained, covered with a little 

 kerosene, or stocked with fish that eat the larvae. All houses should 

 be carefully screened and one should avoid remaining outside where 

 they abound. Fortunately most mosquitoes are simply annoying. 

 Culex is the common variety, anopheles the malaria carrying one. 

 Culex has clear wings, short palpi (the projections on either side of 

 the beak) and appears humpback when resting on a wall, that is 

 the head and beak project toward the wall and are not in line with 

 the body. Anopheles has spotted wings, long palpi, and rests with 

 head and beak in line with the body. 



How Germs of Disease Are Scattered. In general disease germs 

 leave the body of the patient through excretions of some sort. For 

 example, the germs of tuberculosis and diphtheria in expectorations ; 

 of typhoid fever in the excrement and sometimes in the late stages 

 of tne disease, in the urine. Accordingly the first sanitary precau- 

 tion consists in the proper care and disposal of these various excre- 

 tions. Physicians direct the disinfection of the sputum of patients 



