CIRCULAR NO. 15. 



HOUSEHOLD PESTS AND THEIR TREATMENT. 



By H. GARMAN, 

 Entomologist and Botanist. 



Inquiries coming to the Department from time to time with 

 reference to treating household insects, together with the grow- 

 ing recognition among people generally of their importance from 

 the point of view of health and happiness have seemed to me to 

 render desirable an account of the common pests of this sort, 

 somewhat more complete than can be given in correspondence. 

 Malaria, typhoid fever, typhus, plague, yellow fever, spotted 

 fever, filariasis, and Asiatic cholera, constitute an impressive list 

 of human diseases now definitely traced to insect carriers, yet 

 it is far from complete and each year makes additions to the 

 number of ailments conveyed by one or another insect. In view 

 of what has already been accomplished in the way of preventing 

 these diseases as a result of this knowledge it may fairly be said, 

 I think, that the greatest advance in medical and sanitary 

 science made in recent years is a result of the discovery of the 

 relation between insects and diseases. But a great boon remains 

 to be conferred upon mankind by teaching the facts learned, re- 

 peating and re-repeating them, until the most ignorant and 

 thoughtless among us, those who suffer most, are impressed with 

 the importance of guarding their homes against such dangers. 



ANTS. 



Every year complaints are received by me from people 

 who are worried by the activities of these persistent little ani- 

 mals, colonies of which have taken up their domicile in some 



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