INJURIOUS INSECTS 

 AND USEFUL BIRDS 



CHAPTER I 



LOSS TO AGRICULTURE DUE TO INSECTS AND 

 RODENTS 



INSECTS comprise fully four-fifths of the animal kingdom. 

 Nearly 400,000 species have been named and described, and an 

 enormous number, several millions, are probably in existence. 

 Deciduous fruit interests lose, according to Quaintance, over 

 $66,000,000 annually through the work of insects. The Mexican 

 Cotton Boll Weevil in Texas alone has caused a loss of $25,000,000 

 annually, and when all southern states which produce cotton are 

 infested with this insect, the country will lose $250,000,000 every 

 year. In 1906 our hay crop was valued at $600,000,000, but 

 might have been $60,000,000 more had 

 it not been for the inroads made by in- 

 sects. About $150,000,000 is sacrificed 

 every year to the Hessian fly, and 

 between the years 1894 and 1909 the 

 chinch bug destroyed $350,000,000 worth 

 of crop. The codling moth (Fig. 1) alone 

 levies an annual tax in the United 

 States of $12,000,000. FlG ' l - Codl * moth > enlar * ed - 



Farm and forest products (Fig. 2) each year in the United 

 States probably average more than $8,000,000,000, and these same 

 products suffer a loss annually of $900,000,000, approximately, 

 through the attacks of insects. Of this the wheat crop alone suffers 

 a loss each year of about $100,000,000. In 1908 a cut-worm, 

 attacking corn over a limited area in Indiana, caused a loss to that 

 crop of $200,000. The work of cattle ticks entails a loss of from 

 $40,000,000 to $100,000,000 each year. Briefly, about ten per 

 cent of all of our crops are sacrificed every year to insect ravages. 



The work of the economic entomologists is to restore to the 

 agricultural classes as much as possible of this loss, and, by their 



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