TWENTY FOFRTir REPORT OF STATE ENTOMOLOGIST 5 



ing advantage of niotliods wliieh Jiave been worked out largely l)y 

 the Montana Agricultural Experiment Station, for which that insti- 

 tution has gained a world-wide reputation, predictions were furnished 

 in regard to the pale western cutworm, grasshoppers, and the sugar- 

 beet webworin. The advance notice on this cutworm was given about 

 nine montlis ahead of the outbreak of 1932, from information 

 developed l)y Dr. R. E. AYjill and was based on the rainfall records 

 of 1930 and 1931. The pretlietiou came true with a vengeance, as 

 some 140,000 acres of grain were affected. This was the largest 

 acreage infested by the pale western cutworm since 1921. The rela- 

 tionship between weather conditions and the^webworm is not suffi- 

 ciently worked out to make possible such a long-range prediction as 

 in the case of the pale western cutw^orm. However, several weeks' 

 notice on webworms was given. This probably came to the attention 

 of relatively few farmers and it is true that most of them were 

 unfamiliar with the possible danger from webworms until they sa"\v 

 their gardens and field crops disappearing from invasions of untold 

 numbers of these insects. 



Grasshopper surveys were made througli cooperation with Dr. 

 J. R. Parker, Bureau of Entomology, United States Department of 

 Agriculture, with headquarters in Bozeman. In 1931 the Federal 

 agency assumed the entire cost of the survey : in 1932 it paid the 

 necessary travel expense and the Montana Agricultural Experiment 

 Station paid the salary of the assistant employed for the work. The 

 advance information obtained, that is the accurate data as to where 

 eggs have been laid by grasshoppers in sufficient number to cause 

 trouble the following year, is of real value. A successful campaign 

 against grasshoppers depends on early organization for the work, 

 and early poisoning of the young grasshoppers before they have 

 spread from the egg beds into crops. 



In addition to the insects which attack our major crops there 

 are otliers that need serious attention. Among these are the pests of 

 shade trees. Some of these insects, such as the defoliators, the com- 

 mon aphids, red spider, and a few others, can lie controlled. There 

 are many others, though, on which we have not sufficient informa- 

 tion to base satisfactory recommendations. Among these are blister 

 beetles, leaf-cutter bees, some gall-forming aphids, leaf-rollers, and 

 several species of borers. The leaf -cutter bees and the borers are tlie 

 most important. So far none of the species of borei's in Montana 

 has ever been controlled by spraying, notwithstanding various claims 



