AH INVASION OF BRITISH GUIANA BY LOCUSTS. 347 



Reports from the Resident Agricultural Instructors in the various areas, and 

 my own deductions, soon made it perfectly clear that unless stringent measures 

 were promptly adopted by the Government the control of the locusts would soon 

 get out of hand all together. 



In all the districts a certain small percentage of better class and more intelligent 

 farmers were destroying the hoppers to the best of their abilities, only to have their 

 efforts nullified by fresh swarms from the lands of their neighbours who were doing 

 nothing. In 1914 an Ordinance entitled the Insect Pests and Plants Diseases 

 (Prevention) Ordinance was passed. It provided that any person who failed to carry 

 out instructions issued bythe Board of Agriculture for the destruction of any insect 

 pest became liable to imprisonment or a very heavy fine. Accordingly an order of 

 the Board of Agriculture was drawn up embodying instructions for destroying 

 the locusts, which consisted of a number of methods suitable for all classes of 

 farmers. These were widely disseminated in the form of posters. At the same 

 time a warning was issued clearly setting forth the action which the Government 

 would take if the instructions were not complied with and the hoppers destroyed. 



It now became necessary, so as to enforce the execution of these instructions, to 

 appoint in each district individuals who had the right to summons, if necessary, 

 the recalcitrants. This was done and a number of the Agricultural Instructors 

 were detailed for this work. They were constantly employed travelling about 

 from farm to farm advising as to the best methods to be adopted and watching 

 the progress of such work. 



As soon as it became perfectly clear that the Government intended to take 

 immediate action, the destruction of the hoppers was energetically carried out 

 in all the districts. In some cases, however, summonses were necessary, which 

 served as an example and stimulant to the others. The work went on apace, and by 

 the end of November the greater number of the swarms had been destroyed. Only 

 one instance of locusts that had been bred in the colony migrating has been recorded, 

 thus disproving the theory ventilated by certain individuals, entirely without 

 a satisfactory basis, that this species of locust only migrates at one particular 

 period of the year. It is an interesting point that this was the first time that 

 legal proceedings were instituted under the Insect Pests and Plant Diseases (Preven- 

 tion) Ordinance. 



At a meeting of the Board of Agriculture, specially convened to discuss the locust 

 situation, considerable doubts were expressed by some members as to the advisability 

 of instituting legal proceedings. It was held that better results would be obtained 

 by paying farmers and others to destroy the locusts — a scheme which was instituted 

 in 1886 during a previous locust invasion and which cost the Government many 

 thousands of dollars. 



The success of legal proceedings was amply demonstrated by the results obtained, 

 and from my own observations in the various districts I can still further testify 

 to this success. 



Below are the names of those officers of the Department who bore the brunt 

 of the locust control work both in the field and laboratory from July to December, 

 1917. 



