DESTRUCTION OF THE WINGED INSECTS. 405 



smoke and fumes from such a fire will prevent Ibe locusts from alight- 

 ing and swerve them from their course. Mr. S. T. Kelsey succeeded in 

 saving many of his young forest-trees in Kansas, in 1874, by persever- 

 ingly smudging and smoking them. He gives his experience in the fol- 

 lowing words, in the Kansas Farmer ^ August 26, 1874 : 



At first we tried building fires on the ground, but it was not successful. The smoke 

 would not go where we wanted it to. We then tried taking a bunch of hay, and hold- 

 ing it between sticks, set fire to it, and then, passing through the field on the wind- 

 ward side, held it so that the smoke would strike the grasshoppers. We would soon 

 have a cloud of 'hoppers on the wing, and, by following it up, would, in a short time 

 clear the field. We have thus far saved everything that was not destroyed when we 

 commenced fighting them ; and while I do not give this as an infallible remedy, 

 not having tried it sufficiently, yet it does seem to me, from what I have seen of it, 

 that one good active man who would attend right to it could protect a twenty-acre 

 field or a large orchard. But to be successful one must attend strictly to business. 



The great difficulty experienced in making the smudging successful 

 is in the inconstancy of the winds, as a sudden change in wind direc- 

 tion may render much previous labor unavailing. Mr. W. D. Arnett, of 

 Bear Creek, Colo., who has given a good deal of attention to the practi- 

 cal means to be employed against locusts, has endeavored to meet the 

 difiiculty by using a portable iron bucket as a fire receptacle. A large 

 sheet-iron backet is fitted with a perforated tube, arranged across its 

 bottom, open at one end to admit air, and there provided with a valve 

 to regulate the admission of air. A perforated cover, hinged to the 

 bucket, and a handle to carry it by, complete the arrangement. Filled 

 with some substance which burns imperfectly, such as bufifalo-chips and 

 a little coal-tar, and with the cover shut, an amount of air insufficient 

 for complete combustion is admitted through the valved tube at the 

 bottom, and the dense smoke comes out through the holes in the cover. 



The burning of old bones has been tried, but found to be no more 

 effective than other slow combustibles. The use of smoke will be 

 effectual in proportion as farmers combine together and produce it sim- 

 ultaneously over extended areas. 



THE EFFECT OF CONCUSSION. 



Two modes of concussion have been proposed for the destruction of 

 insects or their eggs ; the first being terrestrial concussion, produced by 

 means of exploding powder or other similar compounds in the grouiid; 

 the second, by means of small fire-arms or cannon. No experiments 

 have yet been made that give anything like satisfactory results. The 

 vitality, whether of the locusts or their eggs, will hardly be affected by 

 such means. We received a number of communications on the subject 

 of concussion during the year, and will quote a few passages from the 

 correspondence in illustration of the different views held. Mr. L. A. 

 Hardee, of Honey Moon, Fla., who is most enthusiastic in urging this 

 supposed means of destruction, writes : " I do not know how many 



