THE MIGRATORY LOCUSTS OF THE PACIFIC COAST. 451 



cause a good deal of uunecessary alarm is often occasioned by the con- 

 founding of species. 



THE MIGRATORY LOCUSTS OP THE PACIPIC. 



California has, especially in former years, had its locust plague ; but 

 since 1855 there has been no general destruction committed. In the 

 last century, according to an article by Mr. A. S. Taylor, in the Smith- 

 sonian Eeport for 1858, they appeared in the following years : 1722, 

 174G-1749, 1753 and 1754, 1765-17G7. In the present century they have 

 appeared in the following years, according to the same authority : 



1823. — *' Since 1823 the grasshoppers have several times ravaged the 

 fields and gardens of the Franciscan Missions of Upper California." 



1827 or 1828.— ''About the year 1827 or 1828 they ate up nearly all 

 the growing crops and occasioned a great scarcity of wholesome food." 



1834 or 1835. — ''About 1834-'35 occurred another visitation of the 

 grasshopper, when they destroyed, a second time, the crops of the 

 rancheros and missions, with the exception of the wheat." 



1838-1840. — " Crops and gardens about San Francisco and San Ea- 

 fael were destroyed." In these districts they stopped for three suc- 

 cessive years. 



1846. — " Corn and frijoles were completely consumed this year on the 

 Salinas Plains." This was a dry year in California, 



1852. — '' Some time during the months of June and July the 'hoppers 

 came from a range of rolling hills, some four miles from here, arising 

 from the salt marsh on the east side of the Bay of San Francisco. The 

 grasshoppers have been noticed in the same locality every year since 

 1852, but not in large numbers."— [Lorenzo G. Yates, Centreville, Ala- 

 meda County, California, October 17, 1877. 



1855. — This year is noted for the prevalence of destructive locusts 

 on the Pacific coast. Taylor remarks that " the summer of 1855, and 

 up to the 31st of October, was the direst which has been known for ten 

 years." They were most abundant from July 15 till September 20. 



The Shasta Courier, printed in the Northern Sacramento Mountains, 

 remarks that "on Wednesday last (19th September, 1855) an immense 

 flight of grasshoppers passed over this place, flying westward. The 

 greater portion of them flew very high, and could only be seen by 

 shading the eyes from the sun. They were as thick in the heavens as 

 flakes of snow in a snow-storm. We hope they will not stop flying until 

 they reach the Pacific." We find, also, in the accounts of the press of 

 Humboldt and Klamath Counties, that about this time locusts visited 

 the valleys of that part of the country. The Oregon and Washington 

 Territory papers also notice that in the first week of September of that 

 year the grasshoppers were becoming more numerous than ever in their 

 valleys, and doing great damage. 



Again : 



The grasshoppers appeared in 1855 in much larger numbers in the valley of the Sac- 

 ramento and the mountains which bound it on the eastern or Sierra Nevada side than 



