50 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Limitation of the outbreak. This matter is of great practical 

 importance in control work, since if there is a general flight and 

 distribution of the pests, individual effort is of comparatively little 

 value. It was noted at the very beginning of our investigations 

 that the trouble was confined entirely, or nearly so, to sandy areas 

 and the further our inquiries were pushed, the more data supporting 

 this conclusion were obtained. A most striking instance of this 

 limitation was to be seen along the State road from Gloversville to 

 Broadalbin in the vicinity of the Skinner Creek valley. To the 

 southeast of this road is a fertile, well-cultivated valley which last 

 summer was practically free from grasshoppers, while on the north- 

 west and extending almost to the road, was a series of low, sandy 

 hills and generally sparse vegetation which fairly swarmed in places 

 with grasshoppers. The line of demarcation was so sharp that hosts 

 of grasshoppers could be found in some places within 200 feet of the 

 roadway on one side, while practically none were to be seen upon the 

 other. The same conditions, but on a much larger scale, obtained in 

 the Mohawk valley. There were no signs of an unusual number of 

 grasshoppers in the valley from Amsterdam west as far as St 

 Johnsville, and in the latter locality inquiry from a number of pre- 

 sumably well-informed persons failed to disclose any knowledge of 

 nearby infestations, though in the sandy region of Lassellsville, about 

 3 miles to the north of St Johnsville, millions of the pests were to be 

 found. The same restriction, broadly speaking, was noted in Sara- 

 toga, Warren and Dutchess counties, and so far as we were able to 

 learn, obtained in other sections where the pests were extremely 

 abundant. In other words, there is a close connection between the 

 sandy soil and sparse vegetation and an outbreak of local grass- 

 hoppers such as that which caused so much loss last summer. 



Species destructive. The lesser red-legged grasshopper, M e 1 - 

 anoplus atlanis Riley, was by far the most destructive species, 

 and the evidence at hand, including earlier records, leads us to support 

 the conclusion of Scudder l that this is probably the form which has 

 been responsible for most of the earlier grasshopper injury in the 

 eastern part of the United States. This pest is very similar to the 

 more generally distributed and commoner red-legged grasshopper, 

 Melanoplus femur-rubrumDcG., the two forms differ- 

 ing in somewhat obscure structural characters and, to a marked ex- 

 tent, in prolificacy. M. atlanis, according to Scudder, has a very 

 wide distribution, extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific ami rang- 

 ing north as far as latitude 50 , and on the Pacific coast extending to 



1 U. S. Nat. Mus. Proc. 20: 182, 1897. 



