BOLL-WEEVIL COTTON IN TEXAS. 11 



at the same time and used the same .methods, which would be the 

 ideal system of weevil control. 



Comparisons of different dates of planting or of different spacing 

 methods necessarily lose their significance when the weevils are so 

 abundant that no crop can be set or when enough weevils are bred 

 in the earlier plantings to destroy adjacent later plantings. A method 

 or precaution may show a practical effect in avoiding weevil dam- 

 age under the ordinary conditions when there is moderate or light 

 infestation of weevils, but the same method may show no advantage 

 in seasons when the weevils come through the winter in large num- 

 bers, as happens occasionally in southern Texas. Though the weevil 

 population is relatively small in the spring, enough weevils may 

 survive the winter to destroy all of the early buds, depending largely 

 upon the weather conditions of the fall, winter, and spring seasons. 

 Thus, in the fall of 1921 the frosts came very late, much of the cotton 

 in northern Texas, as around Greenville, not being killed till the 

 night of December 24, so that the survival of large numbers of 

 weevils could be expected. It is easy to understand that in such years 

 the normal and usual advantages of early fruiting are not realized 

 and that everything may depend upon the opportune occurrence of 

 a period of dry weather in June or July to check the reproduction 

 of the weevils and allow some bolls to set. 



Even the best methods of handling the crop may fail sometimes 

 if conditions are too adverse or the weevils are abundant early in the 

 season and are not checked by dry weather or by the use of poison. 

 Though experience in Texas has shown that complete destruction 

 of the crop by boll weevils is a rare and local occurrence if reasonable 

 precautions are taken, the possibility of total destruction in excep- 

 tional years has to be recognized and unreasonable panic avoided, 

 or frantic changes of varieties or methods, for worse instead of 

 better. With other crops it is recognized that even the best varieties 

 or the best methods may fail if conditions are too adverse, and cotton 

 is no longer the " sure crop " of preweevil times. Xo kind of cotton 

 is weevil proof, in the sense of having any complete protection from 

 weevil attack, and no method of handling the crop can assure safety 

 under all conditions, though striking advantages may be shown 

 under ordinary circumstances. 



Farmers in southern Texas who know how the seasonal conditions 

 fluctuate will the more readily appreciate the difficulties that may be 

 encountered in .any particular test or demonstration of methods 

 and the need of observing carefully the behavior of cotton and the 

 extent of weevil injury under different conditions or of trying simple 

 experiments with different spacings to see what can be gained by this 

 means under their local conditions. Even when no effort is made to 

 try a formal experiment, significant information may be obtained 

 by careful observation of the behavior of different plantings if the 

 different features and factors of the problem are kept in mind and 

 conclusions not drawn prematurely on the basis of limited experience 

 or the results of a single comparison. 



EARLY CROPS FROM SMALL PLANTS. 



On account of the longer season required and the later opening 

 of the bolls of large plants, it is plain that the further solution of 

 the problem of avoiding Aveevil damage does not lie in the direction 



