REPORTS OF OBSERVATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS. 13 



podii, 3>nd have furnished for publication in Insect Life a more detailed 



description than is here given. 



Whether or not my visit to the region in question resulted in any 

 good to the settlers I can not say, for I have not heard from there up 

 to the date of this writing. If the instructions which I gave and 

 insisted upon being carried out were followed the valley could be 

 practically freed from the pest. 



In estimating the cost for the extermination of the plague in this 

 particular region, I believe that it could have been done with an 

 expenditure not to exceed a couple of thousand dollars in money. Of 

 course, the labor necessary for the extermination would be quite an 

 item were it performed solely for the destruction of the 'hoppers without 

 any regard to the saving of crops, and if not done by the settlers them- 

 selves upon their own and adjoining lands. Some of these figures were 

 given to the public in my talks above alluded to. 



In closing my remarks concerning this visit to Grand Junction, I 

 wish simply to add that nature has made the region one of the very 

 best fruit districts in the country. Climate is favorable, but few insect 

 pests have been introduced from abroad, and these cannot live in the 

 changed conditions of the arid climate belonging to the country. Few 

 of the native insects can ever become injurious on account of the differ- 

 ences in the food-plants that this change would entail. Lastly, the 

 grasshopper plague of the past few years is due entirely to careless- 

 ness on the part of the settlers themselves, and a repetition of such an 

 occurrence can be prevented by a little watchfulness on their part. A 

 little care in the way of cleaning up about the waste lands lying along 

 the ditches will be all that is necessary. 



West Nebraska and Wyoming Trip. — On the '2'od of August I left 

 Lincoln for the western part of this State and eastern Wyoming to 

 examine into the reported locust injuries in that section of the country. 

 Stops were made at Sidney, Pine Bluffs, Cheyenne, and the country 

 lying at the headwaters of Pole and Crow creeks. Over this entire 

 scope of country the various " native species 1 ' of Acridians were exceed- 

 ingly numerous — much more so than ordinarily — and any one who has 

 collected these insects here knows what such an assertion means; 

 Judging from the collections made at each of the localities visited, 1 

 have no hesitation in making the statement that fully one half of the 

 species common to the country embraced were injuriously numerous. 

 Some of these had never before been observed by me to occur so plenti- 

 fully. While but little farming is done in this region, the injury was 

 nevertheless much felt by the settlers. The ranges were much reduced 

 in value by these insects, which must have devoured fully one halt' of 

 all the grasses and other forage plants growing upon them. In many 

 places the vegetation had been eaten so closely that a sheep would 

 have had a hard time to feed upon the remnants. 



In settled districts and where irrigating is resorted to remedies can 

 be suggested, but upon the high, dry plains of western Nebraska and 



