128 ASSOCIATION OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGISTS. 



seasons quite as great as that now occasioned by the boll weevil. He 

 felt, therefore, that the encouragement of the abundance of the leaf- 

 worm was open to some question, and that such encouragement from 

 official sources might lead planters to ignore the presence of this pest 

 and omit the customary prompt treatment, with resulting great losses 

 to the cotton crop. 



Mr. Xewell said that it was quite true that the cotton worm was at 

 one time a most serious pest, and did great damage, but since then the 

 planters have learned how to control it with certainty, and without 

 the necessity of consulting an entomologist. It is doubtful whether 

 there is any other single injurious insect which is subject to as full 

 and certain control as is the cotton caterpillar. 



In sections heavily infested by the boll weevil, the production of a 

 so-called " top crop n is impossible, and it is rarely that the caterpillar 

 ever destroys more than the top crop. In weevil-infested sections the 

 top crop must be sacrificed, and in view of this fact, it is preferable 

 to allow the caterpillars to take it and thereby decrease the food 

 supply and breeding places of the boll weevil. 



The boll-weevil problem is most serious upon our alluvial lands, 

 Avhere the cotton grow- high and rank. If caterpillars are permitted 

 to " rag " the foliage of such cotton in the latter part of summer, sun- 

 light is permitted to reach the unopened bolls on the lower limbs, 

 and the maturity of these bolls is accordingly hastened. Any factor 

 which tends toward early maturity of the crop is of the utmost 

 importance in the weevil sections. 



It is not propo>ed to sub>titute one injurious insect for another, in 

 attempting to utilize the caterpillar in the warfare against the weevil. 

 but merely to let one injurious insect destroy the food-supply of the 

 other, after all possibility of making additional fruitage is gone. 

 When the caterpillar appears early in the season, it must be con- 

 trolled, but the application of Paris green to the cotton never secures 

 total extermination of the caterpillar, so that in such years the cater- 

 pillars will become abundant enough to defoliate the plants in from 

 three to four weeks after poisoning ceases. It is merely proposed to 

 utilize the work of the caterpillar in those years when it is sufficiently 

 abundant to completely defoliate the cotton three or four weeks before 

 frost, such complete defoliation answering practically the same pur- 

 pose as the fall destruction of the cotton plants by the planter, and at 

 a much less cost. 



Mr. Hunter said that it was true, as had been stated, that the leaf- 

 worm was a dangerous insect many years ago. but the conditions 

 have so changed that this is no longer true. One of the factors in 

 this has been the cutting up of the larger plantations. Even before 

 the boll weevil came, planters had come to regard a late visitation of 



