438 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



it occurs to us we have state 1 before. It is 

 nothing more than the employment of hogs to 

 exterminate them. In the year 1844 about the 

 last of May they appeared in countless myriads 

 on the wheat field of Col. Thos. J. Randolph 

 ol Edge Hill in the county of Albemarle. Their 

 course was pretty nearly due North,, and they 

 stripped the wheat of blades through the field. 

 North of that field, and adjoining it, we had a 

 pasture in which were many hogs and a few 

 turkies. As the army worm entered the field 

 they were eagerly devoured by the hogs, and 

 the turkeys got what escaped the hogs. Both 

 seemed to prefer them to any other food, and 

 •we do not think a single caterpillar crossed 

 the field. The wheat crop though they had 

 stripped it of leaves was a good one. They re- 

 turned no more in our time, a period of some 

 ten years. We have heard that the same plan 

 has been partially tried in Henrico or Charles 

 City and with success as far as it went. 



Another plan we have heard of has been 

 tried by Mr. Blake, the steward of Mr. William 

 Allen's Curies' Neck property. He dug a ditch 

 along the line of the wheat field, ploughing it 

 out to about a foot or somewhat more in depth 

 and shovelling out the earth. The ditch was 

 about a foot wide at bottom, and nine inches at 

 the top, thus reversing the form of an ordinary 

 ditch, which is sloped from the top to the 

 bottom, whereas this was sloped from the bot- 

 tom to the top. But this reversed slope was on 

 the side next the corn or oats, the side next 

 the wheat being perpendicular. In this bot- 

 tom, at intervals of about twenty feet were 

 pockets, sloped on all four sides from the bot- 

 tom to the top, and of such dimensions as to 

 admit an ordinary weeding hoe. Into this 

 ditch the worms fell as they were attempting to 

 cross and when collected in it and the pockets 

 in sufficient numbers they were mashed by the 

 hoes. In this way Mr. Blake • says he killed 

 them all, and has saved his corn crop, and 

 perhaps his oats. The work took him about a 

 week. 



Our friend, Mr. Wm. C. Tompkins, reports 

 that he saved his crop of wheat on his farm in 

 Chesterfield by sowing corn in a wide belt all 

 around the wheat on which the worm fed until 

 it grew to a chrysalis state. This may do very 

 well when we know they are coming, but can- 

 not, we should think, be of any general utility. 



Insects, particularly ants, as will be seen, eat 

 a good many of them, and birds get numbers 

 of them. Every man who was fool enough to 

 shoot a crow has lost a friend in this emer- 

 gency that would have been worth money to 

 him. 



As soon as the worm reaches its full size it 

 either dies or passes into the chrysalis or pupa 

 state, and they will all most probably have 

 reached this condition by or before the last of 

 June : and it is probable that they will not 

 return again for some years. 



The extent of their depredations cannot, of 

 course, be known now; but we apprehend that 

 it will be considerable, though not as heavy as 

 many persons seem to anticipate. At Shirley, 

 .Westover, and Curie's Neck, where they 

 abounded to such extent that we are informed' 

 they had to be swept out of the houses, in some 

 cases by persons constantly stationed at the 

 doors with brooms and provided with hot water 

 to scald them, the loss to the wheat is estimated 

 at from a fourth to a third of the crop. Aa 

 usual the poor crops have suffered most ; and 

 in those cases the damage may be greater. 



The Grass Caterpillar. 



(Locusta ?) 



Another insect, (PI. VI. fig. 6,) which 

 is often found in cotton fields, and mista- 

 ken for the real cotton -caierpillar-, is com- 

 monly known by the trivial name of the 

 " grass worm," or " caterpillar,'' owing to 

 the circumstance of its most natural food 

 consisting of grass and weeds, although, 

 when pressed by hunger, it will sometimes 

 eat the leaf of the cotton-plant. 



These caterpillars were very numerous 

 in the vicinity of Columbus, in Georgia, 

 about the end of September and the be- 

 ginning of October, 1854. They devour- 

 ed grass, young grain, and almost every 

 green thing which came in their path. 

 Instances have been known in which, 

 urged as they were by necessity and star- 

 vation, they actually devoured stacks of 

 fodder that were stored away for winter 

 consumption. Deep ditches cut in the 

 earth to stop them were immediately filled 

 up by the multitudes which fell in and 

 perished, while eager millions still rushed 

 over the trembling and half-living bridge, 

 formed by the bodies of their late com- 



