192 The Rocky Mountain Locust. 



they are reported to have eaten everything green. In Caledonia 

 county, Vermont, they have been very destructive. All through 

 Windsor they have been " a terrible scourge." In Orleans they 

 are reported abundant, and in Windham they have done " much in- 

 jury to some of the crops." In Wayne county, Pennsylvania, also, 

 they are reported to have done much damage. — [Monthly Report 

 Dep. of Agr. for August and September, 1871. 



In 1872 they were again injurious East : 



The grasshoppers are making great havoc on the grass, grain 

 and corn. For a space of about one and a half miles square, they 

 are destroying almost everything. Clover is trimmed up all but the 

 head ; oat fields look like fields of rushes coming up to the height 

 of sixteen to eighteen inches without leaf or head. The leaves of 

 wheat and their kernels are eaten out. These hoppers move back 

 and forth two or three times a day, and whole sections are almost 

 alive with them. — [Mirror and Farmer (New Hampshire), August 

 10,1872. 



In 1874, again, much injury by them was reported in the 

 Mississippi Valley and eastward, and a few extracts will 

 suffice to indicate how numerous they often were : 



The grasshopers destroyed four acres of my wheat last fall ; ate 

 and destroyed my timothy twice ; sowed the ground again' this 

 spring, but as there are still plenty of hoppers, there is not much 

 hope for a stand— [Letter extract from G. Pauls, Eureka, Mo., 

 Nov. 10, 1874. 



Some of our good friends in Suffolk county. Virginia, were un- 

 duly excited this summer over the idea that the Western destructive 

 grasshopper, Caloptenus spretus of Uhler, had found its way to the 

 "sacred soil of Virginia." There was no denying the fact that 

 myriads of grasshoppers were devouring nearly "every green 

 thing," even settling on the trunks and limbs of trees, and gnawing 

 the bark in a most unkind manner ; and as it appeared to be some- 

 thing altogether foreign to the locality, of course it must be the 

 Western pest. Specimens were forwarded to us, however, and a 

 glance was sufficient to show us there was no need for alarm, as it 

 was quite a common species in this part of the United States, and 

 though rather too plentiful in this particular locality, would not 

 spread or become the terror that its Western distant relative has 

 proved. The insect is known as the Acridium Americanum, and is 

 of large size, often measuring over two and a half inches in length. 

 — [C. R. Dodge, in Rural Carolinian, November, 1874. 



In 1875, again, the indigenous species were very abun- 

 dant, and were often supposed to be the genuine spretus, the 



