STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
759 
midge* its local distort. 
the heads just protruded from their sheaths, to my astonishment 
I found the flies present thereon in abundance, and already busily 
engaged in depositing their eggs. Of no fact was I ever better 
assured—there had not been a sufficient number of larva) last 
summer in all the wheat fields in this neighborhood to produce 
one-tenth of the number of flies which I there beheld. The con¬ 
clusion is irresistible, therefore, that these insects had been nur¬ 
tured in some other situation than in the wheat. And for nearly 
a month this field continued to be thronged with these flies; their 
larvae soon appeared in the wheat ears ; the yellow birds somewhat 
later commenced opening the chaff to feed upon these larvae, and 
everything took place in its customary round. Though as these 
pages are closing for the press, the wheat is not ripe for the har¬ 
vest, enough is revealed to show that the crop in this field will 
be severely injured, and that other fields in the neighborhood will 
suffer to a considerable extent. A person in passing my door, 
calls to make enquiries on this subject, saying that through his 
town they find the yellow larv® so numerous in the wheat ears 
they fear the crop will be ruined. Beyond this I have no intel¬ 
ligence as yet of what the result of this year’s harvest promises 
to be. 
The first arrival of the wheat midge at any locality is dis¬ 
covered by a few of the larvae occurring in the heads of 
the growing wheat after it has flowered and before it is fully 
ripe. The next year these are found to be much more nume¬ 
rous. And usually by the third year it becomes so multiplied as 
to almost totally destroy the crop. And this destruction con¬ 
tinues, so long as its purveyor, man, will furnish it the amount 
of food which its legions require. But man soon tires of labor¬ 
ing exclusively for its benefit, and after two or three years he 
abandons the cultivation of wheat. The insect now appears to 
nearly vanish. The few small patches of wheat which continue 
to be grown are but little molested, and the idea becomes cur¬ 
rent that the insect is “ starved out.” The growing of wheat is 
thereupon ventured upon somewhat more extensively, when it 
soon becomes evident that the enemy is still there in full force. 
Every few years a season peculiarly favorable to it occurs, when 
the wheat crop is everywhere devastated by it. In the inter¬ 
vening periods its depredations vary from light to severe. And 
no one is able to foresee when it is safe to give his land and 
