AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
2A9 
187?.] 
Getting Rid of Stumps .- 11 T. H. D.,” 
Oceana Co., Mich. Where improved laud is worth less 
than $50 an acre, it will not pay to get rid of the stumps 
by any expensive process. It will be better to wait until 
they rot out. To extract them with a cheap stump pul¬ 
ler, worked by oxen, and use them for fences, would be 
better upon cheap land, than blowing them out by dyna¬ 
mite. This can only be done where the land is valuable. 
Basket Items continued 
on page 273. 
Locusts—and Locusts. 
One of the New York illustrated papers, wishing to be 
funny over the appearance of Locusts in New Jersey this 
year, publishes an engraving called “ Summer Boarders,” 
in which a N. J. farmer is met at his gate by the arrival 
of a whole family of visitors, which are represented as in¬ 
sects in costume and carpet-bag. The engraviDg might 
be funny enough, had the artist not, by a sad mistake, 
made the visitors the Western or Rocky Monntain Locust, 
which does not come Bast, instead of the 17-year-Locust, 
which is the one at present so abundant in parts of New 
Jersey. The name Locust, being used for the Western 
scourge and the Eastern visitors, has led many to sup¬ 
pose that the insect was in both cases the same. Not only 
are the two insects so unlike as to be placed in distinct 
sub-orders, but they are strikingly different in their hab¬ 
its. The Western Locust so closely resembles one of our 
common grass-hoppers, as to require close observation to 
distinguish them. An account of this insect, with en¬ 
gravings, was given in the American Agriculturist for 
July, 1875. It is known as the Rocky Mountain Locust, 
(Caloptenus spretus ); its ravages have been confined to 
the country immediately East of the Rocky Mountains, 
and fortunately it has not reached so far east as the val¬ 
ley of the Mississippi. The insect which is now attract¬ 
ing attention in New Jersey and some other localities, is 
known as the 17-year Locust, Cicada, septemdecim. The 
genus Cicada is well known to most of our readers in the 
common Harvest-fly, also called Dog-day Cicada and Jar- 
bug, (C. canicularis ), a remarkably square-headed insect, 
about an inch and a half long, which makes its appear¬ 
ance over a wide extent of country near the end of July, 
and by its shrill note, said to be audible for a mile, an¬ 
nounces that the dog-days are at hand. As an account of 
the 17-year Cicada or Locust, as it is commonly called, 
will serve to answer numerous questions, and relieve 
some apprehensions, we give a brief outline of its habits, 
referring those who would know more about it to 
Harris’Insects, and to Riley’s “First Report on the In¬ 
sects of Missouri,” (1809). We reproduce here some en¬ 
gravings, made to illnstrate an article published in 1866, 
in which year the insects made their appearance in West¬ 
ern Pennsylvania. The eggs are laid by the parent in¬ 
sect, in grooves in the twigs of trees, as shown in figure 1; 
they hatch in about 6 weeks from the time they are de¬ 
posited ; the young larva is about Via of an inch long, 
white, with long feelers, and six legs, the first pair of 
which are remarkably large, shaped somewhat like lob¬ 
ster-claws, and well calculated for digging. Soon after it 
is hatched, the young insect drops to the 
ground, and at once burrows into the earth ; 
here they live upon the roots of plants, it 
is supposed that they employ their beaks in 
sucking the juices of the roots; but little is 
positively known about their manner of 
feeding. The insect continues this under¬ 
ground life, subsisting upon roots, increasing 
in size, and occasionally casting its skin, for 
17 years 1 When the time comes for it to 
end this subterranean existence, it works 
towards the day-light, making a cylindrical 
channel % of an inch in diameter, with 
cemented sides, which reaches to the sur¬ 
face. The grubs, or more properly, pup®, 
remain near the surface for several days, and 
at a favorable time they crawl out, always in 
1- the night. In this condition they are soft, 
whitish, and bear but little resemblance to the perfect in¬ 
sect ; they crawl part way up the trunks of trees, or to 
some other place, and firmly fasten themselves by their 
claws. After a while the skin bursts along the back, and 
the perfect Cicada gradually works its way out, leaving 
the shell in a perfect state, save the rent in the back, 
(fig. 2), where it was made fast; it is semi-transparent, 
and has somewhat the appearance of parchment. When 
the insect leaves the skin, it is at first very soft and limp, 
with no conspicuous wings; in a few hours a great change 
takes place, its body dries and hardens, its wings unfold 
and take their proper shape, and it appears as in figure 3; 
it is soon able to fly off in search of a mate, and to add its 
note to the orchestra already in full blast. The sound is 
not produced by the mouth, but by a curiously construct¬ 
ed drum, found only in the males; a tightly stretched 
membrane, made to vibrate by the muscles of the insect, 
produces the note. Where the insects are numerous, their 
combined drum¬ 
ming sounds like 
a thrashing ma¬ 
chine in opera¬ 
tion. The 17-year 
Cicada is distin¬ 
guished from the 
common Harvest- 
fly, by its much 
narrower head and 
body, and especi¬ 
ally by its red eyes, Fig. 2. — THE EMPTY PUPA CASE, 
and the orange-red 
color of the edge and larger veins of the wings. Near the 
tips of the wings there is a darkish line, somewhat like 
the letter Wj which, to the superstitious, has long stood 
for “ war,” though, as there are two of them, some one 
has suggested that “ warm weather ” is the more appro¬ 
priate interpretation of these “ signs and omens.” After 
pairing, the females deposite their eggs. They are pro¬ 
vided with powerful piercers, with which they make 
grooves in the small branches or twigs of trees, in which 
the eggs are deposited in two rows, in clusters containing 
15 or 20 eggs each. Each female lays 400 to 500 eggs, af¬ 
ter which she dies. The chief damage done by the in¬ 
sect, is in mutilating the twigs of fruit trees in depositing 
the eggs ; though provided with a beak, it is not known 
that the perfect insects feed to any extent, and they are 
unable to eat the foliage. They are much more frequent 
upon forest trees than in orchards, but when they come 
upon fruit trees, there seems to be no remedy. The only 
thing to be done is to cut and destroy the twigs contain¬ 
ing the eggs, to prevent the larv® from entering the 
ground in that locality. The insects do not appear the 
same year all over the country, there being a great nuin- 
Fig. 3.— the 17-year locust, or cicada. 
ber of different broods, each appearing at intervals of 17 
years, and there is scarcely a year but what they are pres¬ 
ent in some part of the country. Mr. Riley, in the report 
above referred to, gives the statistics of 22 different broods, 
some of which, mostly confined to the Southern States, 
complete their career in a shorter time, and appear every 
13 years. The present brood is found on both sides of 
the Hudson River, in a part of Connecticut, in Northern 
New Jersey, and in parts of Pennsylvania, Indiana, 
Michigan, North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland. Its 
appearance at intervals of 17 years has been recorded 
ever since 1724. Next year a brood is due in Central 
Illinois, Southern Iowa, and Northern Missouri. 
Do they Sting ?—Since the above was in type, a friend 
asks us if the 17-year Locusts sting, as the statement 
that they do is frequently made in the papers. The in¬ 
sects have no proper sting, like the wasp or bee. The 
female has an ovipositor, and a beak for sucking, while 
the male has the beak only. Attempts to make the 
female puncture the flesh with her ovipositor have failed, 
and it appears that whatever wounds have been made by 
the insect—and the accounts of these are greatly exag¬ 
gerated—are from the beak. The authenticated cases 
show that this has sometimes, though very rarely, punc¬ 
tured the flesh, but produced no more serious results than 
the prick of a pin, as the beak has no poison gland. It 
is probable that these cases are very rare. 
Bee Notes for July. 
BY L. C. ROOT, MOHAWK, N. Y. 
Indications at the present writing, are, that surplus 
honey may be stored earlier than usual. In most sec¬ 
tions, in this latitude, however, the general crop may be 
expected during July. In Central New York, Basswood 
(or Linden) begins to blossom from the 12th to the 20th 
of July, and at that time we expect our heaviest yield. 
If the honey is to be taken from the combs with the 
extractor, the old honey should be taken out clean from 
each hive, before the yield from Basswood begins, in 
order that the pure white honey from that may be kept 
by itself. This is one of the advantages of extracting 
surplus honey. If bee-keepers will study the different 
honey-yielding plants, and watch the time of their blos¬ 
soming, they may take each kind by itself. 
If boxes are used, and one quality of honey fails before 
they are entirely filled, the bees must be allowed to store 
two qualities in the same box, or they must be taken off 
when only partly filled. 
Hives that are to be boxed, should have boxes in place 
promptly. As fast as boxes are filled, they should be re¬ 
moved, as by so doing the combs will be much whiter 
than if left upon the hives longer, and the bees allowed 
to pass over them. When the first boxes are removed, 
empty ones may take their places, but care should be 
taken not to put empty ones on the hives too late in the 
season. It is quite common for inexperient bee-keepers 
to have too many partly filled and soiled boxes. When 
boxes are taken off, place them near the entrance of the 
hive, and blow a little smoke into them; then, by slight¬ 
ly rapping them, the bees will pass out 
and go into the hive. For applying the 
smoke for this purpose, nothing can 
work more satisfactorily than the 
Quinby Smoker, shown in the engrav¬ 
ing. It will be seen by its construction, 
that the smoke can be very easily 
forced into the boxes. It is desirable, 
especially late in the season, to remove 
the bees from the boxes as speedily as 
possible, and put the boxes where the bees cannot have 
access to them, to prevent robbing. 
Hives should be well ventilated. If the boxes are 
placed upon the hives at the proper time, giving the bees 
sufficient room to store their honey, and the hive is so 
ventilated as to avoid their becoming over-heated, 
swarming may often be prevented. 
If, after bees have a good start in boxes,.they insist 
upon swarming, the swarm may be hived in a new hive, 
and after removing the old hive to a new stand, the new 
swarm may be placed upon the old stand. Two or three 
days later, remove the boxes, that are partly filled, from 
the old hive, and put them upon the new one. In this 
way all the working force will be with the new swarm, 
as nearly all the old bees will return to the old stand, and 
after-swarming will, in nearly every case, be prevented. 
It was my intention to have said in Notes for June, 
that one of the best swarms of bees I have, is the one 
wintered on its summer stand, and the amount of honey 
it consumed was given each month during the winter. 
The swarm had no protection except a quilt placed over 
the frames. I shall give my views on these experiments 
before it is time to prepare bees for the coming winter. 
[Mr. Root is particularly desirous to so shape his Notes 
as to meet the monthly wants of our readers. Bee-keep¬ 
ers seeking information, will please forward their ques¬ 
tions directly to him. In sending.them to us, there may 
be a sufficient delay thus caused, to prevent the answer 
from appearing the following month.— Ed.] 
A Potato Digger and Cultivator. 
We give herewith illustrations of two implements 
that may be found very useful, and in fact where 
potatoes are grown in large quantities, indispensa¬ 
ble. The labor of harvesting potatoes by hand is 
a very slow and costly process, and some machine, 
by which the work may be done both quickly and 
well, is greatly to be desired. The implement shown 
at figure 1, is Rue’s Improved Potato Digger, and 
although we have not actually tried it in the field, 
its appearance recommends it as promising to be 
effective. It is provided with a coulter for opening 
the ground, to which is attached a revolving fender 
which prevents the vines from clogging it. The 
digger follows the coulter and lifts the potatoes, 
the screen behind separates the potatoes from the 
earth and leaves them upon the surface. With a 
fair crop, fifteen pickers are required for each dig¬ 
ger. A curved knife attached to the digger enables 
it to raise sweet potatoes ; the vines being cut on 
one side by the knife prevents them from choking 
the digger. This implement is made by G. W. Rue, 
Hamilton, Ohio. 
A hand cultivator, which will be very useful for 
root crops in the field, or for corn, beans, potatoes, 
or other crops, which are planted in rows too nar¬ 
row for the use of a horse cultivator, is shown at 
figure 2. This is also made by Mr. Rue. In mak¬ 
ing a trial of this implement in beans, sweet com, 
and potatoes, we find that a man can go through a 
quarter of an acre in an hour with great ease, and 
do very clean, good work, the rows being 34 inches 
apart. In small corn, carrots, and other crops, that 
are tender and easily injured by rough work, a 
spiked roller attached to the cultivator works close 
up to the plants, without throwing earth upon 
them, and cleans and loosens the ground very thor¬ 
oughly. In using the hand cultivator, the handles 
are grasped and the implement is then thrust for- 
