THE CULTIVATOR. 
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THE CUT WORM AND HESSIAN FLY. 
The history and habits of these devouring insects, hitherto a mere 
matter of conjecture, continue an object of intense solicitude to in¬ 
quiring farmers; and more especially, the present season, inasmuch 
as their hopes and prospects of the corn and wheat crops, have been 
with little exception, alike prostrated. American entomology is in 
its germ ; Mr. JVIelsheimer, a Lutheran clergyman of this state, may 
be regarded as the progenitor of the science in this country; he 
published a catalogue containing thirteen hundred and sixty native 
species of insects of one order, or group, in 1806; without descrip¬ 
tions or a history of their habits. Professor Say, has also been en¬ 
gaged for many years in an unfinished work, describing scientifical¬ 
ly, the unnoticed insects of this country. Fortunately for the farm¬ 
ers, his occupation, in its present extended march of improvement, 
embraces personages characterized by that noble and disinterested 
zeal, which brings to the task an ardor far superior to the sordid 
ambition of merely amassing wealth, too often at the expense of a 
broken constitution and green old age. 
The cut worms, are evidently the numerous progeny of some fa¬ 
miliar insect. The question arises, to what species can they be at¬ 
tributed! Some are led to conjecture, that they are propagated 
by the order Coleoptera, or beetle : although I have examined with 
some care, the several species of the beetle tribe common in this 
country, among which the pellet beetle is most numerous, yet I have 
invariably found their larvse of pale yellowish, or light brown color; 
whereas the cut worm is nearly black, and very different in its ha¬ 
bits. The conjecture, that the cut worms are the larvae of the bee¬ 
tle, or any other perpetual insect, should be humbled by the single 
circumstance, that the cut worm is periodical in its devastating vi¬ 
sitations, and consequently can be the progeny only of a periodical 
insect. I know none of that character bearing a semblance of sus¬ 
picion, excepting the cicada septembecem, of the order liemiptera, ge¬ 
nus cecada, and species grilli or grillus of Linn, (here very impro¬ 
perly mistermed locust, for those visiting Europe and Africa, whose 
history present a series of calamities, inspiring all people with su¬ 
perstitious horror.) The American cicada is remarkable for its re¬ 
gular and simultaneous reappearance every seventeen years, in 
countless milllions. They appeared here in 1817 and 1834, several 
years succeeding each of those dates, have been marked, by the de¬ 
struction of the cut worm. And as some of the cicada appear eve¬ 
ry year, we also find some, however few, of the cut worm every 
year. It is ascertained, that the cicada deposite each from 600 to 
1,000 eggs, forming of course a numerous progeny. 
This conjecture of mine, relative to the cut worm, although 
strengthened by observation and experience, yet should any of your 
observing and enlightened correspondents offer an idea more plausi¬ 
ble, the above shall be freely yielded notwithstanding. 
Many practical farmers have prescribed remedies to counteract the 
ravages of the cut worm, stating the consummate success of their 
modus operandi; but it is matter of regret to know, that an effectu¬ 
al remedy is still wanting, to expel or dislodge them when once in 
possession of the corn hill. There are, however, preventives, well 
worthy the farmer’s attention. The most effectual prevention con¬ 
sists in ploughing sward ground intended for corn in autumn, previ¬ 
ous to planting ; but if this be not convenient, a stubble field should 
be chosen, if ploughed in the spring; the rationale or philosophy of 
the mode is simply this, the sod being turned up to the frost of winter, 
it becomes so meliorated and consolidated by spring, (if well plough¬ 
ed) that there will be no green thing scarcely of vegetable kind left 
for the larvae of the insect to subsist upon, and consequently they 
either desert the field or perish. The same parity of reasoning 
holds good for stubble ground, it being also destitute of food, and 
thus affording the grub no harbor. Another method, by means of 
which 1 have entirely succeeded the present season, notwithstanding 
the adjacent field of a neighbor was wholly destroyed, it may not be 
amiss to notice. The field was an old sod of timothy and clover. 
Apprehending the danger of the cut worm, I delayed ploughing until 
after the first of May, to give the grass a start, which grew strong, 
and was ploughed under, designing it as food for the cut worms; 
my expectations were realized, the corn was scarcely touched by 
the worms, and the green grass, consisting almost wholly of soluble 
matter, from present appearances, will be no detriment to the corn 
crop, but vice versa. 
The Hessian Fly, cecydomia destructor of the order diptera, was 
perhaps never more destructive in the middle states than the pre¬ 
sent season. There is a discrepancy in the opinions of writers on 
the history and habits of this insect, which amounts to vaguery. 
One moot point, however, appears settled concerning it, i. e. it is 
entirely mistermed; instead of it being an exotic, it was never 
known in Europe, while its ravages were felt in America long be¬ 
fore the revolution. The tipula tritici of Europe, is in modern no¬ 
menclature, termed cecydomia tritici , but known to be very different 
from our c. destructor in many respects. 
When the fly first made its appearance in Long Island, in 1776, 
its ravages threatened the total abolition of the culture of wheat. 
An alarm was excited in England, that the fly would be imported in 
cargoes of wheat from this country. After the subject had occupied 
the privy council and Royal Society for some time, during which, 
despatches were forwarded to his majesty’s ministers abroad, and 
expresses were sent to all the custom houses, to search the cargoes, 
a mass of information was collected and published, which, instead of 
affording any correct information, served only to prohibit the import¬ 
ation of American grain. 
It is to be doubted whether the fly ever was, or ever will be, the 
primary cause of failure of the wheat crop. The season was the 
primary, and the fly merely the secondary, cause of failure the pre¬ 
sent year. There are sufficient quantities of seed-wheat infected 
every year by the fly, to produce a great devastation, if aided by the 
season. There were still fields in this region the present season of 
failure, which by good soil and culture, grew on undiminished by 
the warm drought of May. I harvested one field of twelve acres, 
low land, which, from facts already ascertained, will average up¬ 
wards of thirty bushels an acre; when in an adjacent field of high 
southern aspect, (which bore on much of its surface less than half 
the quantity of snow which lay on the former, all winter and much 
later in the spring than the latter, which I note as an evidence that 
the wheat plant is never injured by snow, while the rye suffers 
much, it is remarkable to see writers not name the drought of May 
as the main or chief cause of the failure,) though sown of the same 
seed precisely, yet there were not ten bushels to the acre, being in¬ 
fested with the fly, while the field above was entirely free. The 
field which failed looked very fine in the spring after the snow dis¬ 
appeared, but was exceedingly injured by the drought in May, and 
never recovered, giving the larvte of the fly advantage of the sun 
and air to complete its transformations, and prepare it for destruc¬ 
tion. Discoveries deduced from microscopic observations, as well 
as other reasons, combine to establish the fact, that the fly deposites 
its eggs within the glumes of the florets of the wheat, in June ; and 
if the wheat be sown too early, the larvse may injure the wheat 
plant in the fall; and again, if sowed very late, the growth will be 
feeble in the spring, and extremely favorable to the transformation 
of the fly. In May the young insects are easily discerned by the 
naked eye, (having grown from the nits deposited in the grooves of 
the wheat grain,) lodged in the bulb of the plant, between the radicles 
and culm, or plumula, in the pupse state, and soon after form chrysalis, 
after which, they being now in the perfect state, the young fly by 
means of its ovipositor, escapes through the bulb of the plant, near¬ 
ly even with the surface of the ground, when the stalk, from the in¬ 
jury thus sustained, falls to the earth, or hangs pendantly over the 
adjacent grain. The wheat grain, at that season, is generally in 
the milky state, and the whole injured, by preventing the maturing 
process, is of course valueless. When the flies are very numerous, 
their devastation may be compared to that of a hail storm. If the 
habits of this insect be closely pursued, it will be found that they 
are closely confined to the fulfilment of the object of their destiny. 
After it escapes from its terrene abode, it exercises its sexual privi¬ 
leges, seeks the propagation of its species, and then, like all insects, 
in all probability, dies. To recapitulate, if the eggs of the fly be 
not deposited on the grain of wheat, so as to be sown with the 
wheat, how can the pupa be formed in the bulb of the root, com¬ 
pletely encased by the plant in its growth, forming as it were, a 
close cocoon about them 7 This fact must be obvious to every one 
who has examined the plant at the proper season ; this single cir¬ 
cumstance admitted, makes null the conjecture, that the fly is har¬ 
bored about stack yards, in the stubble field, &c. I never knew a 
heavy crop, or a field promising a heavy crop in the spring, and free 
from other causes, to be injured by the fly; hence, if wheat fields 
continue luxuriant up to the season in which the fly commits its de¬ 
predation, they are never injured; but if the wheat, prior to that 
season, be retarded in its growth, or shows the premonitory indica¬ 
tions of a light crop, then the fly may invariable be expected to ap¬ 
pear. 
