UC-NRLF 
 
 
 FARM 
 
 CON RAD I 
 
 AND 
 
 THOMAS 
 
FARM SPIES 
 

 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO DALLAS 
 ATLANTA SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED 
 
 LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA 
 MELBOURNE 
 
 THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. 
 
 TORONTO 
 
FARM SPIES 
 
 HOW THE BOYS INVESTIGATED FIELD 
 CROP INSECTS 
 
 BY 
 
 A. F. CONRADI 
 
 PROFESSOR OF ENTOMOLOGY, CLEMSON AGRICULTURAL 
 COLLEGE 
 
 AND 
 
 W. A. THOMAS 
 
 ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ENTOMOLOGY, CLEMSON 
 AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE 
 
 gork 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 1916 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
QIFt 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1916, 
 BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 
 
 Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1916. 
 
 , DEFT, 
 
 Noriuooti 
 
 J. 8. Cashing Co. Berwick & Smith Co. 
 Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 
 
TO THE LATE 
 COL. E. W. SIMPSON 
 
 PENDLETON, S.C. 
 
 IN RECOGNITION OF HIS WISE COUNSEL AND HIS 
 UNSELFISH DEVOTION TO THIS CAUSE 
 
 445098 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 IN our work with boys and girls in the public 
 schools and with college students in agriculture we 
 have found that the greatest interest was taken in 
 subjects that answered the following question, 
 " What am I going to do with it ? " They are not 
 satisfied with the life history and habits of insects 
 unless the methods are explained by which they 
 may be controlled, provided the methods given are 
 practical. 
 
 The stories in this book are written for the boys 
 and girls and for those persons who know nothing 
 about insects and how to fight them. The authors 
 have tried to write them in simple language and 
 no attempt has been made at exhaustive discus- 
 sions. The control measures have been confined 
 to such as may be readily employed by any one 
 troubled by the insects treated. Though the arti- 
 cles have been written in story form to assist the 
 teacher and parent to interest the child, the facts 
 
 Vll 
 
Vlll FOREWORD 
 
 in regard to insects are correct, while nearly every 
 incident mentioned has at some time or other come 
 within the experience of the authors. 
 
 The articles are action stories and the figures as 
 far as practicable represent action. It has been 
 the aim to make each story sufficiently complete 
 to give the reader a clear view and a working 
 knowledge of the subject. The same plan of pres- 
 entation is not adhered to in order to avoid mo- 
 notony. Plans for investigating insects have been 
 embodied in a few of the articles to enable the 
 child to understand how the facts were obtained. 
 
 The boys and girls constitute the greatest asset 
 in our national life. There is no greater force on 
 earth available by which we can induce parents to 
 adopt better practices than the boys and girls. In 
 shaping our agriculture for the future the progress 
 made will be in direct proportion to the extent to 
 which we can interest them. 
 
 In the preparation of these stories we are in- 
 debted to the work and writings of entomologists 
 past and present. Especially helpful has been the 
 work of the Sections of Southern Field Crop In- 
 sects, and Cereal and Forage Crop Insects, Bureau 
 of Entomology, U.S. Department of Agriculture ; 
 Dr. W. E. Hinds, Entomologist, Alabama Experi- 
 ment Station, and Dr. S. A. Forbes, State Ento- 
 mologist of Illinois. A number of the illustrations 
 
I 
 
 FOREWORD ix 
 
 were obtained from various sources, due credit 
 being given in each case. 
 
 In the preparation of the manuscript and a 
 number of negatives the authors are indebted to 
 Mrs. A. F. Conradi for valuable assistance. 
 
 A. F. C. 
 W. A. T. 
 
 CLEMSON COLLEGE:, S.C. 
 June 1, 1916. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 PAOB 
 
 THE BOLL-WEEVIL 1 
 
 THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN . . . . . .23 
 
 WHEN CORN is FOX-EARED 43 
 
 THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 56 
 
 GRASSHOPPERS 79 
 
 CHINCH-BUGS 105 
 
 THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE .126 
 
 WINDFALLS OF CORN . . 146 
 
FARM SPIES 
 
 THE BOLL-WEEVIL 
 A GREAT FIGHT TO SAVE THE COTTON 
 
 MANY years ago the Southern soil was ruled by a 
 king whose name was Cotton. Not only did he 
 rule the soil, but the people also, because there was 
 no other cultivated plant on the farm so abundant 
 as cotton. The people depended on the cotton- 
 crop for their money with which to buy food, cloth- 
 ing, and other things they needed or wanted. Peo- 
 ple, for that reason, spoke of the cotton-plant as 
 King Cotton. 
 
 One day Mr. Corn visited the South and saw how 
 much the people loved cotton, and no matter in what 
 direction he looked he saw nothing but cotton, 
 cotton, cotton. "I never saw anything to beat 
 this/' Corn said to himself. " People are surely in- 
 terested in Cotton, and no other cultivated plant seems 
 to have a chance on the farms down here because 
 no one believes that there is anything so good as 
 Cotton. I do not see how this can go on much 
 longer. I know it does not do in my section of the 
 B 1 
 
FARM SPIES 
 
 country, where Corn is a great crop, and I believe 
 I will speak to Cotton about it sometime." 
 
 One day King Cotton and Mr. Corn were walking 
 down the street together talking to each other. 
 
 " People surely love you in this section of the 
 
 FIG. 1. "People are surely interested in cotton." 
 
 country/ 7 said Mr. Corn to King Cotton. This 
 pleased the king, and he smiled and answered, 
 "Yes, that is true, and they have every reason to 
 feel proud of me, and all my fellow-plants. If it 
 were not for me, the people would have to starve. 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 3 
 
 This is surely my country, and no other plant need 
 ever try to get started here, ahem!!" 
 
 King Cotton had said this in such a haughty way 
 that it made Mr. Corn angry, and he replied : 
 ?Mt seems to me you are taking a great risk." 
 
 "What do you mean?" King Cotton asked gruffly. 
 
 "To grow nothing but cotton over such a large 
 area as the cotton-belt must sooner or later make 
 more cotton than the people can use, and when that 
 happens the cotton will bring a very poor price ; 
 it would be a bad thing when so many people depend 
 on it for their living. Now look at it in another 
 way : year after year you have the same kind of 
 plant growing on the same soil, and all the plants 
 eating the same kind of food ; this must be starv- 
 ing the soil. You are taking plant-food from those 
 soils without putting any back. I don't care how 
 much money a boy has in his bank, if he keeps tak- 
 ing away day after day without putting any back, 
 his bank w r ill become empty in spite of what he may 
 think about it. Will the crop ever fail? It is 
 possible that the cotton-crop may fail some bad sea- 
 son, and then how are the people going to make a 
 living till another crop can be made ? In my coun- 
 try the farmers always have more than one crop, 
 so if one or the other should fail they will not suffer 
 an entire loss." 
 
 While Mr. Corn was talking, King Cotton looked 
 
FARM SPIES 
 
 Sit him as if he was angry enough to bite him. Then 
 he scolded Mr. Corn, saying: "It seems to me you 
 are taking a great risk talking to me the way you 
 do, but a big and powerful king like me would call 
 
 your talk only 
 childish prattle. 
 Do you not know 
 that my tern- 
 tory extends from 
 ocean to ocean 
 and from the 
 Gulf of Mexico 
 northward half- 
 way across the 
 United States ? 
 I and my. coun- 
 try are known 
 the world over. 
 Every year I 
 furnish food for 
 millions, build 
 railroads, high- 
 ways, and water- 
 ways. During 
 my reign not an enemy appeared in the cotton- 
 fields that did not soon become very sorry for 
 having come, because we whipped every one of them. 
 When the cotton-leaf worm came he thought that 
 
 (From Bur. ofEnt., U. S. Dept. ofAgr.) 
 
 FIG. 2. "He thought that he was the biggest 
 bug on earth." 
 
THE BOLI^WEEVIL 5 
 
 he was the biggest bug on earth, but he did not 
 stay with us long because he said that the Paris 
 green we treated him to was a little too strong for 
 his stomach, ha, ha, ha, ha, ahem ! And he was 
 mighty careful about coming again. I do not see 
 what on earth could be strong enough to force me 
 to take notice of it." 
 
 When they came to the cross-road they parted, 
 and as Mr. Corn was walking along one road he said 
 to himself, "That Cotton has the big-head and 
 there is no doubt about it. He is just a big egotist, 
 and that's what he is. So far he has had fairly 
 good luck, but I have never yet seen a road that does 
 not turn sometime. 7 ' 
 
 At the same time King Cotton, walking along 
 another road, was scolding in an undertone : " Doesn't 
 Corn think he is somebody ? The idea ! trying 
 to tell me what to do. If he ever gets as big and 
 powerful as I, then he will not have time to 
 listen to such childish prattle as he was giving 
 me." 
 
 In the year 1892 the road turned. Sometime 
 during that year there came across the Rio Grande 
 river a veteran army of many wars. Fifty years 
 ago their ancestors had fought King Cotton in 
 Mexico, and, it is said, they won. When this army 
 came to Texas, Cotton was much surprised. A 
 little plant at the edge of the field looked at a taller 
 
6 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 plant, and asked, "Who are those fellows with those 
 
 long noses?" 
 
 "Sonny," the tall plant answered, "that is the 
 
 boll-weevil," and- they both looked very grave. 
 
 "What scares me/' the older plant continued, "is 
 
 the way the rascals work. They make no fuss about 
 
 it, but every time 
 they start their 
 jaws to work on 
 a square it is al- 
 most certain death. 
 I do not mind hav- 
 ing a leaf or two 
 eaten by some cat- 
 erpillar ; that does 
 not injure me. I 
 
 (FromB U r.ofEt..U.S.Dept.ofA g r.) fo n()t mind hay _ 
 FIG. 3. "Sonny, that is the boll-weevil." . 
 
 ing a bug come and 
 
 eat a square or a boll, because I can stand that, 
 as I have plenty of others left to make a crop ; 
 but these rogues bore holes into the squares or bolls, 
 and every time they puncture a square it is almost 
 sure to drop to the ground ; sometimes they re- 
 main hanging on the plants and dry up. It looks 
 like a dreadful thing to me," said the plant with a 
 long sigh. 
 
 Yes, Cotton had bragged that there was nothing 
 strong enough on earth that could make him take 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 7 
 
 notice of it, but he surely seemed to take notice of 
 the boll-weevil. 
 
 Mr. Corn was talking to Miss Cowpea about it 
 one day, and said, "Miss Cowpea, have you noticed 
 King Cotton lately?" 
 
 "Yes, I have, and he seems terribly nervous 
 about something/' Miss Cowpea replied. 
 
 "Do you know what ails him?" Mr. Corn 
 asked. 
 
 "No, what is it, do you know?" Miss Cowpea 
 asked. 
 
 "Why, that boll-weevil has him frightened almost 
 into a fit," Mr. Corn said. 
 
 "Is that boll-weevil as bad as all that?" Miss 
 Cowpea asked. 
 
 Mr. Corn explained: "He is a bad one, let me 
 tell you. Those boll-weevils are the smartest 
 beetles that ever visited a cotton-patch. They 
 work so differently from other insects that have 
 attacked cotton heretofore. They do not eat the 
 foliage as the cotton leaf-worm or the grasshoppers 
 do. They do not display themselves on the plants 
 as the 'fool' leaf-worms do, but they stay behind 
 the little leaves you see around every square and 
 boll." 
 
 "How do they feed?" asked Miss Cowpea. 
 
 "You know that they have beaks that remind 
 you of little elephants' trunks. At the ends of 
 
8 FARM SPIES 
 
 these beaks are the mouths. With these they make 
 
 cavities into the squares and bolls and eat the in- 
 
 sides," Mr. Corn explained. 
 
 "Don't they eat the outside of the squares and 
 
 bolls?" Miss Cowpea asked again. 
 
 "I guess I have told you. No, they do not eat 
 
 the outside except 
 for a tiny hole as 
 big as an ordinary 
 pin." 
 
 Old Mr. Crab- 
 grass had now be- 
 come interested, and 
 looking up, said, "I 
 have been watching 
 the performance for 
 some time, and I 
 am sure I do not 
 
 (FromBur.ofEnt.,U.S.Dept.ofAgr.) S66 hoW Cotton is 
 
 FIG. 4. "With these they make cavities go j ng to manage it. 
 into the squares and bolls. 
 
 But speaking about 
 
 those cavities, do you notice they leave some of 
 them open and others they close very carefully. I 
 wonder why they do that?" 
 
 Mr. Corn replied, " Those that are left open are 
 used for food only, but when they want to lay their 
 eggs they make the same kind of cavity, and after 
 the egg has been laid into it they seal it very care- 
 
THE BOLLr-WEEVIL 
 
 9 
 
 fully ; this must 
 be quite a pro- 
 tection to the 
 egg from ene- 
 mies and it must 
 prevent the 
 square from dry- 
 ing." 
 
 "But look at 
 all those squares 
 lying on the 
 ground. Who does 
 that?" Miss Cow- 
 pea asked. 
 
 Mr. Corn, who 
 had been watching 
 very closely, ex- 
 plained : "That is 
 because many of 
 the squares will 
 drop to the ground 
 within a week after 
 they have been 
 punctured either for 
 feeding or for egg- 
 laying. A few days 
 after the eggs are 
 laid they hatch into 
 
 (From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. ofAgr.) 
 FIG. 5. "Those that are left open are used 
 for food only." 
 
 (After Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 6. "They hatch into little footless 
 grubs." 
 
10 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 little footless grubs which feed on the inside of 
 the squares. When the grubs become full-grown 
 they change to pupa?, from which a few days later the 
 young weevils emerge. The time required from egg 
 to full-grown weevil is from two to three weeks." 
 
 "Let me tell you 
 something more," 
 Corn added; "this 
 is going to be a 
 great war. That 
 boll-weevil army is 
 something terrible, 
 but people think so 
 much of Cotton that 
 they will fight as no 
 farmers have ever 
 fought before." 
 
 Wherever the 
 weevils were at 
 work one could see 
 the buds and blooms 
 
 lie on the ground. No one had ever seen anything 
 so destructive. When Martin Hentsel's boys came 
 from the field one day at dinner-time they told their 
 father about it. He answered, "Well, I had better 
 go and look at it myself after dinner." The way 
 he said it made his son Jim rosy, and he replied 
 rather curtly, "The damage will be just the same." 
 
 FIG. 7. "They change to pupse." 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 11 
 
 "What!" his father retorted, "did you ever see 
 anything that could stump me, heh?" 
 
 "I am afraid I have ; I think I saw it this morn- 
 ing, and it is the little boll-weevil. If you know how 
 to get us out of this trouble, then I am willing to 
 believe that there is nothing on earth that can 
 stump you." 
 
 "We will see about it," Mr. Hentsel answered 
 with importance. 
 
 It is true that Mr. Hentsel was a bright man and 
 a good farmer and always seemed to find some way 
 to get over trouble, so when he came to the cotton 
 field after dinner several of the neighbors saw him 
 and came also. After he had looked at the cotton 
 carefully, he turned to the other men and said, "Let 
 me tell you something." Everybody listened, think- 
 ing that a bright idea had occurred to him. "This 
 is terrible," he said, and walked home. 
 
 "We have known that for several days, haven't 
 we?" George Carnes said. "We may as well go 
 back to our plows." 
 
 And so it was with the best farmers. They saw 
 that, in spite of anything they said or tried to do, 
 the weevils became more and more destructive. 
 Year after year they became more numerous and 
 kept on spreading over more plantations. In 1900 
 they had spread over the greater portion of east 
 Texas and had entered Louisiana. Cotton and his 
 
12 FARM SPIES 
 
 supporters saw nothing but gloom ahead. Soon 
 after the weevils had been discovered, entomologists 
 of the United States Department of Agriculture 
 came and studied the pests. Cotton saw them 
 busily working day after day, night after night ; 
 they never made any noise and they would not talk. 
 One day when Cotton was talking to Corn he said : 
 "I never felt so bad. I always thought that I was 
 so strong that I had nothing to fear, but I tell you 
 I am being beaten by those pests, and nobody can 
 help me." 
 
 "Go easy," answered Corn; " those entomologists 
 are at work, and they are the men who will get you 
 out of this trouble if anybody on earth can do it." 
 
 "I don't know about that," Cotton replied. 
 " Those men are too quiet ; they will not talk. Oh, 
 I admit they are busy enough, but why don't they 
 talk and tell us something. I have no faith in them. 
 Other men come around and they make speeches 
 and the people cheer them, and I think that they 
 will help me if anybody can." 
 
 "Don't you pay any attention to those speech- 
 makers. This is not the time for speech-making. 
 It is wasting breath. Those entomologists are 
 members of the staff of Dr. Science, and I have end- 
 less faith in the old Doctor. You have not had 
 enough experience with him to know ; he has his 
 men work slowly and carefully, and they say noth- 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 13 
 
 ing until they have something to say. Dr. Science 
 and his staff have been of untold help to us in the 
 corn-belt, and you can take my word that before 
 long you will find that those entomologists are the 
 best friends you have, and that they will find a way 
 to save you. Don't listen to the talkers, they are 
 mostly men who do that to get into politics. You 
 put your faith in Dr. Science, and mind what I tell 
 you." 
 
 A short time after Cotton and Corn had this talk 
 the entomologist said: "We have found that the 
 weevils suffer heavy losses in winter and are so 
 weakened by spring that it is necessary for them to 
 increase their numbers greatly before they can do 
 great damage. We must force the cotton to get 
 ahead of the weevil. To do this we must prepare 
 our land in the fall and winter. The seed-bed must 
 be well prepared and plant-food must be given 
 intelligently. After the cotton is up, keep the weeds 
 down and cultivate often and shallow in order to 
 keep a blanket of loose soil at the surface ; this pre- 
 vents the soil from drying out and is called a soil- 
 mulch. We must save the soil-moisture because 
 the cotton needs it when the hot and dry weather 
 sets in. If you allow the surface of the soil to pack 
 or let a crust form by rain, you will lose the soil- 
 moisture quickly and the plants will suffer. 
 
 "The soil-water helps to bring the plant-food in 
 
14 FARM SPIES 
 
 the soil into solution so that the plant can take it ; 
 plants, as you know, cannot take solid foods. This 
 will enable the cotton to bloom, and form bolls 
 before the weevil-army, weakened by winter, can 
 become strong enough to puncture all the squares 
 before they bloom and form bolls." 
 
 When Cotton saw people beginning to practice 
 this and that it helped, he felt more cheerful. He 
 said to Corn: "You know I feel somewhat better. 
 I thought that my end had come, but those quiet 
 entomologists have gained a point in my favor. 
 Those men are here, there, and everywhere, study- 
 ing every movement of the weevils to see if these 
 movements cannot be made into weapons to fight 
 the bandits. I agree with you now that, the ento- 
 mologists are the best friends I have. Who would 
 have thought that they could take winter and line it 
 up as an enemy against the weevils ? Planting early 
 kinds of cotton as early as is safe and forcing them 
 as they told us, surely helps." 
 
 There came upon the scene of action another 
 band of workers whose existence had never been 
 dreamed of. They were led by another great Ameri- 
 can who was an expert in farm-management, and 
 his band of workers were called demonstrators. 
 Every important discovery which the scientists 
 made they not only told Cotton, but they went to 
 the farms and showed the farmers how to use it. 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 15 
 
 The people began to prepare their lands better and 
 better. As. they showed them these things they 
 talked to the farmers, saying: "The soil needs air 
 and water. You let your lands lie idle during winter, 
 with stalks and stubble and weeds on them ; the re- 
 sults are land-washing and the loss of plant-food, 
 and it has been shown that the weeds and stalks 
 provide shelter for the boll-weevils in winter. If 
 possible plow your land well in the fall to enable the 
 soil to store up moisture ; cover-crops should be 
 sown to prevent the loss of this moisture, to avoid 
 the leaching away of the plant-food, and to keep the 
 soil from washing. Good crops for this purpose are 
 rye, oats, and wheat, but whenever possible crops 
 should be used that have the power to add nitrogen 
 to the soil, because this is one of the most important 
 and most expensive plant-foods." 
 The people who had listened became very much 
 interested, and asked, "What are some of the plants 
 that have the power to make nitrogen?' 7 They 
 were told that good examples were vetch, cowpeas, 
 clovers, alfalfa, and others ; that the vetches and 
 some of the clovers made good ccfver-crops. Some 
 asked, "How can any plant make nitrogen in the 
 soil?" The entomologist replied: "One day when 
 Dr. Science was walking across a field he heard a 
 vetch-plant and a bacterium talking together, and he 
 listened. 
 
16 FARM SPIES 
 
 '"How do you do?' said the bacterium to the 
 vetch-plant. 
 
 '" Not very well/ answered vetch. ' I cannot get 
 enough nitrogen. You know that every meal I eat 
 I must have potash, phosphoric acid, and nitrogen ; 
 I can get enough of the first two, but I am starving 
 for nitrogen, and so I feel very bad. Nitrogen, 
 you know, is hard to keep in the soil, and as it 
 costs so much, farmers are not willing to supply 
 enough of it.' 
 
 "'That is very funny/ answered the bacterium; 
 'with me it is just the other way. I have all- the 
 nitrogen I need because I have a very cheap way of 
 making it, but I cannot get enough potash and phos- 
 phoric acid, and as I have to have them on my table 
 as well as you, I am starving. 7 
 
 " Dr. Science then stepped forward and asked the 
 bacterium, ' You say you have an easy way for mak- 
 ing nitrogen ; will you explain it to me ? ' 
 
 " ' With pleasure/ the bacterium replied. ' Three- 
 fourths of the air is nitrogen, and God has given 
 me the power to draw on this vast storehouse and 
 change it so that it can be eaten by plants. 7 
 
 "'Wait 'a minute, Mr. Bacterium/ said Dr. 
 Science; 'would it be possible for you two to get 
 together and trade?' 
 
 "'I have an idea/ exclaimed the vetch-plant; 
 'we can live together ; the bacterium can live on my 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 17 
 
 roots and supply me with nitrogen and I furnish 
 him with phosphoric acid and potash." 
 
 This was agreed upon, and now the bacteria live 
 in colonies in little nodules on the roots of vetch. 
 Being asked about it later, vetch answered, "It 
 
 FIG. 8. "The little houses may now be found on the roots of vetch, 
 clovers, beans, peas, alfalfa, and other legume plants." 
 
 works fine." The little houses may now be found 
 on the roots of vetch, clovers, beans, peas, alfalfa, 
 and other legume plants. 
 
 "Use vetch or clover for winter and cowpeas for 
 summer and rotate your crops/' said the demonstra- 
 
18 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 tors. So the people planted rye and vetch in the 
 cotton lands in the fall. Some planted oats and 
 vetch, or clover. Some farmers would plow this 
 under in the spring to add green manure to the soil ; 
 
 (Photo by Harper, S. C. Exp. Sta.) 
 FIG. 9. "And cowpeas for the summer." Cowpeas in the foreground. 
 
 others let it grow in the spring and later cut it for 
 hay or grain. Some of the land where the winter 
 cover-crops were plowed under was planted in 
 corn, and the corn was followed by cowpeas at the 
 
THE BOLD-WEEVIL 19 
 
 last working. The corn-land was again planted in 
 cover-crops in the fall to be plowed under again in 
 the spring to add more vegetable matter. Where 
 the cover-crops were cut for hay the land was 
 planted in cowpeas, and in this way the soils that 
 had been idle a large part of the year were made to 
 work every month of the year. 
 
 The boll-weevils . were mad now. They had a 
 spite against the entomologists and the demonstra- 
 tors. u The way those fellows are going at it is 
 surely hard on us/' they said; " farmers used to 
 plant nothing but cotton, and we had no trouble to 
 find plenty of food everywhere, but now many of 
 the same fields are planted in corn and other crops 
 which we cannot eat. Shucks, what decent bug 
 would eat corn, that old tough stuff ; and those 
 cowpeas that we tried to eat the other day, why, 
 it made our stomachs sick ; there is no taste to them, 
 oh, hum/' they sighed. 
 
 The weevils were now forced to scatter to find 
 food, and when winter came they found that the 
 fields had been handled differently from the old 
 custom. Two weevils were talking one day. 
 
 "How are you getting along?" one asked. 
 
 "I am getting along all right if I could only find 
 a place to stay over winter. It beats all. I never 
 heard of my parents having trouble this way ; they 
 always found plenty of old stubble, rubbish, grass, 
 
20 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 and leaves, but now the farmers clean up the fields 
 so that it is impossible to find lodging. Even the 
 woods are cleaned up, and the nice underbrush along 
 the creeks and branches where my ancestors used to 
 spend the winters in comfort are grubbed out and 
 
 FIG. 10. "They always found plenty of old stubble, rubbish, grass 
 and leaves." 
 
 everything cleaned up. Well, I must hurry, or cold 
 weather will catch me in the open. I must find cover 
 for winter." An old cotton-plant, that was left for 
 an experiment, heard what the old weevil said, and 
 he laughed and laughed. " Whoopeee/ 7 he exclaimed, 
 "we are getting you on our wagon, old boy." 
 
THE BOLL-WEEVIL 21 
 
 All this time the entomologists had been hard at 
 work and had learned that the weevils cannot go 
 into winter quarters until driven by the cool weather. 
 They told the people about it ; and said : " No army 
 can fight unless the soldiers have their stomachs 
 full. You must pick fast and as far as you can, 
 destroy the cotton-stalks about two weeks before 
 the first killing frost. If you can, plow them under. 
 This will force the weevils to starve before they can 
 go into winter quarters, for they must have cotton 
 to feed on until that time." Many people who had 
 been waiting for the entomologists and demonstra- 
 tors to find some spray to kill the weevils saw that 
 the many different kinds of sprays that had been 
 tried were failures. One morning in June a num- 
 ber of those people were sitting in front of Miller's 
 store talking about the hard times. 
 
 "If these entomologists and demonstrators would 
 only find some simple spray that we could use, then 
 we could fight the weevils," they said. 
 
 Just then Jim Conley, one of the best farmers of 
 that section, came along and heard what they said. 
 
 "I hope they will never find a spray," he said. 
 
 "What ! ! !" those people roared. "What do you 
 mean?" 
 
 "If somebody should find such spray, you would 
 depend on it instead of good farming. You would 
 just keep on growing nothing but cotton and wear 
 
22 FARM SPIES 
 
 out your soils," and he walked on, because he was a 
 good farmer who did not have time to stand around 
 the street, arguing. 
 
 Since the weevils came to this country many in- 
 sects and birds have become their enemies and are 
 destroying them. Even the cotton caterpillar, that 
 athlete among insects, has been of help in fighting 
 them, by eating the leaves late in the season when 
 no more squares may be expected to mature ; this 
 kills weevils by starving them or by forcing them 
 into winter quarters before they are ready. 
 
 Mr. Hentsel says: " The boll-weevil is a bad one, 
 and I wish he had never come, but he is here, and 
 we might as well forget when he came. He has 
 done us good. Since he came to the South we have 
 found out that we are better farmers than we thought 
 we were. When that long-nosed rogue came he 
 thought he would just walk over us and starve us, 
 but I tell you, gentlemen, Americans are hard to 
 beat." 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 
 
 JOHN DRAKE had complained several times that 
 something was injuring his corn, but was unable to 
 find out what was causing it. One evening he came 
 home with his face looking 
 somewhat like a thunder 
 cloud, and it did not re- 
 quire a second look for any 
 one to conclude that he 
 was in a very bad humor. 
 His right hand was closed 
 as if he were carrying some- 
 thing, and the children 
 were wondering what he 
 
 found that displeased him so. He walked to the 
 dining room and laid two black beetles on the table. 
 
 " I have caught them in the act," he said. " These 
 rascals are the cause of my corn's dying. I found 
 them in an old stalk, and you ought to see what 
 they did to the inside of the stalk. They just 
 about made sawdust out of it," and striking the 
 table with his fist he looked at Mrs. Drake and the 
 children about him. 
 
 23 
 
 FIG. 11. "And laid two black 
 beetles on the table." 
 
24 FARM SPIES 
 
 "They are not rascals; they are beetles," said 
 Johnny, who was too young to understand how his 
 father felt. If Johnny had been old enough to be 
 responsible for a corn crop, he might have under- 
 stood. 
 
 "What??" Mr. Drake thundered. 
 
 Johnny in his innocence thought that he was ask- 
 ing for information, and so he repeated, "They are 
 beetles. They have hard wing covers and - 
 
 "I don't care what they are they are killing 
 my corn they have killed it, and it made no dif- 
 ference to them what I said or did," his father 
 roared. 
 
 Johnny had by this time realized that he made a 
 mistake when he spoke and that his father was in 
 no frame of mind to listen to a story on insect struc- 
 ture. His father had discovered that these insects 
 had killed his corn, and he wanted revenge. 
 
 "How are they injuring the corn?" Mrs. Drake 
 asked. 
 
 "They are not doing any injury now because the 
 corn is ready to gather, but what they did do is 
 enough. I am going to get ready for war, and if 
 necessary I will catch every one of them and twist 
 their heads off. Yes, sir, that is what I will do," 
 he said, sitting with his chin in his hands and a 
 grouchy look on his face. 
 
 To the children it looked comical, and they would 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 
 
 25 
 
 have laughed had they considered it safe. No one 
 laughed, you may be sure, or if he did he took good 
 care that his father should not see him, because he 
 was not in a humor to see 
 anything funny about this. 
 
 Johnny had to goto school 
 the rest of the week, and he 
 saw farmers all around him 
 harvesting corn. When he 
 came from school the first 
 evening after his father had 
 found the beetles, he asked 
 him whether he had found 
 any more. 
 
 "No," his father answered, 
 "I cut dozens of stalks open 
 to-day, but I did not find 
 another beetle.' 7 
 
 So it was the rest of the 
 week. His father had been 
 cutting stalks but had found 
 no more beetles. On Satur- 
 day morning all the corn had 
 been gathered, and only the 
 stubble were left in the fields. There was much 
 other work to do at this time of the year, so that 
 the beetles were soon forgotten. One very cold 
 morning in January, as Johnny started to school, 
 
 FIG. 12. "But what they did 
 do is enough." 
 
26 FARM SPIES 
 
 he met Frank Welden on the road, and they walked 
 along together. Mr. Welden was one of the oldest 
 farmers of that neighborhood, and was very fond of 
 Johnny. 
 
 "Well, Johnny, this is a cold morning, but when 
 a man has plenty of good kindling-wood, plenty of 
 meat, potatoes, and fruit in the cellar, and his barn 
 full of fodder, he does not mind it so much. That 
 is what I like about farming; we farmers always 
 get along better than many of the people living in 
 town.' 7 So Mr. Welden talked to Johnny and 
 Johnny listened to every word he said. When they 
 came to where they could see Mr. Drake's cornfield 
 on the right of the road, Mr. Welden said, " Johnny, 
 tell your father that he should not be leaving the 
 corn stubble on the field over there the way he does." 
 
 "Why?" asked Johnny. 
 
 "It is a bad thing to do. It is only common 
 farming. Those stubble somehow make lots of 
 bugs next year/' Mr. Welden explained. 
 
 Just at this time they came to the cross-road. "I 
 will tell him what you said," Johnny called as he 
 left Mr. Welden. 
 
 When Johnny came home that evening he told 
 his father what Mr. Welden had said. 
 
 "Mr. Welden believes that all kinds of insects 
 stay in those stubble during the winter," his father 
 replied. 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 27 
 
 "Do you believe that?" asked Johnny. 
 
 "I don't know whether I do or not. It looks 
 to me as if any bugs trying to stay in those stubble 
 would freeze to death during the winter," Mr. 
 Drake replied. 
 
 "I have been thinking about it," Johnny con- 
 
 FIG. 13. "Those stubble somehow make lots of bugs next year." 
 
 tinued ; "the little bugs have no houses with warm 
 stoves and I have wondered many times what they 
 do through the long cold winter when there is no 
 food. I should certainly hate to be a bug." At this 
 remark by Johnny the whole family laughed. 
 
 "What makes you think that the bugs live during 
 the winter?" asked his mother. "I thought that 
 they all died in the fall." 
 
28 FARM SPIES 
 
 "My teacher told us that bugs lived during the 
 winter in a quiet, sleepy condition called hiberna- 
 tion/' Johnny replied; "during the winter , she said 
 that they did not have to have food, and that from 
 the bugs that stay over winter the insects come the 
 following year." 
 
 "All right, Johnny," said his father with a laugh, 
 "I give you a job for next Saturday. You go over 
 the old corn stubble in the field back of the barn, 
 cut them open and examine them closely to find 
 out if there are any bugs in them." 
 
 "I'll do it/' answered Johnny. They all laughed, 
 and no more was said about the subject that evening. 
 
 On Saturday morning, Mr. Drake saw Johnny 
 going across the field. "Where are you going, 
 sonny?" he called. 
 
 "I am going to hunt for the bugs you told me 
 about the other evening," Johnny answered. 
 
 Mr. Drake, laughing with a "guffaw," said, 
 "Well, well, boy, go easy now and don't catch them 
 all, because if there happened to be no bugs next 
 year it would surprise me so that I could hardly 
 get down to. business, and then the weeds would 
 cover my cornfield." 
 
 "That is the time I would plow the corn for you," 
 Johnny answered, laughing, and walked on. 
 
 When he arrived at the cornfield he confessed 
 to himself that he had little faith in finding bugs in 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 29 
 
 the corn stubble, and if he failed the folks at home 
 would laugh at him. Starting in a half-hearted way 
 he selected the biggest stubble he could see and 
 putting his right foot on one side and his left on 
 the other he stooped over and began pulling with 
 both hands as hard as he could, in fact he pulled 
 so hard that he grunted. While pulling he bit his 
 tongue between his teeth and drew his face out of 
 shape as if he were suffering severe pain. When he 
 had pulled, twisted, grunted, and looked painful for 
 some time, the stubble, root and all, came so suddenly 
 that Johnny was not prepared, and he fell backwards, 
 almost turning a somersault, with earth flying all 
 over him. He remained on his back a few moments 
 as if to catch his breath, then got up, stiffly, like an 
 old man, and sat rubbing his eyes. He put his 
 hands down, winked hard a few times, and then 
 rubbed his eyes some more. He kept on spitting 
 and sneezing, wondering if he would ever get rid of 
 all the pieces of earth that had lodged in his eyes, 
 nose, mouth, and ears. Then he slowly drew his 
 knife from his pocket and split the stubble and root. 
 What do you suppose he saw as he laid the two pieces 
 on the ground very quickly and looked at them with 
 bulging eyes? He thought that he saw three bill- 
 bugs partly hidden in little nests in the dried and 
 rotten pith of the inside of the stubble. 
 
 "I must have fallen pretty hard, for I never see 
 
30 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 such things except when I dream at night. I won- 
 der if the fall hurt my eyes." He rubbed them once 
 more, quite thoroughly this time. He looked again, 
 and, sure enough, the bugs were still there. He 
 broke a piece from another stubble, and getting down 
 on his knees he pushed the beetles and turned them 
 over. 
 
 FIG. 14. "He looked again, and, sure enough, the bugs were still there." 
 
 "My eyes are all right, and those are bill-bugs as 
 sure as I live. I bet they are dead, or maybe asleep, 
 no, I saw that one move." He pointed to one 
 of the beetles which he saw move its legs. After 
 a few moments he saw the others move slightly. 
 
 "Hm, they act like boys when you wake them 
 up in the morning, except that they do not yawn. 
 
THE BLACK BILI^BUG OF CORN 31 
 
 Maybe they do, but their mouths are so small that 
 I cannot see .them. To tell the truth I do not know 
 yet at which end the mouth is located." So Johnny 
 spoke to himself, at the same time carefully studying 
 the beetles. He saw the eyes and feelers, and then 
 was sure that the mouth was at the end of the little 
 beak. Looking at them gravely, he said to himself : 
 "They look like elephants except 
 that they are blacker, much 
 smaller, have no tails, no lopping 
 
 .. T FIG. 15. -"They look 
 
 ears, well, 1 guess they are not like elephants, ex- 
 like elephants after all. Why cept ~ 
 should my looking at them have reminded me of 
 elephants? Oh, I see now, those little beaks did 
 it, because they remind one of elephants' trunks. 
 That is it. Well, well, well," he sighed and looked 
 about him. "I am going to pull some more, and 
 I will surely take some home to show to father. 
 See here, I did not come to practice for a circus, so 
 the next stubble I am going to dig up, and then 
 there will be no danger of my turning somersaults 
 without knowing it until it is all over." He went 
 to a near-by fence, broke off a good-sized sliver, and 
 with it he dug up many more stubbles. With his 
 knife he split these open. Finding beetles in most of 
 them, he was no longer discouraged, but felt that he 
 was being well repaid for his trip. It was a great 
 relief that they could not laugh at him when he 
 
32 FARM SPIES 
 
 returned home, because he had a discovery to report 
 and the bill-bugs in the stubble to prove it. 
 
 Did you ever discover anything, and do you re- 
 member how good you felt about it ? Here in these 
 innocent-looking corn stubble was the winter home 
 of the corn bill-bug. There the little insects slept 
 throughout the long winter when the ground of the 
 
 FIG. 16. "Johnny, that cold-frame back of the chicken-coop I give 
 you for an insect breeding-cage." 
 
 stubble-field was frozen and icicles hung from the 
 eaves. 
 
 When he came home and showed them what he 
 had found, they all became very much interested. 
 "Johnny/' said his father, "that cold-frame back 
 of the chicken-coop I give you for an insect breeding- 
 cage. It is my cold-frame, but you clean the glass 
 in the sashes well, and then get more stubble from 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 33 
 
 the place where you got these and put them in the 
 ground in the cold-frame just as they were in the 
 field ; do not cut the stubble. Please get the stubble 
 to-day, because I am going to plow them up and 
 remove them from the field. I'll warrant that they 
 will not stay there this winter to breed the bugs to 
 eat the corn next summer. It begins to look to me 
 as if I have been breeding bugs to eat my corn. 
 No more of that ; I am going to see the neighbors 
 and tell them about this and ask them to destroy 
 the stubble." 
 
 Johnny got the stubble as his father had directed, 
 and put them in the ground under the glass sashes. 
 Not a day passed that Johnny did not look into the 
 cold frame. It took much tedious waiting through 
 many weeks because the insects would not stir as 
 long as the tang of frost was in the air. Johnny 
 said he thought it was the longest winter he had 
 ever spent. When at last the warm weather of 
 spring set in, the insects woke from their long sleep 
 and left their winter homes to find something to eat. 
 
 "I do not blame them," said Johnny, " because 
 such a long nap would make anybody hungry." 
 
 During the first few days they did not seem to be 
 able to get their appetites in good condition even 
 though Johnny had been so thoughtful and planted 
 five hills of corn in the nice rich soil of the cold- 
 frame. They wandered about as if uncertain what 
 
34 FARM SPIES 
 
 would be the best thing to do. Sometimes several 
 beetles would gather near the same spot with their 
 heads close together. One morning a funny thing 
 happened ; seven of the beetles had gathered near 
 the same spot with heads near together. When 
 Johnny saw them he laughed outright and called 
 his father. Mr. Drake came, pulled his spectacles 
 from his vest pocket, put them on his nose, and slowly 
 and awkwardly set the bows over his ears, in the 
 meantime drawing his face out of shape as though 
 the putting on of spectacles was a painful piece of 
 work. Johnny got impatient, because he was afraid 
 that the bugs would leave their positions before his 
 father would get through putting his spectacles on. 
 
 " It does take dad a long time to get ready before 
 he can look at anything carefully," he said to him- 
 self very impatiently. 
 
 Mr. Drake at last got his spectacles where he 
 wanted them, and looked at the spot which Johnny 
 pointed out to him. 
 
 "They must be plotting," his father said in a low, 
 careless tone, and putting his spectacles back in the 
 vest pocket he walked to the barn, where he had 
 some work to do. Johnny's eyes followed him, 
 searching him from head to foot until he disappeared 
 from sight through the barn door; then, turning 
 around he spit on a chip with much emphasis and 
 grumbled to himself: "I didn't learn much, did I? 
 
THE BLACK BILlr-BUG OF CORN 
 
 35 
 
 He seemed to be short about it. Maybe, though, 
 he had had no opinion about it, and if that was the 
 case he said enough." He looked at the beetles 
 again and they were still in the same position. "I 
 
 FIG. 17. "They must be plotting." 
 
 must be getting ready for school,' 7 he said, and left 
 the insects to themselves. 
 
 The next day Johnny saw that they were begin- 
 ning to feed, and he watched them as carefully as he 
 could day by day. They attacked the tender little 
 
36 FARM SPIES 
 
 cornstalks near the surface of the ground. With 
 their beaks they would slit them and eat the juicy 
 parts on the inside, which would soon kill the bud, 
 leaving a few green leaves at the bottom of the 
 stalk. There was not very much excitement in this 
 for Johnny. "Because/' he said, "the beetles just 
 kill the young corn and that ends it." However, 
 his curiosity had been aroused, and so he kept watch- 
 ing. It was well that he did, for later in the season 
 he had a chance to see something that stirred his 
 blood. He saw them attack the corn in a field 
 where the plants were from ten to twenty inches 
 high, and the way the plants battled for life was as 
 good an example of perseverance and true courage 
 as he had ever read about in his books. "And this 
 is a living example right before my own eyes," he 
 said. 
 
 When the plants had become twisted and dis- 
 torted from the hard attacks of the bill-bugs and 
 growth seemed no longer possible, each plant threw 
 out suckers near the ground as if to say, "If I must 
 die, then maybe these young sprouts will succeed 
 in making corn. ' ' Often these suckers were attacked, 
 but being as brave as the old stalks from which 
 they came they were determined not to give up 
 the fight, but before they died produced a second 
 set of suckers. In their heroic struggle for life the 
 plants continued to produce suckers, until at last 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 
 
 37 
 
 the old dying plants were surrounded by a mass of 
 
 sprouts that .made the field look very odd. Many 
 
 of the plants were so riddled by the repeated attacks 
 
 of these pests that they could not 
 
 succeed in making grain. Johnny 
 
 sat down by one of these masses 
 
 of suckers and examined it very 
 
 closely. Looking at the dying 
 
 shoots he shook his head gravely 
 
 and said : " Old fellows, you have 
 
 taught me a lesson that I will not 
 
 forget as long as I live. You were 
 
 true to the farmer who so carefully 
 
 prepared the land and planted the 
 
 seed from which you came. He 
 
 hoped to make a crop, and that 
 
 it cannot be done is no fault of 
 
 yours. You fought bravely, but 
 
 the enemy was stronger than you ; 
 
 you had to go down in the 'fight, 
 
 but you went down fighting like 
 
 heroes." 
 
 Johnny found later that when 
 the corn had grown to the height of four feet the 
 beetles could no longer injure it seriously. He 
 thought that the battle was over, and was greatly 
 surprised afterwards when he found that he had 
 seen only part of the fight. 
 
 (After Kelly, Bur. of Em., 
 U. S.Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 18. "Each 
 plant threw out 
 suckers." 
 
38 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 "Why, man/' he said to his little friend Willie 
 Burns, " those beetles were but the skirmishers of 
 the bill-bug army." 
 
 He had forgotten about the eggs the beetles had 
 
 been laying on the corn. 
 He had noticed the egg- 
 laying from June 1 to 
 July 1. The eggs were 
 laid in tiny holes which 
 the mother beetles had 
 made with their beaks, 
 and they had laid any- 
 where from one to ten 
 eggs in a stalk. One 
 reason why he had paid 
 no attention to this was 
 
 (After Kelly, Bur. Ent., U.S. Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 19. " The eggs were laid in 
 tiny holes." 
 
 (After Kelly, Bur. Ent., U. S. Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 20. "The eggs had hatched 
 into little whitish, humpbacked 
 grubs." 
 
 because those stalks were not damaged like the 
 others. He had just taken it for granted that 
 these stalks would go through the season safe, but 
 when he found that the eggs had hatched into little 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 39 
 
 whitish, humpbacked grubs eating the pith he felt 
 that they had not only outwitted the corn but 
 himself also, and this hurt him very much. 
 
 The little grubs were gluttons, eating all the pith 
 from that part of the stalk where they worked, leav- 
 ing only the outer woody wall of the stalk. This, 
 of course, cut off the flow of sap and killed the 
 plants. It was a dry season, and the attacks were 
 so deadly that much of the corn was killed even 
 after silking and tasseling. 
 
 " This beats everything," 
 said Johnny ; "they played 
 it on me this time, but I am 
 
 (After Kelly, Bur. Ent., U. S. Dept. Agr.) 
 
 going to Watch them Closely FIG. 21. "They changed to 
 after this, and if they do the quiet or pupa stage." 
 
 succeed in ' stealing another march on me/ it will 
 not be on account of my being asleep." 
 
 Johnny did see their next move, but it was not 
 until they had become full-grown grubs. They 
 made little cells from chewed pith in the stalks and 
 in them they changed to the quiet or pupa stage. 
 Johnny had read about such things in his books, 
 but this was the first time he had ever seen it. 
 From these pupae the full-grown bill-bugs escaped. 
 Few of them came out of the stalks, and as winter 
 approached nine out of every ten beetles remained 
 in the stalks just as Johnny had found their parents 
 in the corn stubble last January. 
 
40 FARM SPIES 
 
 When Johnny told Mr. Welden what he had seen, 
 the old man asked : " Where do they stay? I have 
 never been able to find any." 
 
 Johnny answered: "The beetles are unlike boys, 
 because these little pests are early risers. They 
 enjoy a good breakfast and supper, but during the 
 hotter parts of the day they hide in shade or just 
 underneath the soil at the base of the plants. " 
 
 "That must be the reason that I never saw them ; 
 I looked at the wrong time of the day/' Mr. Welden 
 replied. "But see here, sonny," he continued; "it 
 seems to me that when we move the stalks from the 
 field after harvest we are taking the beetles with 
 them ; don't you think so ? " 
 
 " Right there is where the the beetles get the best 
 of us, because they do not stay in the stalks. I have 
 cut hundreds of them open and never found a single 
 insect, but if you will cut open the stubble or root, 
 you will have no trouble finding them. When we 
 carry our stalks away we must take stubbles and 
 roots also," Johnny explained. 
 
 Old Mr. Welden was now as tickled as a school- 
 boy who has had good luck. He had such a broad 
 grin on his face that Johnny wondered how he could 
 do it without hurting his face. 
 
 "Sonny," he said, "do you remember when I told 
 you to destroy your corn stubble? I have farmed 
 all my life and I have noticed that where you leave 
 
THE BLACK BILL-BUG OF CORN 
 
 41 
 
 the stubble during the winter the bugs are worse 
 on your corn the next year. I was not able to 
 'ferret 7 it out, but you see now that the old man was 
 right. And I can tell you another thing, sonny; 
 I never plant corn where I had corn the year before, 
 
 FIG. 22. "I have made crops when others failed." 
 
 and whenever I can do it I plant as far away as 
 possible from where corn was before. You don't 
 believe that this is important, do you?" 
 
 "I do, Mr. Welden," Johnny replied; "you are 
 one of the very best farmers of this section, and I 
 
42 FARM SPIES 
 
 have seen you make crops when the other farmers 
 failed. I like to hear you talk." 
 
 "I always knew that you were a sensible boy/ 7 
 said Mr. Welden; "and now let the old man tell 
 you another thing. . I have made crops when others 
 failed because I had planted my corn just as early 
 as it was safe from frost in March. You can't 
 always do it on account of weather, but whenever 
 I can do it the bill-bugs won't get my corn as bad 
 as that which is planted later." 
 
 "Is that so?" Johnny inquired. 
 
 "That is so, Johnny, and now I have to be going. 
 You take what I told you and make your pa put 
 it in his pipe and smoke it." At this they both 
 laughed heartily and parted. 
 
 "Mr. Welden is a good friend and he is a smart 
 man, too," Johnny mused as he was walking down 
 the road. Suddenly. he stopped as if he had for- 
 gotten something. "What about that early plant- 
 ing for bill-bugs? I bet I know. If you can get 
 your corn to silking and tasseling before the beetles 
 lay their eggs, the corn is then strong enough to win 
 the battle." He walked on some distance when he 
 suddenly stopped again. "What did that speaker 
 say at the farmers' meeting last month? He said 
 ' the right planting date for bill-bugs often is food for 
 bud-worms.' What did he mean? Gosh! there is 
 a lot to be learned yet about this bug business, but 
 I bet I'll know that too, some day." 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 
 
 DID you ever see fox-eared corn? If not, then 
 you must go to the cornfield in April when the 
 plants are still small and you will surely see it. 
 You may not see any on uplands, but if you will go 
 to a creek-bottom, or some other low place, you 
 will have no trouble finding them. You may not 
 call sueh plants fox-eared, but John Grimes and 
 many other good farmers do. 
 
 John Grimes lives on his farm in the northern 
 part of South Carolina. He is a very tall man with 
 square shoulders and he has the longest beard that 
 we have ever seen. Should any of you ever pass him 
 on the street we are sure that you would stop for a 
 second look, for such men are not often seen. He 
 has three boys, Fred, Harry, and Joe ; and when 
 any one who knows their father meets them, he 
 knows immediately that they are John Grimes's 
 boys because they look so much like their father. 
 All the neighbors say that Mr. Grimes is a good 
 farmer and one of the best neighbors any one could 
 have. He would go out of his way day or night to 
 do you a favor, and his boys are just like him. 
 
 43 
 
44 FARM SPIES 
 
 They love the farm and are a great help to their 
 father. Hardly a day passes, when they are out in 
 the field, that he does not tell the boys something 
 new about plant-growth, birds, or insects. 
 
 One night in April there was a nice warm rain and 
 Mr. Grimes was pleased. "This will make the corn 
 grow, boys," he said the next morning when he 
 came to breakfast. It 'being too wet to work in the 
 field he walked over the farm, but when he returned 
 he looked as if something had gone wrong. "A lot 
 of our corn is fox-eared," he said to the boys in the 
 yard. "As soon as the ground dries off we must 
 take the planters and replant all the fox-eared 
 stalks." 
 
 The boys looked at him for some time as if to 
 ask, "What is fox-eared corn?" At last Freddie 
 said, "We don't know what you mean." 
 
 "If you will come with me, I will show you," 
 the father replied. Soon they were on their way, and 
 when they reached the cornfield they saw the rows 
 of young corn and they thought it a pretty sight. 
 "They are cute little plants," Harry exclaimed. 
 "Look at their leaves; they remind me of the big 
 feathers in our white rooster's tail. Don't they you ? " 
 
 Fred and Joe agreed, with a laugh. 
 
 "That is right," said the father, "and those are 
 healthy plants, that will grow, but there are many 
 that do not carry their leaves that way." 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 45 
 
 "Here is one, is it not? " said Joe. "Look at it ; 
 the leaves are standing up almost straight. What 
 is the matter with it?" 
 
 Their father asked them to walk over the field 
 with him to find out whether there were many 
 plants like it. As they were walking over the hill, 
 they saw very few, but when they arrived in the 
 bottoms they saw many with straight leaves. 
 
 "Now/' said 
 the father, "all 
 the plants that 
 you see with the 
 leaves standing 
 up and not drop- 
 ping like the big 
 tail feathers of our 
 white rooster, I 
 
 Call fox-eared, and FIG. 23. "They remind me of the big 
 
 feathers in our white rooster's tail." 
 
 they will never 
 
 produce corn ; we might as well replant them now." 
 
 "They surely have their leaves standing up like 
 the ears of a fox/' Freddie remarked. "What makes 
 them fox-eared?" he asked. 
 
 "Worms down in the bottom of the stalk," their 
 father replied. 
 
 "If we replant them now, won't the worms get 
 into the young plants that come from the replanted 
 seed?" the boys asked. 
 
46 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 "I never knew it/' their father answered, almost 
 as if angry. 
 
 The boys thought it very strange that these 
 worms would not attack the young corn coming 
 from the replanted seed. 
 
 FIG. 24. "What makes them fox-eared?" 
 
 " Why don't you find the worms in all the plants ? " 
 Joe asked. 
 
 "I guess it is because there are not quite 
 enough worms/' Mr. Grimes replied with a sickly 
 smile. 
 
 So the boys returned from the field where they 
 had seen fox-eared corn, caused by worms down in 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 47 
 
 the bottoms of the little stalks. They talked about 
 it all that day, and that evening they told Mr. 
 Smith, the demonstration agent, when he visited 
 at their home. Mr. Smith smiled, because he had 
 never heard such corn called fox-eared, but said, 
 "That is a very good name for it." Boylike they 
 told Mr. Smith all they knew about it, and when he 
 saw that their father looked so grave about it he 
 was ready to believe that the worms were doing 
 very serious damage. 
 
 The next morning before taking time to find out 
 how much damage the worms were doing, he saddled 
 his horse and rode over to Mr. Watson's farm, where 
 an entomologist was studying another pest. Mr. 
 Smith explained to him what he had been told about 
 the worms in Mr. Grimes's field. "It has spoiled 
 his stand of corn and much of it has to be replanted, " 
 he said. 
 
 The insect man, whose name was Henry Colby, 
 went with him, and together they looked at the corn. 
 Mr. Colby pulled up some of the plants with great 
 care, examined the roots and also that part of 
 the plant which had been underground; then he 
 looked at the rest of the plant. With his pocket 
 knife he split the stem, and with a smile he laid the 
 plant in Mr. Smith's hand. "Just what I thought," 
 he said. 
 
 "A worm," Mr. Smith said, surprised. "Mr. 
 
48 FARM SPIES 
 
 Grimes was right, then ; he said it was a worm, and 
 so did the boys. What is it? " 
 
 "It is the bud-worm of corn," Mr. Colby replied. 
 
 The boys and their father, having seen Mr. 
 Colby and the demonstrator enter the field, had 
 come and joined them because they were anxious 
 to learn something about the worms. 
 
 " Why do you call it the bud-worm ? " they asked 
 Mr. Colby. 
 
 "They do not seem to be in the bud, but in the 
 plant below the ground/' Mr. Smith remarked at 
 
 the same time when the 
 
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^ others asked their ques- 
 
 (After Chittenden, Bur. Ent., U. S. Dept. Agr.) tlOn. 
 
 FIG. 25. "it is the bud-worm of Mr. Colby then told 
 
 corn." . m 
 
 them that the injury to 
 
 the bud was not from the outside like a worm eating 
 the leaves, but from the inside where one cannot see 
 it without cutting the plant. "These little worms," 
 he continued, "known as larvaa, because they are 
 the young of insects, and are not really worms, bore 
 into the tender stalk of the young corn plant, 
 usually at the base where the roots come out. There 
 they feed, cutting off all of the inside of the stalk 
 except one or two of the outer layers, and this causes 
 the bud to die, leaving one or two green leaves at 
 the bottom of the stalk standing up like the ears of 
 the fox. After killing the bud, the larvae feed 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 
 
 49 
 
 upwards or they may feed downwards into the root. 
 No matter in what direction they feed, the small bud 
 dies and the growth of 
 the plant is stopped, and 
 this is the reason why we 
 call them bud-worms." 
 
 "Oh, we see now/ 7 
 said the boys; "when 
 we gathered our corn 
 last fall we saw holes 
 in the grown stalks, and 
 when we cut the stalks 
 open we found worms in 
 them and they must 
 have been bud-worms." 
 
 "No, they were not ; they were corn-stalk borers, 
 and were very different from these bud-worms," 
 
 (After CMttedaen, Bur. Ent., U. 8. Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 26. "Usually at the base 
 where the roots come out." 
 
 FIG. 27. "No, they were not ; they were corn-stalk borers." 
 
 Mr. Colby explained. "After young corn-plants 
 have grown about twelve inches high and are 
 
50 FARM SPIES 
 
 healthy, these bud-worms can no longer seriously 
 harm them. They merely gnaw the outer skin 
 about the same place as in the young corn, as you 
 see here. In some cases it checks the growth, but 
 it is rare that it kills the plant, and the larvae never 
 reach the soft inside part or pith of the stalk." 
 
 "You speak of it as the larva of an insect, Mr. 
 Colby; what insect is it that makes the larva?" 
 Mr. Smith asked. 
 
 Mr. Colby then told him that the insects making 
 the bud-worms are the common twelve-spotted 
 cucumber-beetles which, no doubt, they all had 
 seen many times in their gardens. " There is one 
 now, sitting under that clod; see it?" Mr. Colby 
 said, pointing to the ground. 
 
 Yes, they all saw it, and then they remembered 
 that they had seen thousands of them before. 
 
 " We never knew that this beetle injured corn ! " they 
 all exclaimed. "Why," said Joe, "I have seen them 
 everywhere, in our orchard and garden, and last year, 
 I remember I saw a lot of them in Aunt SalhVs flower 
 garden in the city, but I had no idea at that time that 
 they were such rogues." At this they all laughed. 
 
 "They looked very good, didn't they, Joe ? " Mr. 
 Colby said; "but remember after this when you 
 meet them that they are not as innocent as they 
 appeared to be when you saw them in that flower 
 garden, but they are the cause of much loss 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 
 
 51 
 
 (After CMttenden, Bur. 
 Ent., U.S.Dept.Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 28. "They 
 change to a rest- 
 ing stage, called 
 pupa." 
 
 to farmers by laying their eggs, which make the 
 
 little bud-worms in the corn. The eggs are laid 
 
 by the mother beetle in the soil at 
 
 the base of the young corn-plants. 
 
 The eggs hatch into little worms, 
 
 such as you see here, which bore into 
 
 the tender stalks and kill the buds as 
 
 I have told you. When they become 
 
 full-grown larvae they leave the stalk 
 
 and make a small earthen cell in the 
 
 soil near by. Inside of this cell they 
 
 change to a resting-stage called pupa. 
 
 During this resting-stage they are really not resting, 
 just because they are so still, but 
 a great change takes place. You 
 remember the little verse you learned 
 in school? It says, 
 
 " Action is not always gain, 
 Crystals form when left at rest." 
 
 " During the pupa stage they change 
 from the simple little larva, such as 
 you see here, to a beautiful twelve- 
 spotted cucumber-beetle having 
 wings, wing covers, feelers, and legs ; 
 after a week or ten days this little 
 cell opens, and instead of a little bud-worm wiggling 
 out of it, as you would suppose, there crawls out of 
 it an active beetle!" 
 
 (After CMttenden, Bur. 
 Ent., U.S.Dept.Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 29. "There 
 crawls out of it 
 an active beetle. " 
 
52 FARM SPIES 
 
 "They had all listened to Mr. Colby with intense 
 interest, and when he finished they stood spell- 
 bound. After a few seconds, Mr. Smith broke the 
 silence by asking, 
 
 "Where do they stay in winter when no corn is 
 to be had?' 7 
 
 "In this part of the country they do not go into 
 real winter quarters, like so many other kinds of 
 insects, but when cold weather begins they find 
 shelter under the leaves of weeds and other suitable 
 places, and from there they come out and feed 
 during warm weather. They - 
 
 "What can they feed on in winter ?" Mr. Smith 
 interrupted. 
 
 Mr. Colby explained, "There are several food 
 plants, but there are two kinds of wild weeds known 
 as life everlasting, which are common on the farms 
 of this section throughout the winter ; during warm 
 spells these furnish food, and during cold weather 
 their leaves furnish shelter for the insects." 
 
 "Then it looks to me as if there is no way of 
 getting rid of these little pests," Mr. Smith com- 
 plained. 
 
 "It is not quite so bad as that," Mr. Colby re- 
 plied ; "it is very important where they give trouble 
 that the corn be planted at the right time to prevent 
 damage." 
 
 "That sounds good enough, Mr. Colby, but how 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 53 
 
 do we know when the right time has arrived?" 
 Mr. Smith asked. 
 
 "This must be determined for the different sec- 
 tions of the South," Mr. Colby told them; "in this 
 section we have studied the life and habits of this 
 insect very carefully and find that the first eggs are 
 laid early in March and hatch during the first week 
 in April. The earthen cells and pupae have been 
 formed about May 19, and the full-grow'n beetles 
 come out beginning about May 24. Now, if the 
 weather is such that you can plant in March, the 
 corn has a chance to get a good start before the 
 worms can do severe injury." 
 
 " How about planting in April ? " Mr. Grimes asked. 
 
 "I have just said that the eggs hatch during the 
 first days of April, and to plant your corn at that 
 time would be like feeding the worms, don't you 
 see ? If you wait until the worms have become full 
 grown or have changed to pupae, they do not feed, 
 and that is a good time to plant, to give the corn a 
 chance to get a good start. In this section they 
 change to the pupaa, as I have said, on May 19, and 
 for that reason about May 19 would be a safe date 
 to plant to avoid injury." 
 
 My brother, who lives in the southern part of 
 this state, has this trouble also ; would you recom- 
 mend the same date for him?" Mr. Grimes asked. 
 
 Mr. Colby replied, "In the middle portion of our 
 
54 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 state the pupae is formed about May 12, and in the 
 southern portion about May 5. We should say 
 then that the dates should be as follows where one 
 cannot plant early : 
 
 Upper South Carolina, May 19. 
 
 Middle South Carolina, May 12. 
 
 Lower South Carolina, May 5. 
 
 FIQ. 30. "Here is a map." 
 
 "Here is a map we have prepared for farmers in 
 this state who lose corn by bud-worms." Mr. Colby 
 handed Mr. Grimes a map. 
 
 During the last four years Mr. Grimes has been 
 very careful about the time he plants his corn. 
 Not only has he learned how to escape bud-worm 
 
WHEN CORN IS FOX-EARED 55 
 
 injury, but the knowledge gained that day in the 
 old cornfield .has set him to thinking, and you see 
 improvements on his farm and in his farm-practice 
 everywhere. The neighbors have noticed it, and 
 often come to ask him questions or talk over their 
 farm problems with him. Always ready to help his 
 neighbors, always willing to listen to what others 
 say, and always ready for improvements, he has 
 become a great leader in his section. Should you 
 ever meet him, be sure to ask him whether he is 
 losing much corn from bud-worms. The big bearded 
 face will smile all over, and he will answer you, "I 
 am losing very little corn from bud-worms now. 
 They used to do me a great amount of damage, but 
 I learned how to outwit them. Plant early if you 
 can, but if the weather does not let you do that, 
 then plant at the right time." 
 
 Then he thoughtfully strokes his long beard, and 
 turns his face toward the old cornfield where he met 
 Mr. Colby some years ago. 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 
 
 THE town of Flanders and the country around it 
 has always been known for its good people. Old 
 Uncle Jerry Miller was born and reared just one 
 mile east of town many, many years ago on his 
 father's farm, and he has lived and farmed on the 
 old place all his life. Uncle Jerry knows everybody 
 in town and every farmer in the country around it, 
 and all the people know him. It was he who said, 
 " There is no finer country than that around Flanders. 
 It is level and the soil does not wash away as it 
 does on the hillsides. I would not live in a hilly 
 country anyway, because it seems to me that people 
 must be wearing themselves out walking up the hills 
 and then down again. We have good churches, fine 
 schools, and first-class people. Everybody says so. 
 The people here have a lot of sense, too. Talk about 
 farming, our people have always known better than 
 to raise nothing but cotton and wear the land out. 
 Our farmers raise corn, oats, and hay ; and there is 
 not a home near or in Flanders that hasn't a family 
 garden. The farmers plow intelligently and they 
 are always ready to learn ; they are not the kind 
 who think they know it all." 
 
 56 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 57 
 
 Uncle Jerry spoke the truth when he said that the 
 people planted other things than cotton. They 
 always made good corn-crops and were proud of it. 
 They always made as good corn-crops as were made 
 anywhere, but they could not keep the corn because 
 an army of black weevils had come into their corn- 
 fields from somewhere and caused much loss to the 
 golden ears. The habits of these little pests were so 
 different from any they had ever found it necessary 
 to fight, that the farmers did 
 not know what to do. In 
 the fields, as well as in the 
 cribs, these little rogues 
 would stay in hiding under 
 
 the Shucks like SO many (After Cmtenden, Bur. En t.,U.S. 
 
 bandits in ambush. Un- FIG. 3i. "Soldier of this 
 
 black weevil army." 
 
 seen, every soldier of this 
 
 black weevil army was busily eating into the kernels 
 of the corn, and the farmers felt very bad about it. 
 Every day you would hear some one say, "If some- 
 body does not find some way of stopping these little 
 black thieves, then all our corn will be eaten in the 
 crib." 
 
 "In the crib!" exclaimed John Matthews, who 
 was one of the best farmers of Flanders; "it is not 
 in the crib alone that they do so much damage, 
 but I know when I gathered my corn in my river 
 bottoms last month they had eaten into some of 
 
58 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 the kernels on nearly every ear, and some ears were 
 not worth hauling into the crib." 
 
 ' ' Shucks, ' ' said Fred Hamilt on , ' ' I never saw them in 
 the corn in the field ; you must be mistaken, John." 
 
 "Mistaken?" answered John ; "it seems that you 
 do not know what you are talking about, Fred. 
 
 (After Smith, N. C. Exp. Sta.) 
 FIG. 32. "And some ears were not worth hauling into the crib." 
 
 They were in every field of corn I examined a couple 
 of weeks ago before any of the corn of this section 
 was put into the cribs." 
 
 "It seems to me that I do remember having heard 
 some people say that the weevils were eating their 
 corn in the field," said Fred. 
 
 "You must have," said John, "because everybody 
 has been talking about it." And so they agreed that 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 59 
 
 this pest was becoming more destructive every year 
 and that it was necessary to have something done 
 to save the corn. 
 
 Joe Henderson, the bank president, had listened 
 to these complaints about the weevils. Mr. Hen- 
 derson was a successful banker and farmer ; he was 
 more than that, for he was a fine business man who 
 was big enough to have the interest of his community 
 at heart. Everybody knew this, and whenever he 
 spoke, the people listened. One day they had a 
 meeting to discuss ways for getting rid of the weevils. 
 
 Mr. Henderson said, " Gentlemen, corn is a great 
 crop and must be saved. Every other crop must be 
 saved, and the business men of Flanders will help 
 you. This is a farming section, and the success of 
 this town and its business men depends on the crops 
 made by the farmers of the surrounding country. 
 Without the backing of the farms this town could 
 not be here, and now the people of this town must 
 help the farmers to find some way of getting rid of 
 this pest. The step for us to take right now is to get 
 an entomologist down here to study this black weevil, 
 and maybe he can find out how to kill the thief." 
 
 "An entomologist.?" asked Bob Griggs. "What 
 is that?" 
 
 "It treats of the structure of words, Bob," ex- 
 claimed Ben Gray, anxious to show what he knew. 
 
 Several who knew better laughed outright, and 
 
60 FARM SPIES 
 
 this made Ben very angry. "What are you laughing 
 at? " he retorted, turning red in the face. "The dic- 
 tionary says that it is the derivation of words ; I 
 looked it up now laugh, will you? " 
 
 This had the effect of making them laugh louder, 
 which, in turn, made Ben's face turn redder. 
 
 Mr. Henderson relieved Ben when he said, "You 
 are thinking of etymologist; I said entomologist, 
 which is taken from the Greek entom, meaning insect, 
 and logos, a study. An entomologist is one who 
 studies insects." 
 
 "I never knew that there were men who made it a 
 business to study insects," said Bob Griggs. 
 
 "Yes, sir, they are called entomologists," Mr. 
 Henderson replied. 
 
 Soon after this meeting an entomologist arrived 
 at Flanders who worked like a trained spy among 
 the black bandits. The weevils were at work every- 
 where, on the low wet bottom-fields, on uplands, 
 in near-by woods, but the entomologist was there 
 also, and it was a common sight to see him crawling 
 out of a crib with corn silk over his face and clothing. 
 After he had worked a long time and had studied 
 the habits and lives of the pests, he asked the 
 farmers and business men to meet at the corn-crib 
 on Jack Smith's place on the following Saturday 
 morning at ten o'clock sharp, when he would tell 
 them what he had found out about the weevils. 
 
62 FARM SPIES 
 
 At the day and time set for ' the meeting the 
 farmers came from far and near, over all kinds of 
 roads, some on horseback, others on foot, and others 
 came in big farm wagons. Some of the business 
 men came in automobiles. Jack said that his big 
 grove back of the barn was " chuck" full of mules, 
 wagons, automobiles, and people. He said, "I am 
 sure glad that my place is a little hilly, for if it were 
 flat there would not be room for them all." 
 
 The entomologist came out of the crib and spoke 
 
 to them: "This 
 black weevil is by 
 far the worst enemy 
 the corn crop around 
 here has to face. 
 
 FIG. 34. "Into these they lay their eggs." 
 
 how these pests keep up their great numbers. 
 The females bore little holes into the kernels, 
 and into these they lay their eggs. One egg is 
 laid in each hole, and the mother does everything 
 she can so that no harm will come to the eggs or 
 the little grubs that hatch from them. The holes 
 into which the eggs are laid the mother drills with 
 her little beak, which looks like a tiny elephant's 
 trunk. The mouth being at the end of the beak 
 makes it a very handy tool for digging. They make 
 the hole as deep as the beak is long, and then the 
 mother moves forward and puts into it her egg- 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 
 
 63 
 
 guide or sting and the egg is pushed down into the 
 hole. The sides of the hole are not straight, as some 
 of you may think, but the cavity has the shape of 
 a hen's egg with the larger end down in the kernel." 
 
 "If the opening of the cavity is smaller than the 
 cavity, how can the weevil put her egg into it? 
 Either the eggs must 
 be soft or the cavi- 
 ties are bigger than 
 they need be/' Sam 
 Sprague remarked. 
 
 "Both of your 
 ideas are correct," 
 the entomologist an- 
 swered. "The eggs 
 are soft so that they 
 can be squeezed 
 through the opening, 
 and they do not quite 
 fill the cavity." 
 
 " Ha, ha, she don't make good fits, then, does she ?" 
 Sam laughed. 
 
 "Oh, yes she does," the entomologist answered, 
 "but she makes the cavities of that shape and size 
 purposely, and I am sure it prevents the egg from 
 being pushed out when the corn dries and shrinks. 
 The eggs do not touch the walls of the cavity at all 
 points, and this is of help to the little grubs when 
 
 FIG. 35. "The sides of the hole are 
 not straight, as some may think." 
 
64 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 (After Smith, N. C. 
 Exp. Sta.) 
 
 working their way out of the eggshell at hatching 
 time. When the egg has been pushed into place, 
 the mother seals the opening of the 
 cavity and that hides the egg and 
 young grub from enemies that might 
 be lurking about the corn." 
 
 "You mean to say that the little 
 FIG. 36. "They white grubs you find in the corn are 
 
 are white, hump- 
 backed, and leg- the young of the black weevils? 
 
 asked Sam Dixon. 
 
 "Most of the grubs you find around here are/' 
 the entomologist replied, "but there are a number of 
 white grubs in corn that 
 do not make weevils. You 
 can tell the weevil grubs 
 without any trouble be- 
 cause they are white, hump- 
 backed, and legless. The 
 grubs eat the inside of the 
 grain, and when they 
 become full grown they 
 change to a quiet or resting- 
 stage, called pupa, and from 
 this pupa the full-grown 
 weevil comes. In warm 
 weather the time required 
 from egg to full-grown insect is from five to seven 
 weeks, but in cool weather a longer time is required." 
 
 FIG. 37. "The grubs eat the 
 inside of the grain." 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 
 
 65 
 
 "It puzzles me/' Sam Dixon interrupted, "how 
 these little mischief-makers can eat the inside of 
 the seed, and yet when I plant it 
 most of the seed comes up. It 
 would seem that they would kill 
 
 the germ/ ' 
 
 "Vpa vrm hpf " FranV TTnrm'l 
 
 ies, yo et, 
 
 ton added, "I have noticed that 
 weevily seed will come up pretty well, but it does 
 not make a stand of corn like sound seed." 
 
 "That is what I say/' Bill Green spoke up. "I 
 have found that out, and I will not plant any more 
 corn that has weevils in it." 
 
 (4fler Hinds, Ala. Exp. Sta.) 
 FIG. 38. " From this 
 
 pupa the full . grown 
 weevil comes." 
 
 FIG. 39. "Weevily seed will not do as well as clean seed." 
 
 "Very often the weevils will not hurt the germ," 
 said the entomologist, "but the gentlemen are right 
 
66 FARM SPIES 
 
 when they say that weevily seed will not do as well 
 as clean seed. The fleshy part of the seed is the young 
 corn plant's first food when it comes up, and when 
 this is taken away the young plants will be weak 
 and often die." 
 
 "It has been found that corn which ripens late 
 is less damaged in the field than early corn/' the 
 entomologist continued. 
 
 "That is a good point. I am going to plant late 
 corn after this/' said Tom Jackson. 
 
 "Go easy, Mr. Jackson/' said the entomologist; 
 "you are dealing with an army of bandits too wise 
 to be easily fooled. If you planted late corn only, I 
 am sure you would find the damage greater than we 
 found it where both early and late corn occurred. 
 We believe that the early corn could be used as a 
 trap to attract the weevils when they appear in the 
 field to lay their eggs. The early corn would be 
 ready for them, while the late corn would not be. 
 If there were no early corn, we are sure that this 
 would not cause the weevils to starve. It might be 
 well to plant late corn for your main crop and plant 
 early corn for the weevils. Of course this trap corn 
 should be gathered by itself and not stored in the 
 same crib with the main crop." 
 
 "Why not store it in the same crib?" George 
 Sanders asked. 
 
 "If you stored it in your main crib, it would be 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 67 
 
 full of weevils by the time the main crop comes in. 
 It would be just like saying to the weevils, 'Here is 
 some more corn, help yourselves/ If they could, 
 they would smile all over and say, 'Mr. Sanders, 
 you are a gentleman.' You see you kept the weevils 
 off your main crop by planting the early corn ; now, 
 would it be wise to gather the early crop, give the 
 weevils a free ride to the crib, and then bring the 
 rest of the corn to them to save them the trouble of 
 flying to it? That would surely be treating the 
 weevils kindly." 
 
 "Ho, ho, ho," many laughed. 
 
 "Put your thinking cap on, George," several 
 exclaimed. 
 
 The entomologist continued: "Select for your 
 seed-corn such ears as give a good yield and have 
 tight and close-fitting shucks. The ears should not 
 stand up straight, but hang down to prevent water 
 from entering the shucks during rains." 
 
 Will Lane now interrupted the entomologist: "I 
 have studied about that myself and always thought 
 that the shucks had something to do with the 
 number of weevils, but I met Sam Faulkner in town 
 the other day and he said that he did not think 
 much of it. He said he had an army of corn ear- 
 worms in his corn last year and that the weevils 
 got into the shucks through the holes made by these 
 worms when they left the ears to go into the ground. 
 
68 FARM SPIES 
 
 I always thought a heap of it, but then that is what 
 Sam said." 
 
 "It is quite true/' the entomologist continued; 
 "the holes made by the corn ear-worms would offer 
 a way for the weevils to get to the ears even when 
 covered by tight-fitting shucks ; but I have never 
 seen a bad case of weevily corn in the field where the 
 shucks were tight-fitting, and covered the ears, 
 even where the corn ear-worms had made holes 
 through the shucks. It is only in some years that 
 this worm is very bad, and the holes they make do 
 not offer as easy a way for the weevils to get in as 
 the loose, short shucks. It may be that this Mr. 
 Faulkner, of whom you speak, happened to look at 
 a few of the worst ears, in which case it would not be 
 fair to speak that way for the whole crop. 
 
 "Do not sweep your wagon beds near the crib 
 after your corn has been unloaded. Many weevils 
 are in that rubbish, and sweeping them on the 
 ground near the crib would be helping them to get 
 to the crib easier." 
 
 George Brown now interrupted the entomologist : 
 " I am glad that I am here ; what we have been told 
 is of great value to us, but what are we going to do 
 right now, gentlemen, when our corn is stored in the 
 crib and the little six-legged thieves are making meal 
 out of it ? They are ruining my corn in the crib right 
 now and I do not even dare to feed it to my mules." 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 69 
 
 "Oh, fudge," exclaimed Fred Hamilton, "Tom 
 Morrill gave me a simple remedy the other day and 
 he said it worked fine. He tried it last year and he 
 said his father always used it. He wets the corn 
 with salt water when he puts it in the crib." 
 
 "I tried it, and it works fine," a voice was heard. 
 
 FIG. 40. "Sweeping them on the ground near the crib would be 
 helping them." 
 
 "I tried it, and it did not do any good whatever," 
 several gentlemen remarked. 
 
 The entomologist smiled and said, "You, who have 
 tried it, seem to disagree." 
 
 "What do you think about it?" several asked. 
 
 "We have tried it," the entomologist answered, 
 "and while the salted shucks seem to taste better 
 
70 FARM SPIES 
 
 when eaten by stock, yet in our trials the loss was 
 greater in the salted crib. Where salt or salt water 
 was used it softened the corn in damp weather and 
 the weevils seemed to like it better. There was even 
 loss in weight." 
 
 " Does heat kill the weevils ? that is, could you 
 haul the corn in wet or wet it after it is in the crib 
 and let it heat to kill the pests?" one farmer asked. 
 
 "Where heat is under control it is no doubt the 
 surest way for killing all kinds of stored grain in- 
 sects, and in seed houses where steam coils are in- 
 stalled we recommend the use of heat. To obtain 
 that heat by hauling corn in wet, we do not advise," 
 the entomologist answered. 
 
 "How much heat does it take to kill them?" 
 
 "The entire crib must be heated to a temperature 
 of 123 degrees F. for several hours." 
 
 "Does that injure the germ of the corn?" another 
 asked. 
 
 "No, sir," the entomologist answered. "The 
 germ stands a much higher temperature for a much 
 longer period without injury." 
 
 "Don't many of the weevils freeze to death in 
 the winter ? " Ed Green asked. " I have heard people 
 say that the weevils cannot stand the cold weather." 
 
 "I do not think that in our corn-cribs it ever gets 
 cold enough to freeze many weevils. This may kill 
 them farther north, where the winters are much 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 71 
 
 colder. During cold weather in the South the 
 weevils become numb and quiet, and this has led 
 many people to believe that the little rogues were 
 dead." 
 
 John Matthews said that most of the weevils are 
 in the cribs during the winter and wished to know 
 how they got to the fields. "Do they travel from 
 the cribs to the cornfields?" he asked. 
 
 The entomologist told him that no breeding places 
 had been found in the fields in the spring, and as the 
 weevils leave the cribs when the corn is badly eaten, 
 he thought that the pests traveled from the cribs 
 to the fields. He also explained that breeding 
 in the fields did not begin in earnest until the corn 
 had begun to harden after the roasting-ear stage. 
 He said further : "At this time the corn that may be 
 still in the cribs is so badly weevil-eaten that in 
 many cases the pests are forced to find something 
 to eat ; one will notice this during June and July, 
 and during this time most of the weevils leave the 
 crib. In the spring the weevils have been found in 
 the fields eating other things, but the numbers 
 found at that time could not very well account for 
 the large number laying eggs in the fields when the 
 corn hardens." 
 
 "Let us come back to the question George Brown 
 asked some time ago," exclaimed Fred Hamilton. 
 "Is there anything we can do right now to save 
 
72 FARM SPIES 
 
 the corn that is in our cribs? After that we can 
 talk about the things we should do next season to 
 prevent the thieves riddling our corn on the stalks 
 before it is put in the cribs." 
 
 "Yes," the entomologist said, "there is something 
 you can do ; go home and make your cribs just as 
 tight as it is possible to make them. In brick cribs, 
 or in wooden cribs that have been made very tight 
 by the use of heavy tarred paper between two layers 
 of sheathed boarding for the walls and ceilings, use 
 about seven pounds of carbon bisulphide for every 
 one thousand cubic feet of space. In cribs not so 
 tight a much larger amount may be necessary. 
 
 "Carbon bisulphide is a liquid which looks like 
 water and has a foul smell. When the liquid is 
 exposed to the air it changes to gas very rapidly. 
 This gas is heavier than air and sinks in the crib - 
 it does not rise like most gases you know. It goes 
 down, sideways, and eventually upwards. To 
 fumigate with this gas, level off the surface of the 
 corn in the crib and make holes by pulling out some 
 ears. The holes should be about three feet apart 
 each way and from one to one and one half feet 
 deep. The liquid is then poured into the holes, 
 using about an equal amount for each hole. The 
 corn is then thrown back into the holes to help hold 
 the gas, and the crib closed tight. Fire must be 
 kept away from the liquid, and if any is left after 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 73 
 
 enough has been put in the crib, it should be kept 
 in a cool place." 
 
 "Is one treatment enough?" someone asked. 
 
 " Of ten it is if everything is just right when the 
 liquid is put into the crib. Be sure and have the 
 crib ready before you put the gas in. Some people 
 forget and then have to open the crib every little 
 while to fix something that should have been done 
 before. One can soon find out if the first dose was 
 not strong enough ; if not, then a second and stronger 
 one should be given. In most cribs it is best to give 
 one dose in the fall as soon as the corn has been 
 put in, and another in the spring. This should be 
 done on warm days. The crib should be kept closed 
 from twenty-four to forty-eight hours." 
 
 "Can I go into the crib with a lighted lantern 
 when the gas is in?" 
 
 "There is just a bare possibility of an explosion, 
 and we would advise you not to carry fire of any 
 kind near the crib at that time." 
 
 "How do you air the crib when you want to open 
 it again?" some one asked. 
 
 The entomologist answered, "Unless you have a 
 brick crib, or a wooden crib very, very tight, it is 
 not necessary to air it, because the gas will disappear 
 in a day or two. In case of a tight crib, just open 
 the door and the gas will soon disappear." 
 
 "I tell you, gentlemen, this gas business looks 
 
74 FARM SPIES 
 
 too dangerous to suit me," said Orrin Doyle. "Were 
 I to put ;that gas in my crib, then I could not go near 
 the barn with a lantern, and what is worse, I could 
 not even smoke my pipe near the crib for fear of 
 having my head blown off. I think I will let the bugs 
 eat my corn and not take the risk of burning down 
 my barn." 
 
 "That is what I say," added George Brown; 
 "that plagued stuff will blow your head off. I 
 believe I am scared of it." 
 
 The entomologist answered, "You are evidently 
 expecting your barn to burn down at any moment ; 
 at least, that is the way I would feel about my barn 
 if I were in the habit of smoking in or near it. If 
 you are used to smoking near the barn couldn't you, 
 for the sake of your crop, your family, and your 
 stock, smoke elsewhere for a day?" 
 
 This caused an uproarious laughter, and the 
 gentleman wished that he had not said what he 
 did about smoking near the barn. 
 
 The entomologist then assured him that there 
 was no more danger than in the use of gasolene, so 
 common in every home. He said further, "If you 
 use the same care you would with gasolene, then you 
 will not have any trouble. The liquid itself will not 
 hurt the skin when it touches it, and the inhaling of 
 a small amount of the gas would not injure any 
 
 one." 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 75 
 
 "How about using it in a crib which has wet 
 corn in it and the corn has heated ? " a farmer asked. 
 " Would it cause an explosion? 77 
 
 "In a very tight crib I should be afraid to use it, 
 but in most cribs there would be no danger/ 7 was 
 the entomologist 7 s reply. 
 
 A little man somewhere in the crowd exclaimed : 
 "Bill Crane said that when he was in Fort Worth 
 some of the big millers used this gas, and the people 
 told him that they could taste it in the bread made 
 from the flour of grain so fumigated. 77 
 
 " I have known of such cases before/ 7 the entomolo- 
 gist replied. "People know that it has a foul smell, 
 but it is funny that they never taste it in bread 
 when they don 7 t know the gas was used. 77 
 
 "I have a newspaper clipping here where it speaks 
 of two other things that have been tried for killing 
 weevils. The names are terrible ; I guess I won 7 t 
 try to read them because it is after four o 7 clock 
 now and I shouldn 7 t be able to get through pro- 
 nouncing one of them before sundown/ 7 and the 
 farmer who said this came forward and handed the 
 clipping to the entomologist. 
 
 "Both of these have been experimented with by 
 
 the United States Department of Agriculture ; the 
 
 first l one mentioned is rather expensive, but the 
 
 second 2 seems to give promise. One point strongly 
 
 1 Carbon tetrachloride. 2 Para dichlorobenzine. 
 
76 FARM SPIES 
 
 in their favor is that they do not burn like carbon 
 bisulphide." 
 
 So the meeting kept on, one question after another 
 being asked by the farmers. They found out that 
 Jim Blair had used this gas, and when asked about 
 it he explained how he had used it. He told them 
 that he had made his crib very tight and that he 
 put the gas in on November 8. Mr. Blair said 
 that he chose a warm, sunny day to put the gas in, 
 and that he was very much pleased when he looked 
 at his corn the next spring and found very few 
 weevils in it. "Of course," said he, "I would not 
 come to a conclusion after just one trial, because it 
 might have been a light weevil year, but I know of 
 a half dozen other farmers who used it for several 
 years with good results. 
 
 "Do not try to depend on treating corn in the 
 crib to control weevils. The first step is to select 
 your seed corn in the right way at harvest time. 
 When selecting, look for type of plant, height of 
 ear, yield, sound grain, tight shuck, and hanging 
 ears. The tight shuck prevents the weevils from 
 getting to the grain, but in most seasons the tip of 
 the shuck will not be tight in ears that stand up 
 because the soaking of the silk during rainy weather 
 followed by drying in hot weather makes it so that 
 weevils can get to the grain. Take pains to harvest 
 your corn dry and put it in good cribs. Then if you 
 
THE BLACK CORN-WEEVIL 
 
 77 
 
 find that it is necessary to fumigate, find out the 
 best thing by' writing to the experiment station or 
 by asking the farm demonstration agent. There 
 are so many things tried at present that we may 
 soon have something that will take the place of 
 carbon bisulphide." 
 
 " Gentlemen/ 7 said John Matthews, "it is getting 
 late, and most of the people have to go home. I am 
 going home to tighten my crib. I am going to select 
 
 (After Hinds, Ala. Exp. Sta.) 
 
 FIG. 41. "When selecting, look for type of plant, height of ear, 
 sound grain, tight shuck, and hanging ears." 
 
 my seed corn more carefully after this. I know that 
 I can grow a crop of corn, and after this I am going 
 to save it." 
 
 "So am I," a dozen or more voices were heard. 
 
 The meeting was over, and a little later you could 
 see men, women, children, teams, and cars going in 
 almost every direction. 
 
 The people of Flanders have put these things into 
 practice, and they have improved the corn of that 
 community very much. Fred Hamilton said a few 
 
78 FARM SPIES 
 
 weeks ago that he had always regarded the black 
 weevil as a terrible pest, but that he had changed 
 his mind, " Because/ 7 he said, "that insect has done 
 more to improve the corn around Flanders than 
 anything else that ever came to this town." 
 
 Joe Henderson is still president of the Bank of 
 Flanders and one of the town's best citizens. Every- 
 body says that the best thing he ever did for that 
 section was when he started the movement for 
 having the black weevil studied which led to the 
 long-remembered meeting at Jack Smith's corn-crib. 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 
 
 WHEN Mrs. Emerson was sitting in the library of 
 her home one June afternoon reading an interesting 
 book, she heard a great noise outdoors. "Those 
 are the Blake boys ; I wonder what has happened," 
 she said to herself, and started reading again. In a 
 little while the noise broke out again, much louder 
 than before. The Blake boys lived next door to 
 her and were very noisy at times, but this time it 
 sounded to her as if something terrible had happened 
 and that the boys were calling for help. She ran 
 across the hall and through another room to that 
 side of the house where the noise came from, to find 
 out what the trouble could be. As she put one 
 hand on the closed shutters to open them she called, 
 "What is the matter, boys?" 
 
 The boys answered at the top of their voices, 
 "Mrs. Emerson, Mrs. Emerson, don't open that 
 blind, and don't look out !" 
 
 "Well, what can the trouble be?" she asked her- 
 self, nervously, and then called very loud : "What is 
 the trouble ? Is there a rattlesnake out there in the 
 rosebushes?" 
 
 79 
 
80 FARM SPIES 
 
 "Mrs. Emerson, do not open," came the reply 
 again, " because there is an awful big hopper-grass 
 on your window-shutter !" 
 
 "Is that all?" said Mrs. Emerson, giving a big 
 sigh of relief ; and, bursting into a laugh, she re- 
 turned to her book. She could not get over the funny 
 side of it, and every little while during the afternoon 
 she would burst out laughing. When her boy John 
 came home and saw her he thought that she must 
 
 be reading a 
 very funny 
 story. 
 
 Willie and 
 
 (After Wastourn, Minn. E X p. Sta.) Freddie Blake 
 
 FIG. 42. "There is an awful big hopper- Were raised in 
 grass on your window-shutter." , -, . , -, /. 
 
 the city and, of 
 
 course, did not know much about grasshoppers 
 except what they had read in their story-books. 
 It was, therefore, not surprising that, when they 
 saw an unusually big one, they should be just a 
 little scared. 
 
 Their father had been reared on the farm and knew 
 most of the common insects and other animals. 
 As a boy he had watched the bumblebee make her 
 home in an old mouse-nest ; he had seen the mud- 
 daubers build their mud-nests on the rafters in the 
 garrets ; and he had often noticed and watched the 
 squirming in manure heaps of maggots that made 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 
 
 81 
 
 house-flies and stable-flies. He could have told the 
 boys about the big grasshoppers which they in their 
 excitement had called hopper-grass, but he was not 
 at home. 
 
 About a week after they had scared Mrs. Emerson, 
 Willie was pulling weeds in the garden and he saw 
 
 FIG. 43. "He saw a large number of grasshoppers eating on their 
 sweet corn." 
 
 a large number of grasshoppers eating on their 
 sweet corn. He stopped and sat very still for a long 
 time, watching them. "What bigmouths they have ; 
 I wonder why they have to be so big?" he asked 
 himself. He talked to one of the grasshoppers, 
 saying : "If my mouth was as big as yours according 
 to the size of my body, what a sight I should be. 
 
82 FARM SPIES 
 
 It would be terrible, and everybody would be afraid 
 of me. I tell you what people would say when they 
 looked at me ; they would say, ' That boy is a 
 frightful looking thing ; I always thought that Frank 
 Stevens's bulldog had an ugly mug, but it is nothing 
 to that of Willie Blake/ he, he, he," he laughed. 
 
 Just then he saw something that took his attention 
 from that grasshopper ; at the edge of the garden 
 
 he saw another grass- 
 hopper sitting quietly 
 with its abdomen, or 
 rear half of the body, 
 h alfway in the ground. 
 F IG . 44. _ -He is stuck fast in the He crept away quietly 
 
 and called Freddie, say- 
 ing, " Freddie, .come here and look what happened 
 to one of the grasshoppers." 
 
 Freddie came and they both looked. "He is 
 stuck fast in the ground, Freddie," said Willie. 
 
 "Why, Freddie, he surely is; poor old long-legs, 
 I wonder how that happened." 
 
 Just then their father came to the house and the 
 boys called him. He came, and after taking a good 
 look, said, "What is the matter with that grass- 
 hopper do you think?" 
 
 "We do not know," Freddie answered. "The 
 poor thing is stuck in a hole there, but how did he 
 get in? Do you suppose that it is an ant-hole?" 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 
 
 83 
 
 "No, boys/ 7 the father explained, a that grass- 
 hopper made 1 that hole and is laying eggs. Grass- 
 hoppers lay their eggs in the ground, and the hole 
 in which they are placed they make themselves by 
 means of prongs they have at the rear end of the 
 body." Picking up another grasshopper he showed 
 the boys the prongs 
 and the way they are 
 used for digging. 
 
 " The thing for you 
 to do now, boys, is 
 to watch these grass- 
 hoppers this after- 
 noon and find some 
 more that are laying. 
 You can then mark 
 the spots and you can 
 dig some of them up 
 to-morrow and see 
 how they look. If 
 you will then take good care of the eggs, you will 
 have a chance to see them hatch and you can tell 
 your boy friends how the little grasshoppers come 
 into the world/' the father told them. 
 
 That entire afternoon the boys spent in the garden 
 watching the grasshoppers. They saw three others 
 laying. They marked the spots very carefully, as 
 their father had told them, so that they would be 
 
 (After Riley.) 
 
 FIG. 45. "That grasshopper made that 
 hole and is laying eggs." 
 
84 FARM SPIES 
 
 able to find them again the next day. " Hello, 
 Pete," Freddie called to the old family horse which 
 stood near by looking at the boys across the garden 
 fence. " Pete ; what are you looking so grave about ? 
 You could not have heard what father said when he 
 was here in the garden some time ago. If you had 
 seen us watching and pitying an old grasshopper for 
 having gotten fast in an ant-burrow when it was 
 merely laying eggs, you could not stand there and 
 look as sober as you do." The boys had a good laugh 
 over what they had nearly forgotten ; and, answer- 
 ing their mother's call, they went to the house. 
 
 "I am glad that father has forgotten about it," 
 Willie said as they were passing through the garden 
 gate. 
 
 "So am I," remarked Freddie. 
 
 After supper that evening their father asked, 
 "Did you find any more grasshoppers stuck fast 
 in ant-holes, boys?" The boys, after a rather 
 sheepish laugh, told what they had seen since their 
 father left them in the afternoon. Freddie, it seems, 
 had paid especial attention to the food of the insects. 
 "I never should have believed that anything on 
 earth could be as big a glutton as Mr. Stevens's bull 
 terrier. I have seen him gulp down a plate of po- 
 tatoes so fast that I have often wondered how he 
 did it. I thought he was about to bust when he 
 turned around and gave a large piece of an old ham, 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 85 
 
 which Mrs. Stevens had thrown out, exactly the 
 same treatment, and within five minutes afterwards 
 I saw him punished for stealing and eating a loaf of 
 corn bread. I tell you that the terrier is not in the 
 same class as the grasshoppers. I watched them 
 when I should have been pulling weeds. I could not 
 help it, because I fell into watching them before I 
 knew it." 
 
 " There is not a plant in our garden which they 
 failed to sample/' interrupted Willie. 
 
 "If you call that sampling, Willie, then I should 
 like to see them eating in earnest. They are strip- 
 ping our sweet corn, and leaving nothing but ribs to 
 our cabbage. They are chewing everything to pieces, 
 and they do not seem to give the weeds any more 
 consideration than our garden plants. It seems 
 that they prefer the young tender buds, but when 
 they are eaten it does not seem to worry them 
 any, at least not judging from the way they look." 
 
 "And did you notice how much they can spit?" 
 Willie interrupted. "It is as brown as tobacco juice, 
 and where it all comes from is a puzzle to me. 
 Look on my sleeve here and you can see the brown 
 spots ; I wonder if it will wash out. When you 
 catch one he sets his big mouth to work, and with all 
 the parts in action it reminds me of a mowing ma- 
 chine thrown into gear. His saliva runs over your 
 fingers and you need not figure that he will do this 
 
86 FARM SPIES 
 
 for a little while and then stop, but he keeps it up 
 until at last you just have to let him go." 
 
 "If I could spit like a grasshopper I would soon 
 stop those cats screeching below my window every 
 night/' said Freddie. 
 
 "How would you do it?" the others asked. 
 
 "How would I do it?" Freddie asked soberly. "I 
 would just turn over in bed with my face toward 
 the window and spit. That would settle it, because 
 it would drown every cat engaged in that choir." 
 At this they all laughed. 
 
 Their father interrupted, "Maybe the grass- 
 hoppers are like some people. When they get nerv- 
 ous they allow their jaws to exceed the speed limit, 
 when you had better keep your distance if you don't 
 want to get into a shower-bath." 
 
 Freddie whispered something to Willie, which set 
 the boys laughing with an uproar. 
 
 "What are you laughing at, boys?" their father 
 asked with a knowing smile. 
 
 Willie answered, "Freddie said that you must 
 have been thinking about old Mr. Bill Grimes down 
 by the creek." 
 
 This created another general laugh, after which 
 they all retired. 
 
 The next morning at about ten o'clock Mr. Blake 
 saw the boys coming from the tool-shed ; Willie car- 
 ried a spade and Freddie a pickaxe over his shoulder. 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 87 
 
 "What are you going to do; what are you going 
 to do ? Are you planning to dig a well ? " asked Mr. 
 Blake. 
 
 "No/' Willie replied; "we want to dig up some of 
 those grasshopper eggs/' - and then they stopped as 
 if stunned, watching their father laughing. He 
 almost doubled up several times, and the boys won- 
 dered if he would ever get over it. When at last he 
 seemed to conquer his laughing, a glance at the 
 boys, armed with spade and pickaxe, would set him 
 off again, and soon the boys found themselves joining 
 in the laugh, although they did not know what it 
 was about. 
 
 "Boys," their father said at last, "when you want 
 to pick your teeth after dinner, would you take a 
 fence-rail? If you want to shoot a squirrel, would 
 you use a cannon? The only tool you need for 
 finding the grasshopper eggs is the small blade of a 
 pocket knife, because the eggs are not more than a 
 fourth of an inch below the top of the earth. Put 
 those tools back where you got them and don't be 
 borrowing trouble." 
 
 The boys did what he told them. When they had 
 disappeared in the tool-shed, they looked about as 
 sheepish as ever any boys looked. 
 
 "Freddie," said Willie, "we might have known that 
 those eggs could not be very deep, especially when you 
 consider the size of the insects." 
 
88 FARM SPIES 
 
 "I did know it, of course, but I just forgot to 
 stop and think about it/' answered Freddie with 
 disgust. 
 
 They went to the garden and began digging very 
 carefully with their knife-blades and 
 soon uncovered the eggs. They were 
 little, reddish, podlike bodies laid in 
 FIG. 46. "They a little earthen chamber which had 
 
 were little, red- , 111,. -i i 
 
 dish, podlike been made by the female with the 
 prongs which their father had pointed 
 out to them the day before. They found the eggs 
 a solid mass and adhered to each other as if 
 glued. When they noticed how nicely the eggs were 
 covered over with soil so that no trace of the chamber 
 could be seen on the surface of the 
 soil, they were very glad that they 
 had marked the place as their father 
 had told them. They counted the 
 eggs and found that there were ninety- 
 four in the mass. 
 
 "They are good layers/' remarked 
 
 W^ie. chamber." 
 
 "Yes, they are," Freddie agreed, "and I do not 
 understand how any of our Plymouth-rock hens 
 can look at a grasshopper without blushing. If 
 those old hens would only lay ninety-four eggs at 
 one sitting, we could go into the poultry business." 
 
 The boys talked the matter over and decided 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 89 
 
 that they would put these eggs in a tumbler so that 
 they might se'e the little grasshoppers hatch. "We 
 want to see them come out of the eggshell/' they 
 said. This done, they tried to find other grasshoppers 
 in the act of laying. They worked all over the garden 
 and found four more egg-chambers, and every one 
 of them was near the edge of the garden. They 
 noticed that they were not laying in the ground 
 that was cultivated and concluded that they must 
 have wise little heads because they would not risk 
 to lay their eggs where they would be in danger of 
 being uncovered by the plow or hoe. After the 
 places had all been carefully marked they put little 
 cages over them just as their father had explained 
 to them. Their mother did not have enough cheese- 
 cloth for all the cages, so they made as many as they 
 could from this material and used muslin for the rest. 
 Their row of cages looked pretty, and many people 
 passing the garden stopped and looked at them. 
 They felt proud when people asked questions about 
 them, but old Mr. Grimes made them angry when 
 he said : "What foolishness is that, boys, putting up 
 a cemetery in the garden? Those little white cages 
 look just like headstones. I would not have them 
 on my place." Although this made them rosy, they 
 could not help looking at each other and grinning, 
 because they recalled their father's remark about 
 nervous people. 
 
90 FARM SPIES 
 
 "How soon will the eggs hatch ?" the boys 
 asked. 
 
 "I do not believe that they will hatch before the 
 warm weather sets in next spring. They will stay 
 where they are throughout the winter. At least, I 
 hope they will/ 7 their father continued, "but I am 
 afraid your cages are in the way when I plow up the 
 garden." 
 
 "But you will not plow the garden until spring, 
 will you?" 
 
 " Not on the left side where the cabbage and other 
 winter vegetables are, but the side where your cages 
 are will be plowed, because we could not afford to let 
 that land lie that way all winter." 
 
 "Why not?" the boys asked, very much worried 
 that their cages might be disturbed. 
 
 "Because," their father explained, "part of it has 
 grown to weeds and they give shelter to insects and 
 diseases. Those weeds will die when cold weather 
 begins, and if there are no living plants on that soil 
 to take up and hold the plant-food, it will wash and 
 leach away. Part of the garden has the soil bare, 
 and this would wash during the wet weather. Now, 
 we will not allow any of those things to happen 
 because it would be very bad farm-practice. I am 
 going to plow that side and sow it to vetch or clover. 
 It would be called a cover-crop, and will prevent the 
 soil from washing. Few insects can feed on such 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 91 
 
 plants, and by keeping the weeds down it would be 
 a cleaning-crop at the same time." 
 
 " Why do you use vetch or clover ? Could you not 
 sow oats?" 
 
 "Yes, I could, and it would do about what vetch 
 and clover do, but oats has not the little nodules 
 on the roots which contain the little bacteria that 
 have, the power of changing the nitrogen of the air 
 so that plants can use it for food. It is this nitrogen 
 that makes up the ammonia in the fertilizer and is 
 the most expensive part. When I grow these plants 
 I need less of that kind of fertilizer and there I am 
 not only saving money, but when I plow this cover 
 crop under next spring I add a lot of nice vegetable 
 matter to the soil which decays, making plant food, 
 making the soil hold water better, and allowing the 
 air to circulate through the soil. Soils having these 
 conditions are most productive." 
 
 "That is very interesting/' the boys remarked. 
 
 "When I plow this fall I will also uncover the 
 grasshopper eggs that may be in that ground and they 
 will die during the winter. Of course, the greatest 
 numbers of eggs are along the edge of the garden. 
 They prefer to lay their eggs in slightly sandy soil 
 along hedges, roadways, and other places where no 
 cultivation occurs. Where your cages are placed 
 the greatest number of eggs are found, and I want to 
 work that soil to kill them. I don't know what we 
 had better do with the cages." 
 
92 FARM SPIES 
 
 The boys knew that their father would often say 
 things with a sober face even when he was joking, 
 and they were not sure what he would do in this case. 
 The truth is that he would never have allowed those 
 cages to be disturbed, as he was glad that the boys 
 were studying the grasshoppers. The next day he 
 had forgotten about this, and did not know that the 
 boys remembered it and were talking it over every 
 little while to find some plan by which they could 
 keep their father from plowing up the land where 
 the cages were placed. 
 
 One afternoon they visited their old friend Captain 
 Shelby and, among other things, they told him about 
 the danger threatening their breeding cages. Cap- 
 tain Shelby knew Mr. Blake well, and was sure that 
 he was merely joking when he talked to the boys, 
 but being a wag, he tried to help the boys with a 
 scheme that would make their father keep away 
 from the cages with his plow. 
 
 "Boys, I tell you," he said, "this is the time of 
 the year to plant turnips, and I never saw anybody 
 that liked them so much as your father. I have 
 plenty of seed and you can sprinkle it all around 
 the cages and rake it with a garden rake. You can 
 also sow a strip two feet wide on that side of the 
 cages farthest away from the fence. The seed will 
 come up, and when your pa gets ready to plow, 
 he will see the turnips and he will not plow them up." 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 93 
 
 The boys went home with the turnip seed in their 
 pockets, and the next morning when their father had 
 gone to town they sowed it. Mr. Blake was busy 
 with his corn-crop and so he did not get back to the 
 garden for nearly three weeks. One morning he 
 decided to plow the garden. As he went through 
 the gate the boys followed him and when he saw the 
 turnips he was greatly surprised. 
 
 "What is this? "he asked. 
 
 The boys explained that they had sowed turnips 
 there because they thought he liked them. 
 
 "I do/ 7 answered Mr. Blake, "but where did 
 you get the seed? 7 ' 
 
 "From Captain Shelby/' they answered. 
 
 A pleased smile crept over his face, as he said : "I 
 see through it now. That is a game of yours, and 
 the Captain helped you. Boys/' he continued, "I 
 would never have disturbed your grasshopper cages, 
 but I am glad that you sowed the turnips, and even 
 if I had intended to plow that ground, your game 
 would have caused me to change my mind." 
 
 The boys watched their tumbler under the old 
 apple tree and the cages by the garden fence, hoping 
 that the eggs might yet hatch before the cold weather 
 set in. But September passed and October came 
 with its colors of russet, gold, and red. The golden- 
 rods and the frost-flowers covered the earth, and the 
 cornfields rustled in the autumn breezes. 
 
94 FARM SPIES 
 
 "Willie/' Freddie said at last, "I hope they will 
 not hatch." 
 
 "Why?" snapped Willie. 
 
 "Because it is just as father said/ 7 answered 
 Freddie; "he said if they hatched now, they would 
 make the greatest mistakes of their lives. It seems 
 to me it would be their first as well as their last 
 mistake, because they could not live long, as winter 
 is almost on us. In our reader it says that in those 
 sections of our country where they have very mild 
 winters, they may be found at any time of the year, 
 but I am sure they could not live through the kind of 
 winters we have here. I think that they had better 
 stay where they are, under the ground in their egg- 
 shells, and if they have any sense they will do so." 
 
 Freddie's idea about this matter did not cause 
 Willie to lose hope, but when December came with 
 a snow-flurry, he was satisfied that there would be 
 no hatching till spring. Often during the winter 
 when the ground was frozen and sleet beat against 
 the window-panes, they would talk about the grass- 
 hopper eggs in the cold ground in the garden. The 
 night following January 22 was the coldest of the 
 winter. A light snow had fallen and the wind blew 
 bitter cold. The boys had to retire to a cold room 
 for the night and this they could not enjoy, no 
 matter how hard they tried. , 
 
 "I wish I had just a little of the grit of those 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 95 
 
 grasshopper eggs so that this would be easier," said 
 Freddie. 
 
 "So do I," Willie agreed. 
 
 With short days and daily school-work, time 
 passed rapidly and they might have forgotten about 
 their eggs in the cages, but one balmy morning their 
 attention was attracted by the high notes of & Ken- 
 tucky cardinal. " Cheo-cheo-cheo-cheo," he repeated 
 over and over from his high perch in the tree-tops, 
 and it filled the boys with a longing to be out-doors. 
 They were sure that spring had come and that 
 they might expect their grasshopper eggs to hatch 
 at any moment. This was on the morning of March 
 20, and being Saturday and no school, they had a 
 chance to see what they had been waiting for so 
 long. That day they saw many young grasshoppers 
 come out from the eggs and sit wondering at the 
 great world about them. 
 
 The boys put into the tumbler whatever green 
 vegetation they could find, and in a day or two they 
 all began to feed. The tiny little insects resembled 
 the full-grown grasshoppers except that they had 
 no wings. For a period of twelve days they did not 
 change except that they grew larger. 
 
 "This subject is getting to be so dry that it is 
 no longer interesting. They just eat and grow a 
 little and that is all," Willie said. 
 
 On the thirteenth morning after hatching some- 
 
96 FARM SPIES 
 
 thing did happen that made Willie feel sorry for his 
 remark. One of the grasshoppers had fastened his 
 little feet firmly to a leaf in the cage and sat so still 
 that the boys thought he was sick. After a while 
 they saw the skin split over his back, and before 
 noon the insect dropped helplessly to the ground, 
 leaving his outgrown skin hanging on the leaf. 
 
 " Whatever this is, it seems to make him feel bad. 
 You see he does not feed like the others," they said. 
 
 In an hour, or maybe a little longer, the new skin 
 had hardened and the young grasshopper joined the 
 others, and seemed to be extra hungry. 
 
 "I was mistaken," said Freddie, " because I see 
 now that he feels better for having lost his skin. 
 Who would have thought that an animal can lose 
 its skin and live?" continued Freddie. "That is a 
 great deal more than you can do. I wonder if papa 
 knows about this." 
 
 So they went and told their father about it, and 
 he explained to them that this is called molting. 
 He assured them that if they kept their eyes open, 
 they would see the others do likewise, and that all 
 grasshoppers do it a number of times. 
 
 By this time they saw young grasshoppers every- 
 where, in their cages, along the garden-fence, and 
 along the roadside. When walking over the short 
 grass they could see hundreds jumping in every 
 direction. They had no trouble now to find plenty 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 97 
 
 of them to watch. They found that they molted 
 about every two weeks, and after the fifth time a 
 full-grown grasshopper with full-grown wings would 
 appear. 
 
 In the meantime the boys learned that the grass- 
 hoppers had begun to do very much damage to the 
 farm crops and gardens of that section and people 
 spoke very unkindly about them. The little hordes 
 of grasshoppers that had hatched along the edges of 
 fields, in pastures and in waste places, had grown 
 and spread to near-by fields, so that some farmers 
 were worried about their crops. It was getting worse 
 every day, and the boys lost their love for these 
 creatures. They began to look upon them as enemies 
 to every man. John Conelly said that they ate 
 every kind of plant that came within their reach, 
 and he had even seen them gnaw the wooden parts of 
 his mowing-machine. George Hyde said they had 
 nibbled on the hard handle of his garden fork which 
 had been left in an upright position in the garden 
 for several days. 
 
 The boys became very bitter against the insects 
 which they had given such protection and sympathy 
 during the winter. One day they noticed that the 
 food in one of their cages had been eaten or dried 
 up long ago. 
 
 "Say, Freddie," Willie called, "we forgot to feed 
 them in this cage and they must surely be dead." 
 
98 FARM SPIES 
 
 After careful examination they found some of the 
 insects still alive, one eating another grasshopper. 
 
 "This is the limit ! ! ! " cried Willie. "They are 
 cannibals. Why, Freddie, there is no knowing what 
 they might not be guilty of." 
 
 "To kill them you would have to put one in a cage 
 without any kind of plants or other insects, " said 
 Freddie. 
 
 "That would not do," retorted Willie; "they 
 would gnaw the wood. It would be necessary to put 
 one in a metal cage." 
 
 "There is one use we could put that old pile of tin 
 cans to," said Freddie. 
 
 ! "What do you mean?" asked Willie. "Put a 
 bug in each tin can and let it starve? " 
 
 "Yes," replied Freddie. "If I got near enough 
 to catch him I would 'lambast' him with a stick and 
 it would beat your method." 
 
 :< What beats me is the way they live," explained 
 Willie. "They don't live like common folks, but 
 they remind me of those rich people just outside of 
 Waverly. They eat a late breakfast and then eat 
 again in the middle of the afternoon, while the 
 working-man eats three square meals a day. These 
 grasshoppers prefer the tender buds and leaves 
 and remain near the tops of plants from early morn- 
 ing till about ten o'clock; then they leave for the 
 lower portions of the plants and remain there till 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 99 
 
 about three in the afternoon. During rainy weather 
 and cold nights they remain on or near the ground. 
 They have strong wings but fly very little." 
 
 On July Fourth, the neighbors of that section 
 had all gone to the picnic in Millers' grove. There 
 were races, speeches, and fireworks. During the 
 afternoon a number of farmers had gathered under 
 the old elm tree near the well and were talking 
 about the hard times on account of the large num- 
 bers of grasshoppers. Most of them believed that 
 it was the worst grasshopper year they had ever 
 seen. William Carnes listened to what they said, 
 and when he began talking it acted on that group 
 of farmers like a whirlwind on a pile of dead leaves. 
 Some walked away in disgust, others stopped and 
 looked at Mr. Carnes in surprise, that such a good 
 man and splendid farmer should talk so. It is well 
 that some stayed, because when evening came some 
 of them had different ideas about farming, and these 
 were better than any they had before. 
 
 " There are not enough grasshoppers, and that is 
 what I am sorry about/' he said. It was this remark 
 that had that lightning effect on the group. Those 
 who stayed looked at Mr. Carnes and thundered, 
 "What is that! ! !" 
 
 "You fellows make me tired. I can see how the 
 grasshoppers can be terrible pests in the West and 
 South where the country is thinly settled and the 
 
100 FARM SPIES 
 
 wild and waste lands are not yet brought under 
 cultivation. Right here we are in one of the oldest 
 sections of the country and few people have more 
 than they could handle properly if they would." 
 
 A general dispute had arisen by this time, in which 
 everyone wanted to w be heard, and it sounded some- 
 thing like the cackling of a flock of geese that had 
 been suddenly disturbed. 
 
 "Be still there, gentlemen/' called Jim Ferguson. 
 "I have never known a time when Will could not 
 back his judgment, and I bet he can do it this time. 
 In spite of all the grasshoppers, he has made about as 
 good crops as if the grasshoppers had not been here. 
 We all know that he is a farmer in a class by himself, 
 and I want to hear him explain what he means by 
 saying that he wished there had been many more 
 of them." 
 
 The group listened, and then quieted in order to 
 give William a chance to explain. 
 
 Mr. Carnes continued: "Many of you still farm 
 as the Pilgrims did when they landed in New Eng- 
 land nearly three hundred years ago. In early days 
 it was believed that when a boy was not fit for any- 
 thing else he was the boy to stay on the farm. That 
 time has passed, but maybe you never noticed it. 
 Farming, to-day, requires an entirely different class 
 of men from what it did a hundred years ago. We 
 can no more afford to have a sleepy-head at the 
 
GRASSHOPPERS.^ 101 
 
 head of a farm than to have a sleeping man at the 
 throttle of the engine of a fast train. Farming is a 
 business which requires education, training, and skill. 
 You do not use foresight. We had a severe grass- 
 hopper outbreak last year, and you had every reason 
 to suspect that there would be one this year. You 
 never thought of watching where they laid most of 
 their eggs. You noticed last spring that they first 
 appeared in large numbers in pastures, along hedges, 
 roadsides, and in waste places, but you never tried 
 to do anything to stop them. When they had spread 
 over your crops and destroyed them, you sat down 
 and grumbled about the hard luck and the hard 
 times." 
 
 "Now, Will, tell us just what you did this summer 
 to keep those pesky things out of your crops," Jim 
 requested. 
 
 "I did many things this summer, Jim," Will ex- 
 plained. "Many of them I expected to do, but 
 equally as many came up unexpectedly. You see 
 a farmer has to watch everything on the place and 
 do what is necessary from time to time, even if he 
 has not planned it that way. I do not farm by rule. 
 So, the first thing I did was to have as little waste 
 land as possible. I watched the grasshoppers last 
 season, and during the winter I knew where they 
 would come from in case of an outbreak. The ab- 
 sence of much of the waste land gave me fewer grass- 
 
102 FARM SPIES 
 
 hoppers to start with in the spring. I do not leave 
 my stubble and rubbish on the fields in the winter, 
 but I plow them and plant cover-crops on them. I 
 pull the stumps because they are not only wasting 
 land and very inconvenient, but they are among the 
 worst things to offer winter shelter for various pests. 
 Sometimes I cannot do all the plowing I want to 
 do, and then I disk or drill the cover crops between 
 the rows. I do not let my oat and wheat stubble 
 stand after harvest, but disk them and plant the 
 land in peas. This gives me hay, adds nitrogen to 
 the soil, and protects my field from washing and 
 drying. When I see that the grasshoppers are very 
 abundant, I keep myself in readiness, and by the 
 time they advance to the crop I have that crop 
 sprayed. It often is necessary only to spray a strip 
 on that side where the attack will begin. The chief 
 damage is done by the full-grown insects, and we must 
 act while they are still young. I find by experience 
 that whatever you do it is best to do it when they 
 are still young." 
 
 u You said spraying; what do you spray?" one 
 asked. 
 
 "I use arsenate of lead mainly; some use Paris 
 green ; and in some sections they use arsenite of 
 soda made up with water and syrup. The arsenite 
 of soda is cheaper and acts very quickly, but in our 
 moist, warm climate of the South I am afraid to 
 
GRASSHOPPERS 103 
 
 use it on some crops for fear that it will burn the 
 leaves. Arsenate of lead is safe, and whenever I am 
 in the least in doubt I use it." 
 
 "How about London purple?" others asked. 
 
 "It is more uncertain as to burning the leaves 
 than Paris green, but I use it sometimes when the 
 grasshoppers are confined to weeds, which I do not 
 mind killing." 
 
 "How does it kill the grasshoppers?" some asked. 
 
 "It poisons them. All the sprays I mentioned 
 are poisonous and must be handled with care." 
 
 "How do you put the spray on?" Jim asked. 
 
 " I have a spray pump. I can use it for my orchard 
 or garden and I have a row spraying attachment 
 which I can use in spraying field crops or potatoes." 
 
 "If you sprayed meadows or pastures, should you 
 not be afraid of poisoning the stock that eats the 
 grass or hay?" a number of farmers asked. 
 
 "For treating meadows or pastures I use the bran 
 mash or grasshopper mixture, made strictly accord- 
 ing to directions. On alfalfa I scatter this broad- 
 cast. You must not forget the lemon or orange 
 juice, for this helps very much to attract the insects. 
 In small pastures this can be put out on shingles so 
 that it can be removed, for in this way it will not 
 poison cattle. When this happens to be near the 
 home, poultry must be kept in the pen or they will 
 eat it. In the West they use grasshopper catchers 
 
104 FARM SPIES 
 
 on pastures and on field-crops. I have not used one, 
 but my brother, who lives in Utah, has told me about 
 them and he says ' They sure catch them. ' ' 
 
 "I am going to watch where the grasshoppers 
 stay on my place over winter," said Jim as the com- 
 pany broke up. 
 
 "So will I," said several others as they walked 
 down the road. 
 
 Johnny Parker had sat throughout the conversa- 
 tion and he took in everything that was said as a 
 sponge takes water. He had not said one word ; he 
 did not have time, because he was listening as hard 
 as he could. As he started to go he said to Mr. 
 Carnes, "William, I am coming over to your house 
 the first chance I get to look at your pump." 
 
 "All right, Johnny, come over and I will show it 
 to you," Mr. Carnes replied. 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 
 
 IT was on a Saturday afternoon in December 
 when five boys of the neighborhood had gathered at 
 the home of Sammy Sprague. The day was lovely 
 one of those warm, cheerful winter afternoons ; the 
 ground was dry and it seemed that everything was 
 just in the right condition for boys to have a good 
 time. While they were playing in the yard Mr. 
 Sprague came and opened the corn-crib to get some 
 corn for the mules. Billy Burnet, who was near the 
 door at that time, did just what any other boy would 
 have done had he been there instead of Billy, he 
 peeked into the crib. That Billy did that was no 
 sign that he was a bad boy, nor was it a sign of bad 
 manners, but he was a healthy robust boy, full of 
 life, and full of boy-curiosity. Like every other 
 healthy boy he found the world full of interesting 
 things ; he was always afraid that something might 
 happen that he would fail to hear or see. For this 
 reason he was continually peeking into, over, and 
 around everything and continually asking ques- 
 tions. Did you ever see a boy like Billy? 
 
 105 
 
106 FARM SPIES 
 
 When he peeked into Mr. Sprague' s corn-crib he 
 said, " Great goshens ! you have a lot of corn, Mr. 
 Sprague. Did you make it all on your farm or did 
 you buy some of it?" 
 
 "No, my boy," Mr. Sprague answered, "I raised 
 that corn on my farm, and if it had not been for the 
 chinch-bugs I should have more than you see here 
 now. Those beggars surely damaged my corn 
 severely ; I judge they ruined nearly one-fourth of 
 my crop." While he was picking up the corn he 
 noticed that Billy was eying him from head to foot 
 with grave, wide open, questioning eyes. When he 
 had stepped through the door again and had fas- 
 tened it he saw that Billy's eyes were still on him. 
 
 Bursting into a laugh he looked at the boy and 
 asked: "Why are you looking me over so gravely, 
 sonny? I am Sam Sprague, your old neighbor, who 
 used to joggle you on his knees when you were a 
 little 'shaver.'" 
 
 Billy, without changing his manner, asked, "What 
 did you say damaged your corn?" 
 
 By this time the other boys had crowded around, 
 because they had heard Mr. Sprague and Billy 
 talking, and boylike, feared that something inter- 
 esting might happen without their knowing about it. 
 
 "Chinch-bugs," Mr. Sprague replied. 
 
 "I never heard of their eating corn," said Billy. 
 "I thought they lived in houses only." 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 107 
 
 "Haw, haw, haw/' Mr. Sprague laughed. "Who 
 ever heard of chinch-bugs in houses?" 
 
 The boys had become interested, and were looking 
 for some argument, but Billy could not see anything 
 funny about having his question laughed at, because 
 he was sure that they lived in houses. He turned 
 red in the face and retorted: "Why, Mr. Sprague, 
 you must be joking; just the other day old Aunt 
 Amy was scolding like a guinea because she said 
 that these bugs were all through her house. She was 
 scrubbing her bedsteads with soapsuds so strong 
 that it made my eyes water. She was scolding and 
 scrubbing and sweating to beat the stir, and after 
 watching her awhile I made up my mind that these 
 bugs deserved careful attention. I told her to fumi- 
 gate with sulphur, and explained to her how my 
 father did it, but she was too angry to listen to any 
 explanations." 
 
 "What did she call the bugs?" Mr. Sprague 
 asked. 
 
 Billy replied, "She called them chinch-bugs, 
 well, no, she didn't either ; she called them chinches 
 for short." 
 
 Mr. Sprague laughed some more and walked 
 toward the barnyard fence where the feed-troughs 
 were located ; the boys followed him. 
 
 "Billy," he said, "we are both right, but the 
 trouble is that you are talking about one thing and 
 
108 FARM SPIES 
 
 I about another. I am talking about chinch-bugs, 
 which are field-bugs, but you are talking about 
 chinches, which are bedbugs. They are both in- 
 teresting kinds of bugs, but while yours is merely a 
 sleep and peace-destroyer, mine is a bread-destroyer. 
 If I had my choice, I would rather have your bug in 
 my house than my bug in the cornfield, because I 
 know how to get rid of chinches but do not know 
 how to control the chinch-bugs." 
 
 "Mr. Sprague, do you know that bedbugs carry 
 diseases?" Frank Gates asked. 
 
 "I did not know that, Frank; is that so?" 
 
 "Yes," all the boys answered; "we learned that 
 in school and since then we would not allow one of 
 those bugs around our house if we knew it was there." 
 
 "Well, I guess you are right then, boys," Mr. 
 Sprague answered. 
 
 "Talking about the chinch-bugs, are they large 
 enough for one to see them when they are on the 
 corn?" the boys asked. 
 
 "They certainly are," Mr. Sprague assured them. 
 
 "How do they look?" they asked. 
 
 "With their eyes, I reckon," Mr. Sprague an- 
 swered with a mischievous smile. The boys laughed, 
 but insisted that he describe them. Mr. Sprague 
 then told them that the full-grown ones were black 
 with whitish wings and the young were reddish and 
 wingless. 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 
 
 109 
 
 By this time Harry Fulmer 
 had become interested. Al- 
 though Harry was one of those 
 boys who said very little, he 
 was a great favorite with the 
 boys. He had the habit of 
 not talking or asking ques- 
 tions until he had made up 
 his mind what he wanted to 
 find out. He would then ask 
 his questions direct and in a FIG. 48. "That the fuii- 
 
 , , , , . grown ones were black with 
 
 Way that COUld not be miS- whitish wings." Enlarged. 
 
 taken. 
 
 "Did you say there were many on your corn last 
 summer, Mr. Sprague?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes, plenty of them/' Mr. Sprague answered. 
 
 (After Webster, Bur. Enl., U. S. 
 Dept. Agr.) 
 
 FIG. 49. 
 
 (After Webster, Bur. Ent., U. S. Dept. Agr.) 
 1 While the young were reddish and wingless. 
 
 "Did they bother your corn the summer before 
 last?" he asked again. 
 
110 FARM SPIES 
 
 u Yes, very much. Ever since I can remember 
 they damaged corn once every two or three years, 
 but during the last three years they have been very 
 bad every summer, owing to dry weather." 
 
 "Do you expect them next year?" Harry asked. 
 
 "I surely do unless we have a wet season." 
 
 FIG. 50. "Unless we have a wet season." 
 
 "Where are the bugs now?" 
 
 Mr. Sprague laughed, "I do not know, but I 
 reckon they all died last fall or froze to death when 
 we had that cold snap early in December." 
 
 "If they are all dead, then I do not see where 
 your bugs can come from next year. If there are to 
 be any bugs next year, then there must surely be 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 111 
 
 some of them staying somewhere over winter, if 
 what we are taught in school is correct." 
 
 "Now, Harry, that looks like good sense to me," 
 Mr. Sprague replied. "Where are the bugs now? 
 Where do you suppose these frail creatures could hide 
 to be able to live through snow, sleet, and ice, such 
 as winter brings ? What shelter protects them from 
 the frosty air and biting winds ? Now, boys, answer 
 quick." 
 
 Every boy looked from one to the other, but no 
 one could answer the question. 
 
 "Listen, boys, there will be a farmers' picnic in 
 the grove back of the town hall at Kingston on 
 January 4. I would like to find out where the 
 chinch-bugs stay during the winter, and if you boys 
 can find it out for me I will take all of you in my car 
 and drive you to that meeting; it is twenty-one 
 miles from here." 
 
 "Hurrah ! " they yelled, and threw their caps high 
 in the air, each boy catching another boy's cap. 
 "We will surely find the bugs," they said. 
 
 Ten minutes later, when Mr. Sprague was sitting 
 in the house reading, he missed the noise of the 
 boys' playing. He looked through the window and 
 saw a sight that made a big smile creep over his face. 
 Under the old water oak sat the five boys, each and 
 every one looking as grave as an owl and talking 
 about a subject which, judging from their looks, 
 
112 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 they must have thought a very weighty one. Mr. 
 Sprague had entirely forgotten that he had asked 
 them to find the bugs, and also his promise to take 
 them to the farmers' meeting. "Hm, boys will be 
 boys/' he murmured to himself, and turned again 
 
 FIG. 51. "Under the old water oak sat the five boys." 
 
 to his reading. If he .ever recalled his promise and 
 thought that the boys had taken it in jest, as he 
 meant it, he was mistaken. They were holding a 
 powwow for the purpose of devising ways and 
 means for finding out where the chinch-bugs stayed 
 during the winter. They had to go to school during 
 the week, but all of them felt sure that they 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 113 
 
 could meet under that water oak the following 
 Saturday morning to start for a bug-hunt. It was 
 getting late, and having completed their plans they 
 left for their homes. 
 
 On the next Friday morning it was raining, and 
 by noon the air had become so cold that every rain- 
 drop froze to ice. When the boys went- to their beds 
 that night they could hear the swishing of the 
 frozen rain among the ice-covered branches of the 
 trees. It did look as if there would be no bug-hunt 
 the next day. 
 
 On Saturday morning when they awoke the sleet 
 had stopped, the sky was clear, and the sun was 
 rising in all his splendor. It was a beautiful world, 
 with rainbows glittering on every ice-covered tree 
 and bush. After an early breakfast they started for 
 the water oak. During the week they had interested 
 Mr. Minter, the pastor, in what they were trying 
 to do, and he was waiting for them at the oak tree 
 when they arrived. 
 
 They started for Mr. Blakeley's farm because it 
 was the most slovenly looking farm in that section, 
 and they felt sure that it was the best place to look 
 for the chinch bugs. " There is plenty of rubbish 
 on his farm for the bugs to hide under during the 
 winter," they said. When they came to the pasture 
 bottom they found it flooded, with only a narrow 
 ridge of dry land left by which they could reach 
 
114 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 the uplands, where they expected to find the bugs. 
 That ridge, however, was held by Jim Blakeley's 
 flock of geese. There were six mean ganders in the 
 flock, and the way they hissed at them led the boys 
 to believe that the geese were determined to defend 
 
 FIG. 52. "There is plenty of rubbish on his farm." 
 
 that ridge. It became a question of taking the 
 ridge by storm or retracing their steps and reaching 
 the uplands by a long route. They might have 
 stopped to think it over, but Harry Fulmer had 
 made up his mind, and waving his stick high above 
 his head he called " Charge ! ! !" Up the ridge they 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 115 
 
 rushed like a pack of wolves. The geese, flapping 
 their wings, began a retreat which soon became a 
 rout. They scattered pell-mell off the ridge into 
 the water below and swam away. When the boys 
 reached the uplands they stopped and waited for 
 Mr. Minter. When he came up he said, "Boys, I 
 wish that they had been chinch-bugs." 
 
 "We should be heroes then/' the boys replied. 
 
 "Yes," said Harry, "we should have earned our 
 ride already, for we surely routed them and scouted 
 them, nor lost a single man." The boys all laughed 
 and walked on. 
 
 When they came to a wire fence at the edge of a 
 cotton field Sammy exclaimed, "By the way, boys, 
 I nearly forgot something. I have with me here 
 little bottles with dead chinch-bugs in them, one 
 bottle for each of you. The other evening papa hap- 
 pened to recall that he had gathered a lot of them 
 last summer and put them in a bottle. He put them 
 in these small bottles and asked me to give each of 
 you one of them so you would know chinch-bugs 
 when you met them and not make the mistake 
 of taking a chipmunk or a field-mouse for one of 
 them." 
 
 With much laughter the boys took the bottles, 
 agreeing that this was very thoughtful of Mr. 
 Sprague. Each boy examined the bugs in his 
 bottle with squinting eyes. 
 
116 FARM SPIES 
 
 When they had crossed the wire fence they were 
 in a thick growth of bermuda grass. "It looks to 
 me," said Mr. Minter, "as though this would be a 
 good place for them to spend the winter." 
 
 "Under the ice?" the boys asked, surprised. 
 
 Mr. Minter explained, "There are many tufts of 
 grass here that have not been soaked by the weather 
 and under them the bugs find shelter. Put your 
 sticks into action and make a search." 
 
 With the sticks they had cut when they started, 
 they whipped the ice from the tufts of grass, then 
 got down on their hands and knees to make a careful 
 examination. After they had worked on that grass 
 for a while Sammy called that he had found one. 
 They all ran to the spot, and after they had compared 
 the bug which Sammy found with those IQ their 
 bottles they all agreed that it was a chinch-bug. 
 Not being able to find more there, they crossed 
 another fence into Mr. Blakeley's old corn-field, 
 full of stumps. Around every stump there was a 
 mass of weeds and old dead grass and many of the 
 stumps were covered with loose, shaggy bark. The 
 boys were now happy, for they soon saw that their 
 ride was earned. Under rubbish, matted grass, under 
 stones and in the refuse on the terraces and in the 
 field they found the chinch-bugs in abundance. 
 Willie Foy found a lot of them in the old husks and 
 behind the dried leaf boots of old corn-stalks that 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 
 
 117 
 
 were left in the field. When they had finished this 
 field it was dinner-time, and they found a nice place 
 on the old covered bridge to eat their lunches. 
 They spent the afternoon roaming over a large part 
 of the country, and when they came back to Sammy's 
 
 FIG. 53. "And they found a nice place on the old covered bridge." 
 
 home with their bottles full of living chinch-bugs, 
 Mr. Sprague was very much pleased. "You cer- 
 tainly must have found their winter homes/ 7 he 
 said with much surprise. "It means that we must 
 clean our fields better in the fall than we have been 
 doing/' he said. 
 
118 FARM SPIES 
 
 Mr. Sprague was so much pleased that he had 
 learned so much about the winter homes of the 
 chinch-bugs that he would never get through talking 
 about it. When he met one of his neighbors he would 
 say, " Do you expect to be bothered with chinch-bugs 
 next year? " 
 
 "Yes, unless we should have a wet season," the 
 neighbor would reply. 
 
 "Well, let me tell you something/' Mr. Sprague 
 would then say; "we do not give enough attention 
 to the cleaning up of our fields in the fall." 
 
 Of course the neighbor would then ask, "What 
 has that to do with the chinch-bugs next year?" 
 and laugh, thinking that Mr. Sprague had lost 
 track of the subject. 
 
 Mr. Sprague would then explain how the bugs 
 wintered in and about the old rubbish, grass, and 
 refuse of crops left in the field. Nearly every neigh- 
 bor who listened to this story would, after a little 
 thinking, exclaim, "That looks sensible to me be- 
 cause the worst spots in my fields always appear 
 near stumps, stones, trash, and along terraces." 
 
 Mr. Sprague would then call attention to the im- 
 portance of knowing more about this bug, and urge 
 that they all attend the farmers' meeting at Kings- 
 ton. "They will have a train there, showing live- 
 stock, grains, farm-machinery, and bugs ; there 
 will also be speakers," he said. Some would then 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 119 
 
 say that the speakers at those meetings were book- 
 worms and did not know how to guide a plow. Mr. 
 Sprague would then tell them that most of the men 
 that came as speakers from the Agricultural College 
 had been reared on farms and had learned to plow 
 and to do every other kind of work necessary on the 
 farm. It takes a different man to run the farm. 
 "They have no business to plow now/' he would say. 
 " If plowing were their business, they would not 
 know any more about bugs than I. I believe that I 
 am a fairly intelligent man, and what I want is facts ; 
 when I have them I can put them into practice as 
 well as anybody, and those fellows who spend their 
 lives studying bugs know the bug facts even if they 
 do not know how to guide a plow. If they spent 
 their time plowing, they could not know so much 
 about their special subjects. They are experts; do 
 you get me? " 
 
 In most cases they did get his idea, and nearly 
 every farmer of that neighborhood was at the 
 farmers' meeting. The day was lovely, and the boys 
 enjoyed their ride in the big touring car. 
 
 Sure enough, among the speakers was a bugman, 
 and this tickled the boys. When the program had 
 been finished the chairman said that the. meeting 
 was open for any questions that any one wished to 
 ask. It was surprising how many questions were 
 asked about bugs, and especially chinch-bugs. The 
 
120 FARM SPIES 
 
 boys listened closely to all the questions and also 
 to the answers by the speakers. 
 
 "I am so glad to see that Mr. Jim Blakeley is 
 here ; I did not think that he would come/' said 
 Mr. Sprague when the meeting was over. 
 
 "He and I were chatting down there in the grove 
 a little while ago. I never saw any man so inter- 
 ested. I asked him how he liked the meeting, and 
 he said that it was fine and that he had learned a 
 number of good things. He seemed to feel satisfied 
 that his old stump-field needed cleaning up, because 
 he was sure, from what was said at the meeting, 
 that it must offer the best kind of shelter for the 
 bugs to pass the winter." 
 
 About two weeks after the meeting Mr. Blakeley 
 called at the home of Mr. Sprague. Will Brown, 
 Walter Carey, and Fred Conner happened to call 
 at the same time to spend the evening. 
 
 When a few neighbors meet like this to spend a 
 pleasant evening, you know that generally every 
 kind of subject is discussed, but this evening the 
 talk drifted to chinch-bugs, and Will Brown said 
 afterwards that he had never before believed that 
 one could spend so pleasantly an evening talking 
 about bugs. It was Mr. Blakeley who started it, 
 and, in fact, he had come on purpose to talk to Mr. 
 Sprague about this matter. 
 
 Mr. Blakeley said, "The last two weeks I have 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 121 
 
 hardly done anything except clean my fields. I 
 found the bugs all right, and I have a notion that the 
 ' bugf eller ' at that meeting knew what he was talking 
 about. He said that when the warm weather came 
 along these bugs would fly away and hunt growing 
 grasses, oats, wheat, and such for food. When 
 they have found it and have settled down they lay 
 eggs which hatch into the little reddish, young bugs 
 that have no wings. Well, he said that they did much 
 less damage in wet seasons ; I have noticed that my- 
 self, and now, ahem ! if we should have rainy spells 
 I reckon I have done all the cleaning for nothing." 
 
 "Very likely not/' said Mr. Sprague, "because 
 there are other bad insects passing the winter in 
 the same way. Then again, it is like insurance ; 
 you never know when your buildings may burn down, 
 but you pay for the insurance just the same. If 
 we only knew beforehand what the weather would 
 be, then we could plan everything just right, couldn't 
 we?" 
 
 "Yes, of course/' Mr. Blakeley agreed, but 
 continued, "that ( bugf eller' said that three dif- 
 ferent things could be done. One was the destruc- 
 tion of the winter quarters by cleaning, burning, 
 plowing, and the like. Well, I did that, but the 
 second thing he spoke about was burying. I don't 
 see how that could be done. Bury all the bugs? 
 Piffle!" 
 
122 FARM SPIES 
 
 The other men could hardly keep from laughing 
 at this. "He did not say burying/' Will Brown 
 explained, "but he said barriers. When the wheat 
 and oats are harvested the bugs spread to the corn- 
 fields for food. The young bugs cannot fly and have 
 to crawl, and that is the reason that he suggested 
 barriers between the bugs and the corn. The barrier 
 may be a deep furrow thrown toward the bugs so 
 that they have to climb its steep side before reach- 
 ing the corn. The furrows can be improved by 
 digging holes with a pesthole digger about fifteen 
 or twenty feet apart in the bottom of the furrow. 
 The furrow must be kept clean and in good con- 
 dition." 
 
 "The best barrier, he said, was prepared as 
 follows : around the field where the bugs are, and 
 before they start to travel, make a smooth path 
 and pour upon it a narrow line of road-oil, tar, or 
 creosote. This line the bugs cannot, or will not, 
 cross, provided the line is freshened from time to 
 time. On the side of this line next to where the 
 chinch-bugs are, pestholes should be dug about 
 twenty feet apart and from eighteen inches to two 
 feet deep. The mouth of each hole should slope a 
 little and should be so made that it will touch 
 the line of road-oil, tar, or creosote. The material 
 may be poured from a pot with a spout, in a stream 
 about one-half inch thick." 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 123 
 
 "I understand that/' said Mr. Blakeley, "but 
 what was that spray?" 
 
 " Sprays have to be used when the corn is attacked 
 by the old bugs as they come from winter quarters 
 and by the young hatching from their eggs ; also 
 when somebody has been asleep and let the bugs 
 travel to his corn from another field and has not 
 stopped them with a barrier. He said that a good 
 spray could be made with one-fourth ounce strong 
 tobacco extract, one ounce good laundry soap, and 
 one gallon of water. The tobacco can be omitted 
 if it cannot be obtained. The bugs should all be 
 wet, but care should be taken not to fill the ' curl ' at 
 the top of the corn with the spray." 
 
 At this moment Sammy came into the room, 
 yawned, and threw himself down in a large chair. 
 
 "Sammy," said his father, "didn't that speaker 
 say that there were two kinds of chinch-bugs?" 
 
 Sammy had fallen asleep, but woke when his father 
 asked the question and answered with a sleepy 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, what did he say?" his father asked, and 
 they listened. From halfway down in slumber- 
 land they heard Sammy's voice, and he answered as 
 though he was speaking his piece in school, "He 
 said there were two races of chinch-bugs, the long- 
 winged race having wings as long as the body, and 
 the short-winged race, having the wings much 
 
124 FARM SPIES 
 
 shorter than the body when full grown. He said 
 that the short-winged form was more inclined to 
 grasses and the long-winged race is chiefly a corn- 
 pest." 
 
 "Have you seen both in your bug-hunts around 
 here?" they asked. After waiting some time they 
 heard a faint voice, "All that I have seen were the 
 long- winged." 
 
 "How many broods did he say there were during 
 the season, Sammy?" Mr. Sprague asked again. 
 
 Sammy's reply was a faint snoring, as if some one 
 was sawing wood about half a mile away. They all 
 laughed with considerable noise, but Sammy kept 
 on snoring and did not hear it. 
 
 "I remember he said there were two broods, one 
 in the small grain and the other in the corn," Will 
 Brown answered for Sammy. 
 
 Sammy's snoring reminded the men that it was 
 already late, and so they parted for their homes. 
 
 The people of the Sprague section had learned 
 something very useful and interesting. They knew 
 the habits and life of the chinch-bug and also the 
 ways for controlling the pest. Some try to use all 
 the methods, and others find that one or the other 
 properly used holds the bugs in check. Mr. Blake- 
 ley's farm looks like a different piece of land ; he 
 has cleaned up* the brier patches and has pulled the 
 stumps, and his fields, which looked so slovenly the 
 
CHINCH-BUGS 125 
 
 day when the boys stormed the ridge, now look 
 cheerful and prosperous. "If these bugs intend to 
 stay on my farm during the winter, they will surely 
 have to be keen hunters to find a place for shelter/' 
 he says. 
 
 "We used to think that the chinch-bugs would 
 drive us out of business/' Mr. Sprague says, "but 
 it looks now as if we have put the bugs out of busi- 
 ness. Not only that, but it has set us to thinking, 
 and we are better farmers than we used to be. Of 
 course, we still have chinch-bugs, but they are much 
 more polite and considerate than they were several 
 years ago." 
 
 And all this good work started when Billy Burnet 
 peeked into Mr. Sprague's corn-crib that lovely 
 December afternoon. 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 
 
 IT was in the spring of the year. The sun was 
 sinking on the western horizon, and trees and bushes 
 cast long shadows over the landscape. Every living 
 thing was hopeful, and the farmers of the Gardner 
 section were more hopeful than usual because the 
 spring weather had been fine ; they had all pre- 
 pared their fields well and had finished their spring 
 plantings. The cotton was just coming up and 
 with the eye, when helped a little by the imagination, 
 one could trace the rows across the fields. Every 
 one of the farmers in that section knew that a 
 cotton-crop well planted in a thoroughly prepared 
 seed-bed was half the battle. Even Si Fletcher, who 
 rarely agreed with anything, said that this was cor- 
 rect, provided good seed was planted. 
 
 Joe Gardner was the youngest, most active, and 
 most progressive farmer of the neighborhood, and as 
 he had planted earliest of the other farmers his 
 cotton was the tallest in the community. But Joe 
 stood by the old bars at the edge of the cotton-field 
 this evening and was very angry. Joe's neighbors 
 told him that he was foolish to be so angry about 
 
 126 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 127 
 
 something that he could not have prevented and to 
 worry about things that he could not change. The 
 truth is that they had noticed nothing wrong with 
 their cotton except that they had very broken stands ; 
 they did not think much about it because they said 
 that it had been that way every year as long as they 
 could remember, and that it was natural. When 
 Joe would not agree to this some of the older men said 
 it was because he was so young. "Wait till he is a 
 little older and he will know better/' one old neigh- 
 bor said. His close friends, however, did not talk 
 that way, but shook their heads gravely and said, 
 " Joe does not often make a serious mistake." 
 
 Will Gray was, no doubt, the most successful 
 farmer next to Joe, and even he had not been able 
 to see why Joe should be so discouraged. 
 
 Joe explained, "I took great pains and did every- 
 thing I thought ought to be done in preparing my 
 land for this planting and the cotton came up beau- 
 tifully, but now the stand is broken everywhere. 
 You can find a number of places in some rows where 
 nearly every plant is dead or sickly over a distance 
 of a hundred feet." 
 
 " You are grumbling over spilled milk, Joe/' said 
 Will. 
 
 Just then Bill Green, who lived near the old bridge 
 on a knoll on the south bank of Clear Creek, came 
 along the road and heard the conversation. Bill 
 
128 FARM SPIES 
 
 was born and reared where he lived and, being over 
 seventy years old, felt that he knew everything that 
 could be known about the country around there. 
 He said to Joe, " I hev' seen it afore and it come all 
 right ag'in." 
 
 Joe replied, "I had just a little of it last season, 
 but what there was of it did not come all right 
 again. The little cotton died and stayed dead. 
 This year much of the cotton looks sickly just like 
 that last year, and I am satisfied that it is going to 
 die/' 
 
 Bill did not like Joe's reply, and with an air of 
 wisdom told Joe that it was the moon. "When the 
 moon changes the cotton will grow, and you will 
 make your crop all right," he said. 
 
 Mr. Gardner hesitated, not that Mr. Green's 
 answer satisfied him, but he was big enough to 
 know that the ways of nature are often beyond 
 understanding and that even the wisest and oldest 
 men are often unable to foresee what the results 
 may be. 
 
 Sam Drake came along the road, stopped, and 
 joined in the discussion. After the situation had 
 been explained to him he looked at the cotton care- 
 fully with, what he proudly believed, knowing eyes. 
 After wrinkling his forehead for a while, he turned to 
 Joe and said : " You made a mistake ; I done knew hit 
 and said hit when I come down the road a couple 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 129 
 
 weeks ago and seen you a-plantin'. I had all my 
 land ready to plant, but I didn't, because the signs 
 weren't right. You planted by the dark of the 
 moon and you shouldn't have done it. That is 
 what I say." 
 
 Joe answered that he did not believe that to be 
 the cause of the cotton's dying. 
 
 "Hold on here, Joe," Bill interrupted, very much 
 vexed that a youngster like Joe should reject the 
 decision of his old neighbors; "you are going al- 
 together too fast ; you are exceedin' the speed- 
 limit ; me and Sam here are old farmers and remem- 
 ber the day you was born. We have lived here all 
 our lives, and if we don't know this country then I 
 would like to know who does. Me and Sam have 
 grown as much as forty acres of cotton a year, and 
 we always had enough cotton to sell that we could 
 buy all the corn for meal and we made our own bacon. 
 You are but a young feller and have a heap to learn 
 
 yet." 
 
 Joe replied, "I want more than a little corn bread 
 and bacon if I stay on the farm. Then I don't care 
 how old you men are or how long you have lived here, 
 I do not believe that the moon has anything what- 
 ever to do with this cotton's dying. There is some 
 good reason for it, and I am going to find out if I 
 
 can." 
 
 When Bill and Sam drove on they did not look as 
 
130 FARM SPIES 
 
 if they were laughing, and Joe, paying no further 
 attention to them, started for the home of George 
 Elliott, the farm demonstration agent, and told 
 him the trouble. Joe knew that Sam and Bill did 
 not think very highly of the demonstration agent, 
 " Because," they said, "that fellow is too young to 
 tell us old farmers anything. We knew him when he 
 was a little shaver going to the old field school down 
 by the crossroads. He has lived here all the time, 
 except for a short time when he was to what people 
 call college. No, siree, Georgie has to wait a while 
 before he can teach us anything about farming." 
 
 Joe knew that the demonstration agent did not 
 presume to know everything, but he said to himself, 
 "He always has a way of finding out when he does 
 not know." 
 
 The farm demonstrator went to the fields and 
 examined the cotton and said, "I do not know what 
 the trouble is, Joe, but I will send some of those 
 plants to the State agent at the agricultural college, 
 who will have one of the experts examine it." 
 
 Some of the older men who heard what the demon- 
 strator said looked at each other with a wise smile 
 and remarked, "Didn't I tell you; that demon- 
 strator does not know. He planted by the dark of 
 the moon ; that is the trouble, ahem ! " 
 
 Mr. Elliott wrote his letter and sent the plants, and 
 a few days later he received a report that the plants 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 131 
 
 had been examined and that the experts found them 
 attacked by foot-aphids and that one of the experts 
 would be at the farm of Joe Gardner and would 
 advise any one interested what to do. 
 
 The man who came there was an entomologist; 
 that is, he was a man who made a study of insects. 
 Early on that Wednesday morning many farmers, 
 old and young, came to hear what the entomologist 
 had to say. When they first saw him, many of the 
 older men were very much disappointed because he 
 appeared so young. The young entomologist care- 
 fully examined the plants. When he could find 
 nothing on the leaves and stalks he took a trowel 
 and drove it into the ground and lifted the plant 
 out, roots and all, together with the soil about the 
 roots. After he had scratched the earth away from 
 the roots with great care, they saw many little 
 bluish, soft-bodied, sucking insects. "What are 
 they?" several of them exclaimed with surprise. 
 "We never saw such bugs on the roots of cotton," 
 others said. 
 
 "That is, no doubt, correct," the entomologist 
 answered. 
 
 Another farmer exclaimed, "My cotton is dying 
 the same way, and I have examined the roots of 
 many of the plants, but I don't find any of these 
 bugs, so I know that this is not the trouble with my 
 cotton." 
 
132 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 " Did you dig up your plants as I did this one ? " the 
 entomologist asked. 
 
 "Why, no/' answered the man, "I did not take 
 time to dig them up ; I just pulled them up, ex- 
 amined them, and had done with it." 
 
 The entomologist replied. "That is very likely 
 the reason that you did not discover 
 these bugs when you examined the 
 plants. These insects are cotton 
 root-aphids, or what some people 
 call root-lice. They occur mainly 
 on the small feeding roots as you 
 will notice when you look at this 
 plant which I have dug up. You 
 see they have their beaks fastened 
 in the tissues, and when you pull 
 up a cotton plant the little feeding 
 roots are torn off, leaving the aphids 
 in the ground. When a few occur on 
 the main stem they will be pulled 
 off when the plant is drawn through 
 the soil to the surface. If, therefore, you pull a 
 plant instead of digging it up, you may not see the 
 aphids, then you come to the conclusion that the 
 roots are clean. In the way I lifted the plant from 
 the soil, the roots are retained by the plant and 
 will bring the aphids to view if there are any." 
 At this time Jake Wheeler relieved his mouth of 
 
 FIG. 54. "These 
 insects are cot- 
 ton root- 
 aphids." 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 
 
 133 
 
 a load of tobacco juice which he had let uncon- 
 sciously accumulate while listening to the entomolo- 
 gist, and approaching Bill Green, said in an under- 
 tone which was almost a whisper, "Say, Bill, I 
 believe that young fellow knows 
 what he is talking about." 
 
 Bill, who had been watching 
 and listening with interest to 
 what the entomologist said 
 and did, removed his corn-cob 
 pipe from his mouth long 
 enough to reply, "He sure 
 does, Jake. In them good 
 clothes, and appearin' young- 
 like, he looked like one of them 
 city fellers, but he sure talks 
 so we can understand him. He 
 sure does." 
 
 Joe, who had become greatly 
 interested in what the young 
 entomologist had said, asked, 
 " How in the world did all these 
 aphids get there so early in the 
 season ? They certainly could not have been there 
 during the winter because there was nothing green 
 on the fields." 
 
 : 'The habits of these aphids are quite well un- 
 derstood," the entomologist started to explain; 
 
 FIG. 55. "How in the 
 world did all these 
 aphids get there so early 
 in the season?" 
 
134 FARM SPIES 
 
 "entomologists have worked on what we believe to 
 be the same kind of aphid for many years. Some 
 get to the cotton by flying, as a certain number of 
 them get wings. Most of them are carried by the 
 little ants that you see so abundantly here on the 
 ground." 
 
 "Carry them there! carry nothing ! " exclaimed 
 old Jack Terrell. 
 
 "Don't carry them there? What makes you say 
 that ? " the entomologist asked. 
 
 "They eat them, and that is just what these 
 ants are good for/ 7 Jack answered. "If it wasn't 
 for those ants these little bugs would not let us 
 grow a single stalk of cotton." 
 
 "Have you ever seen an ant actually eat an aphid, 
 or, have you at any time seen an ant eat an aphid 
 anywhere?" asked the entomologist. 
 
 "No-o-o," Jack replied hesitatingly, as though by 
 reflecting he must recall having seen it; "but," he 
 continued, "I have seen the ants have these lice in 
 their jaws and that is enough, is it not? The ants 
 eat the lice or aphids as you call them, and that is 
 what I say." 
 
 "No doubt you have seen them between the jaws 
 of the ants, but if you had watched them long 
 enough your conclusion would have been an en- 
 tirely different one. Had you watched long enough 
 you would have found the ants, which you believed 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 135 
 
 were eating the aphids, in the act of carrying them 
 to some desirable food plant. They were not eating 
 the aphids, but they were merely transferring them 
 from a poor food-plant or from their burrows to 
 another or better food-plant, just as the mother cat 
 carries her kittens from one place to another." 
 
 Jack stood and stared at the entomologist, with 
 his mouth wide open. Then the entire group of 
 farmers burst into a laugh which angered him. 
 
 "Piffle," he exclaimed. "Nonsense ! I have been 
 farming all my life and you can't make me believe 
 such a fool thing as that." Thereupon he turned on 
 his heels and went straight home. Just what he 
 said when he arrived home no one has been able to 
 find out exactly. 
 
 The entomologist looked serious, and did not know 
 what to think of such a performance, when Joe 
 turned to him and said, "Don't mind him, because 
 when he has a notion you nor anybody else could 
 get him away from it. Go on and tell us more about 
 the ants and aphids. What object has the ant in 
 being so plagued hospitable to the aphids?" 
 
 The entomologist continued : " This question of 
 ants attending aphids is an old one and is quite well 
 understood, not only in regard to these particular 
 ants but with others as well. These are known as 
 the corn or cotton-field ants because they are so 
 common and so well known to everybody. They 
 
136 FARM SPIES 
 
 are so much interested because they enjoy eating 
 the sweet liquid or honey-dew made by the aphids. 
 The ant does not require this honey-dew because it 
 has been shown that she can live without it, but the 
 ant loves it just as a boy loves ice-cream or the mos- 
 quito loves blood. The ant is willing to put itself to 
 a great deal of trouble attending the aphids in order 
 to get the honey-dew." 
 
 Joe asked, "You say that the aphids are carried 
 there by ants, and when the plant upon which they 
 feed fails they carry the aphids to other and healthier 
 plants, all for the honey-dew? " 
 
 "That is correct," he replied. 
 
 " Now, then," Joe continued, " this goes on through- 
 out the summer and fall when it is warm and there 
 are growing plants on the field, but what happens 
 when winter comes, when the plants all die and the 
 ground becomes chilled?" 
 
 "It does appear as if this might be a serious matter, 
 especially to those who have not studied the ways of 
 ants," the entomologist replied, "but the ants have 
 more foresight than most people are willing to give 
 them credit for. The ants realize that the aphids 
 are the machinery for making honey-dew, and for 
 this reason must be protected. When the food- 
 plants die in the fall the ants invite the aphids to 
 their warm burrows of their own underground homes. 
 The aphids never seem to hesitate in accepting this 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 137 
 
 invitation and the ants seize them in their strong 
 jaws and carry them to their homes. This is what 
 Jack Terrell saw, and it led him to the conclusion 
 that the ants ate the aphids. In the underground 
 homes of the ants the aphids are at ease. Although 
 ants are somewhat eccentric about who shall, and 
 who shall not, be allowed the liberties and pro- 
 tection of their burrows, yet the aphids are free to 
 visit any chamber. Not only do they enjoy free 
 passes to go where they wish, but the ants even 
 show them every courtesy and no occupant of the 
 ant-home is allowed to molest them." 
 
 "How do the aphids get their food during the 
 winter, for they surely have no means of support 
 in the ant-homes? " inquired Will Gray. 
 
 The entomologist answered, " Nature has so pro- 
 vided that during this period of indolence, which 
 lasts from two to three weeks, .the aphids can fast. 
 In the meantime the ants are very active, scouting 
 the field in every direction in search of desirable 
 food-plants, principally life-everlasting, and as soon 
 as these are located small channels or galleries are 
 constructed about the tender roots ; the burrows 
 around the roots of life-everlasting are then con- 
 nected with the channels of the ant homes by under- 
 ground passages, and they transfer the aphids to 
 these tender roots undisturbed by frosty air and 
 biting winds. The aphids immediately insert their 
 
138 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 \ 
 
 beaks into the roots to satisfy their hunger, at the 
 same time making delicious honey-dew which they 
 yield to the ants willingly in pay for coming between 
 them and destruction at the approach of winter. 
 In most cases this arrangement provides sufficient 
 food until the spring plants appear again." 
 
 Joe had become excited. "In the spring the ants 
 
 carry the aphids to the 
 young plants as they 
 come up, do they?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "Well, yes, but there 
 is a faster way," the ento- 
 mologist explained . "Na- 
 ture has so endowed the 
 aphids that in the spring 
 when the winter food- 
 plants fail in their sup- 
 ply of sap, the little wing- 
 
 \. 
 
 (After Forbes.) 
 FIG. 56. "The little wingless 
 
 less creatures produce a 
 
 large number of winged individuals, which, driven 
 by impulse, leave the homes of their protectors and 
 fly through the air in every direction in search of 
 the sweet juice of the young cotton plants." 
 
 "How in the world do the ants find the aphids 
 again after they let them fly away ? ' ' Sam Drake asked. 
 
 "I was just going to tell you about that," the 
 entomologist replied. "It seems that even before 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 139 
 
 the aphids acquire wings the ants foresee what is 
 coming, and are very active in the cotton-fields. 
 By the time the aphids reach the fields the ants are 
 there to receive them. The little rogues have al- 
 ready finished the tunnels, and, running in every 
 direction, they discover the aphids and carry them 
 to the roots of the young cotton through the tunnels 
 made for- that purpose. Here the aphids find plenty 
 of food and are soon 
 surrounded by little 
 family groups." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said 
 Joe Gardner, "this is a 
 treat. I never knew 
 that these little bugs (After Forbes.) 
 
 Were SO Wise. Could FIG. 57. "And fly through the air 
 
 in every direction. 
 
 you tell us what we 
 
 might do to prevent them from killing our young 
 cotton ? There are plenty of other plants here to 
 which they are welcome. They can have my whole 
 wood-lot pasture over there and I would watch them 
 work whenever I had time. They are cute and 
 hard working little fellows and they are welcome to 
 live on my farm, but I cannot let them have 
 my cotton merely to satisfy their thirsty little 
 throats for honey-dew." 
 
 "Put something in the fertilizer," exclaimed Will 
 Gray. " Can't you do that ? " 
 
140 FARM SPIES 
 
 "That is the same old question asked over and 
 over again until it is almost worn out. We have 
 tried everything we could think of, hoping that we 
 might be able to kill them in the soil or drive them 
 away from the plants. Among the many things ex- 
 perimented with none has so far proven effective. 
 We have made up our minds that the only remedy 
 so far known is hard sensible farming. That, we 
 know, does control them. 
 
 "The first step is to keep. the aphids off the 
 field for at least one year, or, in other words, drive 
 them away from the field." 
 
 "How can you do that?" several exclaimed. 
 
 The entomologist continued: "We have studied 
 the food-plants and we know quite well on which 
 plants the aphids can live and also those on which 
 they cannot live. For this reason we keep their 
 food-plants off the field which is to be planted in 
 cotton ; this forces them to leave and allows the 
 cotton to get a good start before enough aphids can 
 be brought back to harm the plants. It will never 
 do to let your land, on which you wish to plant 
 cotton, lie idle during the winter, because that gives 
 the wild food-plants a chance to grow on such land, 
 and I have already explained to you how well the 
 ants know how to make use of them." 
 
 "What are some of those wild food-plants you 
 are talking about?" several farmers asked. 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 
 
 141 
 
 "There are a number, but the plants known as 
 life-everlasting are the most important. There is 
 one," and the entomologist pointed to a plant on 
 the ground. 
 
 FIG. 58. "Life-everlasting are the most important." 
 
 "What are some of the plants on which they can- 
 not live?" they asked. 
 
 "Among our farm crops are oats, rye, barley, 
 wheat, vetch, clover, and peas, and these are all 
 plants which you know well and which you are 
 growing on your farms," the entomologist explained. 
 "When you plant a heavy cover-crop of one of the 
 
142 FARM SPIES 
 
 plants on which the aphids cannot feed, the weeds 
 have little chance to grow during the winter. They 
 are cleaning crops because they clean the fields of 
 weeds and aphids. Many farmers call them cover- 
 crops because they will take up the plant-food and 
 hold it so it cannot waste during the winter ; they 
 
 FIG. 59. "The weeds have little chance to grow during the winter." 
 
 also hold the soil-moisture and keep the soil from 
 washing during heavy rains. You can see how 
 important it is to use these cover-crops even when 
 you have no aphids. Let us take, for example, this 
 farm on which Mr. Gardner grows cotton, corn, and 
 oats as the main crops. Oats planted in the fall 
 keep down the weeds during the winter, and since 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 143 
 
 the aphids dp not feed on oats, the ants would not 
 care to keep them there just to starve. If the ants 
 figure on getting into the field after the oats are 
 harvested they are badly mistaken, because the oats 
 are followed by cowpeas, which is not a food-plant 
 for the aphids. To make matters still worse for the 
 ants and aphids, you follow the cowpeas with oats, 
 rye, vetch, or clover for winter cover; as none of 
 these is a food-plant there will be few aphids on 
 that field by spring. Then is the time to plant the 
 field in cotton." 
 
 "Why not plant that field in corn?" one farmer 
 asked. 
 
 "Because," answered the entomologist, "there is 
 no crop on the farm that suffers so much from these 
 aphids as cotton, and for that reason you should 
 give cotton the first chance after the field is clean." 
 
 "In regard to cultivation," the entomologist 
 continued, "as soon as the cotton is large enough, 
 begin and give it frequent shallow cultivation until 
 the plants have a good start. This cultivation nettles 
 the ants very much because they do not go by sight 
 as you or I do, but they seem to go from one place 
 to another by following trails made before. Just 
 think, Mr. Gardner, if you were an ant and wished 
 to go home you would have to follow some trail 
 you made when you came to the field before, instead 
 of looking and seeing your house and then walking 
 
144 FARM SPIES 
 
 f 
 
 to it. Should anything have destroyed the trail 
 you would lose your way and be as much nettled 
 as the ant. There ! watch that ant crossing from 
 one row to the other/ ' he said, pointing to an ant 
 crawling on the soil; "she does not go in a straight 
 line and doesn't it look as if she is following an old 
 trail ? Let us see if there is any sense in my thinking 
 so." The entomologist then rubbed his fingers over 
 the ground in front of the ant, and sure enough, 
 when she came to his finger-mark she stopped and 
 was vexed. 
 
 "Now," continued the entomologist, "think of 
 a harrow or some other shallow tool going through 
 this row, how it must confuse the ants and how im- 
 possible it must then be for them to care for the 
 aphids. I have often thought how the ants must 
 smile when a farmer does not cultivate as he should. 
 To control this aphid is a case of humbugging an 
 ant. The best way is to rotate crops intelligently, 
 and to give thorough shallow cultivation when the 
 plants are young." 
 
 It was now late in the afternoon and the people 
 started for their homes. 
 
 Since this meeting in Joe Gardner's cotton-field 
 many of the farmers of that section have greatly 
 improved their lands by intelligently rotating the 
 crops and giving cotton rapid shallow cultivation 
 when it is young. George Elliott, the county demon- 
 
THE COTTON ROOT-LOUSE 145 
 
 stration agent, is still there, and he says that where 
 the root-aphids used to kill the cotton nearly every 
 spring, they do no damage now. Whenever some 
 one says that the agent is too young, Joe and the 
 other good farmers always reply, "He is doing more 
 good helping the farmers of this county than any- 
 body else. It was he who got the entomologist to 
 come and tell us about the root-aphid, and we now 
 know how to humbug this pest." 
 
 Although this happened many years ago the old 
 bars are still there, and whenever Joe passes through 
 them going or coming from the field he recalls with 
 a smile that evening when he stood there so angry 
 because he did not know what was killing his cotton. 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 
 
 MR. GEORGE WHITNEY lives in the foothills in the 
 northern part of South Carolina. He is now a very 
 old man, but until he was seventy years old he 
 farmed. His farm contains one hundred and forty 
 acres and is known far and wide as the Whitney 
 farm. If you ever visit that neighborhood, you will 
 hear people tell of the wonderful crops that were 
 made -on that farm in the days when old man Whit- 
 ney was young. 
 
 One day Frank Sellars and his father started in 
 an automobile to visit Frank's uncle, who lived near 
 Mr. Whitney. About twelve miles from home one 
 of the tires deflated and they had to stop to repair it. 
 It happened directly in front of Ed Cherry's house 
 and Ed came out to talk to Frank's father. When 
 everything was in readiness to go, Frank's father 
 said, "Have you made good crops this year, Ed? " 
 
 u Yes, I have had good luck this year," Ed replied. 
 
 "Does that field across the road there belong to 
 you? " Mr. Sellars asked, looking at an old cornfield 
 where the stubble were left, at the same time crank- 
 ing his car. 
 
 146 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 
 
 147 
 
 "No, indeed not/' answered Ed with disgust. 
 "If it were mine, it would not be lying there with all 
 the stubble on it ; it is a regular breeding cage for 
 windfalls next year." 
 
 Calling good-by, Frank and his father drove on. 
 
 FIG. 60. "If it were mine it would not be lying there with all the 
 stubble on it." 
 
 Frank was in deep thought, and when they came 
 to a smooth road where his father was not so busy 
 guiding the car, he asked, "What did Ed mean by 
 saying that the stubble-field across the road from his 
 house is a breeding cage for windfalls for next year ? " 
 
 "I don't know/' his father answered, "I have 
 thought about it and wish I had asked him." 
 
148 FARM SPIES 
 
 Frank continued, "He said if it belonged to him 
 it would not be lying there as it is. It is nearly 
 Christmas time. What do you suppose Ed would 
 do to that field this time of the year?" 
 
 "I suppose he meant that he would plow it and 
 plant something in it," Mr. Sellars continued, "but 
 he talked as if the field lying there the way it does, 
 made it a breeding-cage ; that is what I do not 
 understand." 
 
 They arrived at the home of Frank's uncle about 
 noon. After dinner Frank told his uncle what Ed 
 had said about the old corn stubble-field across the 
 road from his house, but his uncle did not seem to 
 know what he could have meant. "In this section 
 we consider it bad practice to leave the corn-stubble 
 on the field over winter in fact we do not allow 
 our_ fields to lie bare over winter ; we always put 
 cover-crops on. We are satisfied that such fields 
 as the one Ed was talking about make vermin for 
 the following season, but I don't know about wind- 
 falls. It is worth while to think about it, because 
 you know Ed is a smart fellow and a ' crack' farmer/' 
 Frank's uncle explained. 
 
 Frank's father then spoke up, saying, "I bet old 
 George Whitney knows if anybody around here 
 does." 
 
 "He very likely does, but whether he would tell 
 us or not is another question," said Frank's uncle 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 149 
 
 with a smile. "You know he is a peculiar man/' 
 he added. 
 
 "Frank/' said his father, "you can go and ask 
 Mr. Whitney, if you want to." 
 
 "All right/' Frank answered, and started down the 
 road to Mr. Whitney's home. 
 
 Frank's father and his uncle sat on the front porch 
 watching Frank going down the road. Frank's 
 uncle said, "I am not sure whether the old man will 
 answer his questions ; let me see, Frank is twelve 
 years old now and Mr. Whitney has never been 
 much of a man with boys. There is no better farmer 
 for miles, and he would do anything for you in 
 trouble, but he is peculiar. When you ask him a 
 question he may answer it or he may not, or he may 
 give you a good scolding. He and I are good friends, 
 and when he finds out that Frank is my nephew, he 
 may be real nice to him." Mr. Sellars wondered 
 how this visit might come out. 
 
 Frank was a bright, cheerful, winning boy, with 
 a smile for every one he met. When he arrived at 
 Mr. Whitney's home a large collie came running 
 towards him, barkjng ; he spoke to the animal and 
 they became friends immediately. Mr. Whitney 
 was sitting on a chopping-block under the lean-to of 
 the old barn. 
 
 "Good evening; is this Mr. Whitney?" Frank 
 said. 
 
150 FARM SPIES 
 
 "That is who I be, sonny," he answered, and his 
 look betrayed his curiosity as to who that boy 
 might be. 
 
 The boy spoke again : " That is a lovely big dog 
 you have, Mr. Whitney. I like dogs and he is about 
 the finest fellow I ever saw." 
 
 The frankness with which this was said pleased 
 the old man, and he became interested in his young 
 visitor. "Yes," the old man explained, "he is all 
 you say ; I raised him myself ; he was born in that 
 old kennel you see over there under that tree. His 
 mother came from South Carolina and was as fine 
 a dog as you or anybody else ever saw. What may 
 be your name, sonny? " 
 
 "My name is Frank Sellars and my father and I 
 are visiting Fred Collins. Mr. Collins is my uncle," 
 said Frank, wondering in the meantime what the old 
 gentleman meant by saying that the dog came from 
 South Carolina, the State in which he was now 
 living. 
 
 "So you be visitin' your uncle Fred Collins. 
 Well, Fred is a mighty fine man and a good neighbor. 
 Have a seat, sonny. Git that box leanin' thar 
 against the tree and bring it over here and set down." 
 
 When Frank went for the box he could but admire 
 the tall and stately elm against which the box leaned. 
 When he came back he said, "What a beautiful elm 
 that is, Mr. Whitney. There are none prettier on 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 151 
 
 the Capitol grounds at Washington. I looked at 
 them last summer when we were visiting there." 
 
 Mr. . Whitney looked at him and remarked, "So 
 you visited Washington ; that must have been 
 
 nice." 
 
 "Yes, it was/' said Frank, "and we also had a 
 boat ride to Mt. Vernon, where we visited the tomb 
 of Washington." 
 
 "Visited what?" Mr. Whitney asked quickly. 
 
 "The tomb of Washington ; Washington's grave." 
 Frank repeated. 
 
 "Well, well, well, why that is news to me. I did 
 not know he was dead. When did he die? " 
 
 Frank, not sure whether this was ignorance or 
 second childhood, answered hesitatingly, "Why, 
 Mr. Whitney, he has been dead a long time." 
 
 "That is strange," the old man replied, "I saw a 
 paper only about a month ago and it said' that 
 Washington was dressed up for the inauguration. 
 How came you to visit him ; do you know him?" 
 
 "We visited Uncle John; he is a congressman," 
 Frank replied. 
 
 "So be I!" Mr. Whitney asserted emphatically, 
 hitting his right knee with his fist. " I am a congress- 
 man and a Wilson man. Them two are the biggest 
 men who ever lived. Even the Americans say so." 
 
 Frank thought to himself, "Mr. Whitney may be 
 a very good farmer, that is, he may know how to 
 
152 FARM SPIES 
 
 make good crops, but I would call him a very ignorant 
 man." He wondered whether there would be any 
 use to ask him about what Ed had said. 
 
 Like every boy, Frank was never at a loss for words 
 nor schemes for getting what he wanted. 
 
 "Mr. Whitney/' he said, "you have a very nice 
 farm. How many acres are in it?" 
 
 "One hundred and forty/' Mr. Whitney replied 
 promptly. He said nothing more, and Frank saw 
 that a few more well-planned questions might lead 
 to the one he wished to ask. 
 
 "You know, Mr. Whitney," Frank continued, 
 "when father and I came down the road this morn- 
 ing we saw several cornfields that had the stubble 
 left on them. I do not see any fields like that on your 
 farm." 
 
 "Of course you don't; I never allow it." Mr. 
 Whitney said curtly. 
 
 "I have to keep on asking questions to get him 
 to talk," Frank thought. " There was a corn stubble- 
 field across the road from Mr. Ed Cherry's place and 
 if nothing is done don't you think it will breed 
 windfalls?" Frank asked this question not knowing 
 what he meant by it, but he thought it would at 
 least bring him nearer to the question he wished 
 answered. 
 
 "Yes, it will; yes, it will," the old man managed 
 to say, but not another word. 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 153 
 
 "He surely is a hard man to get started, but I 
 am going to try again/ 7 he said to himself. 
 
 "Isn't it funny, Mr. Whitney, that old stubble 
 left on the field during the winter breeds wind- 
 falls ?" Frank asked again. 
 
 "Not at all, sonny, not funny at all when you 
 understand it," and again he stopped. 
 
 "I do not understand it, Mr. Whitney," Frank 
 
 FIG. 61. "It is a worm that stays in the bottom of the stubble 
 during the winter." 
 
 replied; "is it a disease that breeds in the stubble, 
 do you suppose? " 
 
 "I suppose nothing about it, sonny," Mr. Whitney 
 replied. " I know what it is. It is a worm that stays 
 in the bottom of the stubble throughout the winter, 
 and in the spring a candle-fly comes from it. In 
 the spring after the corn has a good start these 
 candle-flies lay their eggs on it, and from these eggs 
 come the worms that bore into the corn-stalks. 
 
154 F ARM SPIES , 
 
 This, sonny, weakens them, and during heavy winds, 
 or even rains, in July, the stalks break down and 
 the farmers call them windfalls." 
 
 Frank looked at the old man with admiration. 
 "Though short, it is one of the best speeches I ever 
 listened to in my life," he said to himself. Just a 
 moment ago Frank had regarded him as the most 
 ignorant man he had ever met, and yet he could in 
 a few well-framed sentences tell what his father and 
 uncle did not know. Mr. Whitney had now become 
 talkative, and he told Frank many things about 
 farming that he had never known and which he 
 felt few people knew. This mountaineer, so igno- 
 rant about the country in which he lived, surely 
 understood better than anyone else in that section 
 how to make crops. 
 
 Before leaving, Frank said, "Mr. Whitney, if I 
 knew as much about farming as you, I would farm 
 all my life." 
 
 "Sonny," said the old man, patting him on the 
 head, "and if I knew as much as you know now I 
 would be twice as good a farmer." Frank stared 
 at him surprised, but the old man continued: "I 
 am an ignorant old man, while you are young 
 and have life and opportunities before you. When 
 I was a boy of your age I had no chances to get 
 an education. I am making a living and pay my 
 honest debts, but I am too ignorant to enjoy life. 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 155 
 
 My two boys went to college and I know what I 
 missed." 
 
 Frank went down the road to his uncle's home in 
 deep study. He told his father and uncle everything 
 Mr. Whitney had said. When he retired to his bed 
 that night he repeated to himself, "And I thought 
 that he was an ignorant man." 
 
 When Frank woke up the next morning he knew 
 that he had been dreaming about candle-flies. He 
 dreamt that he had been in the field across the road 
 from Mr. Ed Cherry's house pulling up corn-stubble, 
 and that in the bottom of nearly every root he had 
 found a worm. "That was a funny dream/' he said. 
 
 After breakfast he told his father that he was 
 willing to give everything Santa would bring him 
 if he could go into the stubble-field he dreamt about, 
 and examine the roots. "I don't see any stubble- 
 fields around here," he said. 
 
 Uncle Fred down by the shed had heard Frank, 
 and called, "No, Frank, you won't see any near 
 here because Mr. Whitney has folks trained around 
 here not to allow stubble on the fields during the 
 winter, but Sam Hoyt down by the river takes no 
 notice of it, and if you go to his place he will show 
 you all the stubble you want to see. Sam is a nice 
 fellow, but he does not believe what Mr. Whitney 
 says about the stubble causing windfalls. If you 
 find any of those worms on his place, I wish you 
 
156 FARM SPTES 
 
 would show them to him, and maybe he will then 
 do something about it. His farm is only about a 
 half mile beyond those woods. You follow the main 
 trail, starting at the bars, and when you come out at 
 the other side of the woods you will see a.white house 
 and an old log-barn. That is his place." 
 
 Frank started, and soon arrived at Mr. Hoyt's 
 home. He told Mr. Hoyt his name, where he came 
 from, and what he came for. 
 
 "Haw, haw, haw, haw," Mr. Hoyt laughed. The 
 laugh was so hearty and the face of the big fat man 
 so good-natured that before Frank knew it he was 
 laughing with him, as hard as he could. 
 
 "Sure, you can examine my stubble," Mr. Hoyt 
 continued, "but if you can find the windfalls in them, 
 then you are a good one. You seem to have gotten 
 some of old man Whitney's notion's ; haw, haw, 
 haw." 
 
 Frank and Sam went to the field and pulled the 
 first stubble they came to. Frank split it with his 
 pocket-knife, and there were two large, yellowish 
 worms in the root. ".Great Tecumseh ! " Mr. Hoyt 
 exclaimed, and stared at the worms a long time. 
 Frank kept on pulling and splitting stubble, and in 
 nearly every one he found one or two worms and 
 in some even three. He explained to Mr. Hoyt what 
 Mr. Whitney had told him about these worms 
 making candle-flies, and Sam answered with a loud 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 157 
 
 'guffaw/ and said, "The old gentleman dreamt that 
 or maybe he read some fool story somewhere." 
 
 Frank tied together all the stubble he had pulled 
 and split and started for home. When he was almost 
 in the center of the forest on the old trail he suddenly 
 stopped and said to himself: "I am calling these 
 bugs by the wrong name. I remember now in our 
 reader in school it says that young insects are larvae 
 and that the young of butterflies and moths are 
 called caterpillars. I recall that my teacher told us 
 not to call them worms. All right, I am glad that I 
 remembered that, and so I will call them .larvae or 
 caterpillars after this." 
 
 When he returned he said to his father and uncle, 
 "I have the caterpillars, or worms, as Mr. Whitney 
 calls them. He was right so far, and I am going to 
 find out whether they will make candle-flies. I am 
 going to bury the roots of the stubble in that old 
 flower-bed and put a mosquito net over them so 
 that the chickens will not scratch them up." 
 
 "I have a big box here with a wire screen on 
 it. I used to keep hens in it. You can turn that 
 over them; it beats mosquito netting," his uncle 
 said. 
 
 "What are you going to do with them when we 
 go back home?" his father asked. 
 
 "I will take them with me and bury them at 
 home," Frank replied. 
 
158 FARM SPIES 
 
 "All right, I have window-screening that you can 
 use," his father said. 
 
 When they started back home Frank had his 
 corn-stubble packed in the rear of the car, and when 
 he arrived there he buried them back of the wood- 
 shed. Several days afterwards he came and told 
 his father, "Bringing the stubble from Uncle Fred 
 makes me laugh." 
 
 "Why?" his father asked. 
 
 "Because I can find all I want around here," 
 he answered, and they both 
 laughed. 
 
 (Afte7B U r.EM.,u~s.Dept.A g r.) In the spring when the 
 FIG. 62. "He found a num- corn was being planted none 
 
 ber of chrysalids." . , . 
 
 ol the caterpillars had changed 
 
 to moths, and this puzzled Frank very much. At last 
 when it seemed to him that he could wait no longer 
 he uncovered the stubble and examined them. To 
 his surprise he found caterpillars in only a few of them, 
 but after a somewhat closer examination he found a 
 number of chrysalids. "You know I scratched my 
 head and wondered what became of some of the 
 caterpillars," he said to his father, "but I understand 
 it now ; they are changing to chrysalids or pupae and 
 that means that they will soon become moths; 
 hurrah ! " 
 
 He kept on watching, and when the corn was large 
 enough to cultivate they had not yet become moths. 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 159 
 
 He began to think that something was wrong after 
 all. "I know they are not dead because they wiggle 
 just a little when I handle them/' he said. 
 
 Corn was about five inches high when his first 
 moth came out, and one by one the others followed. 
 They were of a smoky brownish color. "They must 
 be laying on the corn in the field by this time and 
 I am going to the field to see about it," Frank said. 
 He watched several days ; and, seeing no moths, 
 he became dis- 
 couraged but said 
 nothing to anyone 
 about it. 
 
 One evening after 
 sundown his father 
 
 asked him tO get a (After Bur. Ent., U.S.Dept.Agr.) 
 
 Wrench which he FIG. 63.- "When his first moth came out." 
 
 had left at the far end of the farm. It was about 
 dusk, and Frank walked slowly up the driveway 
 to a certain point, then crossed the cornfield to 
 the place where the wrench had been left. To his 
 delight he discovered some of the moths hovering 
 about the corn. "They are laying eggs now, 
 and I am coming here to-morrow to watch them," 
 he said. 
 
 The next morning he came early, and although he 
 stayed till noon he saw not a single moth. He went 
 home disappointed and told his father about it. 
 
160 
 
 FARM SPIES 
 
 His father said, " Maybe they lay their eggs at 
 dusk only." 
 
 In the evening Frank went back to the corn- 
 field and, sure enough, the moths were there. He 
 marked the places on every stalk where he had seen 
 a moth, and the next morning he found the tiny eggs 
 
 on the leaves. After 
 a few days the eggs 
 hatched and the little 
 caterpillars crawled 
 down the blades of 
 corn into the bud. 
 He noticed that they 
 ate small holes into 
 the buds, and when 
 later those leaves un- 
 folded there were 
 rows of round or ir- 
 regular holes across 
 them. 
 
 "I do not understand how the rows of holes get 
 in those leaves," Frank said. 
 
 u That is quite simple," his father answered, and 
 then rolled up a piece of paper and punched one 
 hole through it with his lead pencil, and when he un- 
 folded the paper there was a row of holes. His 
 father then explained, "The young corn bud consists 
 of leaves folded up, and if you make a hole through 
 
 FIG. 64. "I do not understand how the 
 rows of holes get into those leaves." 
 
.WINDFALLS OF CORN 
 
 161 
 
 the bud as the caterpillars do, a row of holes will 
 show when the little leaves unfold." 
 
 When the caterpillars were about half grown, they 
 left the bud, traveled down the stalk, and ate into 
 it near the ground. When they became full-grown 
 
 FIG. 65. "Left the stalks through the openings they had cut." 
 
 each cut a round opening through the outer wall of 
 the stalk, and after plugging it with chewed pith 
 from the inside, crawled to a small chamber pre- 
 pared in the pith and transformed to a chrysalis. 
 About two weeks later the moths came from the 
 
162 FARM SPIES 
 
 chrysalids or pupae and left the stalks through the 
 openings they had cut and so carefully plugged 
 when they were caterpillars. 
 
 When the corn was tall enough to tassel and silk > 
 the moths laid eggs on the bottom leaves. The 
 little larvae bored into the stalk, and like their an- 
 cestors, chewed the pith. When the summer winds 
 were blowing Frank noticed that many stalks had 
 been burrowed so that they broke off near the soil. 
 
 "Now I know what windfalls are. I wish every 
 farmer knew what caused them. 7 ' He then went to 
 his father and asked, " Won't the windfalls make 
 corn?" 
 
 "No," his father replied, "the milky corn on the 
 windfalls sours and rots." 
 
 The larvae kept on growing in the fallen stalks 
 or in the stubble, and when winter began, unlike 
 their parents, they bored to the tip of the root and 
 there they stayed during the winter, undisturbed by 
 snow, sleet, or wintry winds. The following spring 
 they changed to pupae, and two weeks later the 
 smoky brown moths appeared to lay their eggs on 
 the new corn-plants. 
 
 Frank said that he counted as many as a dozen 
 larvae in a single stalk of corn. 
 
 "That is nothing," John Drake retorted ; "I have 
 seen as many as fifty holes in a stalk." 
 
 Frank answered, "That is because they some- 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 
 
 163 
 
 times come out of the stalk and go in at another 
 place; so there may often be more holes than 
 larvae." 
 
 John, looking at the larvae Frank had in his hand, 
 said : "Those are not 
 the same kind that 
 work in my corn 
 
 during the Summer. FIG. 66. "In summer and early fall 
 
 They look different." they are white dotted with black '" 
 
 Frank explained to him, "In summer and early 
 fall they are white, dotted with black, but when 
 winter comes they change to a cream yellow color, 
 
 and this leads some people 
 to believe that they are 
 different caterpillars." 
 
 "I want to know how 
 to kill them," John said. 
 " We ought to do as they 
 do in the Whitney sec- 
 tion," said Frank. "All 
 the farmers around there 
 destroy the corn stubble 
 in the fall. They never 
 allow them to stay in the fields over winter because 
 they say that they breed windfalls." 
 
 "How do they destroy them, do you know?" 
 John asked. 
 
 "There are several ways," Frank answered. 
 
 FIG. 67. "But when winter 
 comes they change to a cream 
 yellow." 
 
164 FARM SPIES 
 
 "Some harvest the corn, then plow out stalk, root 
 and all, rake it in heaps and burn. Others plow out 
 the stubble, rake them and haul them to the barn- 
 yard. Then again some farmers just plow them up 
 and let them lie on the surface. Mr. Whitney, one 
 of the best farmers living in that section, plows his 
 stubble under with a large disk plow and then sows 
 oats and vetch on the land. He says it is the proper 
 thing to do, not only to prevent windfalls but to 
 destroy many other pests as well. He says that his 
 way of sowing the land for winter keeps the soil in 
 good condition because it holds moisture better, 
 does not wash away, and holds the plant-food. 
 'Always plow your corn and cotton land deep in 
 the fall and sow a cover-crop. If you cannot do 
 the deep plowing, sow the cover anyway, and never 
 let your corn-stubble stay on the field.' 
 
 " Mr. Whitney, says, ' Because they do these 
 things in the Whitney section they have no trouble 
 with windfalls/ The farmers around there work 
 together and Mr. Whitney says ' That is what 
 counts/ ' 
 
 The following year all the farmers in Frank's 
 neighborhood agreed not to leave the stubble on 
 the cornfields over winter, and the next year they 
 had very few windfalls. 
 
 One day when Frank was visiting his uncle Fred, 
 Mr. Whitney came in and he and Frank had a long 
 
WINDFALLS OF CORN 165 
 
 conversation about good farming.- When they 
 parted Frank' asked him, "How did you know so 
 much about the worms that make windfalls ?" 
 
 Mr. Whitney replied, "Some years ago I got a 
 bulletin from Washington ; I studied it and it has 
 helped me very much." 
 
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 A collection of stories which all children ought to read. 
 
 OSWELL: 
 
 Old Time Tales. For Primary Grades. 
 Ballads and folktales that children of the Old World 
 have heard for hundreds of years. 
 
 OSWELL: , 
 
 A Fairy Book For Primary Grades. 
 A collection of good stories of fairies and other little earth 
 people. 
 
 OSWELL: 
 
 Stories Grandmother Told. . For Primary Grades. 
 Old fairy stories interestingly told. 
 
 REYNOLDS: 
 
 How Man Conquered Nature. For Intermediate Grades. 
 Stories that will give vitality to the study of history and 
 geography. 
 
 STOCKTON : 
 
 Stories of the Spanish Main. For Grammar Grades. 
 A collection of stirring adventures on land and sea, por- 
 traying scenes of historical and literary value. 
 
 UNDERWOOD: Heroes of Conquest and Empire. For Intermediate and 
 Grammar Grades. 
 Old stones of famous conquerors told with freshness and 
 vigor. 
 
 WARNER: 
 
 Nonsense Dialogues. For Primary Grades. 
 Mother Goose in dramatic form. 
 
 WERTHNER 
 
 : How Man Makes Markets. For Grammar Grades. 
 The story of commerce. 
 
 YOUNG: 
 
 When We Were Wee. For Intermediate Grades. 
 A vivid picture of child life in war times. 
 
 THE 
 
 MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 
 64-66 Fifth Avenue, New York City 
 
 ATLANTA 
 
 BOSTON CHICAGO DALLAS SAN FRANCISCO 
 
THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
 STAMPED BELOW 
 
 AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS 
 
 WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN 
 THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY 
 WILL INCREASE TO 5O CENTS ON THE FOURTH 
 DAY AND TO $1.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY 
 OVERDUE. 
 
 NOV 5 
 
 LD 21-100m-7, '40 (6936s) 
 
YB 45178 
 
 5098 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY