From Farm Spies, How the Boys Investigated Field Crop Insects by A. F. Conradi, and W. A. Thomas; New York: The Macmillan Company, 1916; pp. 1-22.
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, clothing, and other things they needed or wanted. People, 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 interested 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 2 country, where Corn is a great crop, and I believe I will speak to Cotton about it sometime.”
Fig. 1. — “People are surely interested in cotton.”
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 country,” 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. 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:
“It 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 starving 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 taking away day after day without putting any back, his bank will 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 season, and then how are the people going to make a living till another crop can be made? In my country 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 4 at 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 territory extends from ocean to ocean and from the Gulf of Mexico northward halfway across the United States? I and my country are known the world over. Every year I furnish food for millions, build railroads, highways, and waterways. 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 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.”
( From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. of Agr. )
Fig. 2. — “He thought that he was the biggest bug on earth.”
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.”
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 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 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 almost certain death. I do not mind having a leaf or two eaten by some caterpillar; that does not injure me. I do not mind having 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 remain hanging on the plants and dry up. It looks like a dreadful thing to me,” said the plant with a long sigh.
( From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. of Agr. )
Fig. 3. — “Sonny, that is the boll-weevil.”
Yes, Cotton had bragged that there was nothing strong enough on earth that could make him take 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 these beaks are the mouths. With these they make cavities into the squares and bolls and eat the insides,” 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.”
( From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. of Agr. )
Fig. 4. — “With these they make cavities into the squares and bolls.”
Old Mr. Crabgrass had now become interested, and looking up, said, “I have been watching the performance for some time, and I am sure I do not see how Cotton is going to manage it. 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 carefully; 9 this must be quite a protection to the egg from enemies and it must prevent the square from drying.”
( From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. of Agr. )
Fig. 5. — “Those that are left open are used for food only.”
“But look at all those squares lying on the ground. Who does that?” Miss Cowpea asked.
Mr. Corn, who had been watching very closely, explained: “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 10 little footless grubs which feed on the inside of the squares. When the grubs become full-grown they change to pupæ, 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.”
( From Bur. of Ent., U. S. Dept. of Agr. )
Fig. 6. — “They hatch into little footless grubs.”
Fig. 7. — “They change to pupæ.”
“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.”
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 morning, 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, thinking 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 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 speechmakers. 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 endless 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 nothing 13 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 prevents 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 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 my end had come, but those quiet entomologists have gained a point in my favor. Those men are here, there, and everywhere, studying 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 entomologists 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 American who was an expert in farm-management, and his bank 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. 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 the winter, with stalks and stubble and weeds on them; the results 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?” They were told that good examples were vetch, cowpeas, clovers, alfalfa, and others; that the vetches and some of the clovers made good cover-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“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 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 phosphoric acid, and as I have to have them on my table as well as you, I am starving.’
“Dr. Science then stepped forward and asked the bacterium, ‘You say you have an easy way for making 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.’
“ ‘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 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 works fine.” The little houses may now be found on the roots of vetch, clovers, beans, peas, alfalfa, and other legume plants.
Fig. 8. — “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 demonstrators. 18 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; 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 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.
( Photo by Harper, S. C. Exp. Sta. )
Fig. 9. — “And cowpeas for summer.”
Cowpeas in the foreground.
The boll-weevils were mad now. They had a spite against the entomologists and the demonstrators. “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 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 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,” he exclaimed, “we are getting you on our wagon, old boy.”
Fig. 10. — “They always found plenty of old stubble, rubbish, grass, and leaves.”
21All 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 demonstrators 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 number 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 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 insects 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.”
Elf.Ed. Notes
* As the text implies, Paris green was an early insecticide. It made it’s way into a joke book, The Encyclopedia of Comedy, by J. Melville Janson, 1897; page 204:
ROACHES
MR. A. — I moved since I saw you, and the house is full of roaches. I told the landlord about it and he told me to try paris green.
MR. B. — Did you do it?
MR. A. — I’ve taken three doses and it don’t seem to do any good.