ERADICATING GRASSHOPPERS.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 10819, 9 December 1902, Page 6

ERADICATING GRASSHOPPERS.

Grasshoppers have recently been doing soirip damage in Victoria, and are particu-larly-numerous, in Gippsland. In former , years iKese little pests have done enormous harm, and now, when' all Gippsland districts are heavily taxed by the- rush of stopk from the drought-stricken areas,' the presence of grasshoppers in large numbers would be the .cause for. general alarm were it pot for .the fact that, science has come to the aid of the graziers. A few years ia^o^the^Goxernmei^t JE.ntpmologist "of Cape Colony , was endeavouring to find a means of v dealing effectively .with the locust plagues; > when hft 1 made ' the~ discover^ 'that ■great numbers of th.c insects were dying from some contagious disease in particular localities. Investigation >soon.; proved that their complaint was" one of winch the gcrins could be cultivated, and that when healthy locusts were Brought into, contact with the artificial cultures, they not onlyi contracted, the , fatal , disease themselves, but also spread ii to others. This discovery, has • been "applied ,io >he destruction of the Victorian grasshoppers. Germ cuitiires. of ' the disease wpre imported by .-.the, 4jfovprnnient, ,^and pxperiinpnts made in the idstrict? north of Benr digo. These, -were only partialjy successful, owing, jt W£s believed, to the'dryness of the climate.- In the cooler and moister districts, howeyer, the introduction of the disease ' proved highly cial, except from ;the, point of view pf the grasshopper, < and this < year < the ■ Government has beep besieged by applicants for supplies of the locust "fungus.'\ Two Binall glass tubes of thp cultures, to^etlier with printed. instructions, are supplied to each applicant. The farmer dissolves the contents of a tube-, with some sugar, in a tumbler of water and floats in this some pieces iof cork.' In three or "f our t days a fungus growth appears round the cork. . Then, he has simply to catch' a few grasschoppers with a net,^ immerse them in the contents of the .tumbler and liberate them. Tliey will be infected themselves, and will spread the disease wholesale' through the grasshoper communities. Th» disease, as lax as can, be judged at present, affects nO insect 'or.apimal except the, grasshpppers, anfl.ttyesp s^em,in a fj\ir way to. be_ practically, ergdfcated. „. .„; ,>( „.