PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS.

Waikato Times, Volume 98, Issue 15283, 9 July 1923, Page 6

PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS.

DAIWAGE IN SOUTH AFRICA. The coming of the locusts, which settled in dense patches In most of the .suburbs, awakened no apprehension in the minds of city folk, says a Johannesburg paper of April 28. It Is true that enthusiastic gardeners commandeered Jim from the kitchen and ordered him to make smoke screens and to imitate a jazz hand by beating on a paraffin tin. True, too. that the boys at King Edward's School found Ihe locusts could slop their game, for the football would not travel any distance while they were flying low. But to most the invasion was a novelty. To youngsters it was the signal for an outburst of that barbarism which is always seeking an outlet; and they chased the winged strangers with much shouting and yelling.

To the natives they were welcome as a variant from the eternal mealie pap. They were picked up rapidly and stewed, though some tribesmen, it is said, prefer their locusts roasted. The streets around Yeoville and Hospital Hill were strewn with the dead. The Juggernauts of a modern city are more powerful agents of destruction than the thornbush sledges of the farmers. The townsman was able to go about his work without dismay. But the invasion, and the prospect of another, as dark-brown clouds appeared in the west, made one sympathise with the farmer, and visualise the scenes described by country correspondents of green fields eaten down to the brown earth, of growing crops vanishing in a day, of blighted hopes—of broken hearts.

A huge swarm heading for the Zoo, from the west, galvanised the keepers into activity. Under the direction of the superintendent they sent up smoke screens. All the houseboys in Parkview lent assistance lighting small fires and thwacking empty petrol tins.

Their united efforts were rewarded, for the swarm passed over in the direction of Craighall. Locusts continue to cross the border of the Union.from the desert places of South-West Africa. In countless millions they are sweeping the country from west to east. Tireless workers in the night goad the oxen until these trample the invaders, so that the whole farm is strewn with the killed. But ;fresh millions take their place. Now, it is hard to say where it will end. At Potchefstroom a swarm that was estimated to be 100 miles in length blackened the sky. .Around Pietersburg, where farming: enterprise is at its highest, all hands are out to combat the plague. In the Free State the locusts have penetrated as far east as Vredefort.

The slender organisation attached to the Agricultural Department will not admit defeat,, but even their superhuman efforts appear to be of no avail. There is talk of a new non-poisonous powder. Suggestions, indeed, are being sent the locust officers by Ihe score. One of the latest is that a siring of balloons, with nets suspended from them, should be utilised to turn aside the invaders. But it is too late now to devise new means of meeting the enemy.