First Annual Report, Beneficial and Other Insects, of the State of Missouri: Made to the State Board of Agriculture, Pursuant to an Appropriation for ... Legislature of the State (Classic Reprint) - Tapa blanda

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Excerpt from First Annual Report, Beneficial and Other Insects, of the State of Missouri: Made to the State Board of Agriculture, Pursuant to an Appropriation for This Purpose From the Legislature of the State

To the Members of the Missouri State Board of Agriculture:

Gentlemen: - I herewith present my first annual report on the Noxious, Beneficial and other Insects of the State of Missouri, pursuant to your instructions of April 1st, 1868.

It is neither so full nor so valuable as I hope to make its successors, should the office be continued. This is principally owing to the fact, that but eight months have elapsed since my appointment, and that the natural history of a number of the insects that received my attention during the summer, can only be given after they have completed their transformations, which will require one, two and in some cases, even three years.

I have been exceedingly gratified at the warm reception which I have met with from all quarters. Wherever I have been, from one end of the State to the other, the cordial hand has been extended, and I have found our farmers and fruit-growers thoroughly alive to the importance of the work, for they know full well that they must fight intelligently, their tiny but mighty insect foes, if they wish reward for their labors. During the year 1868, insects injurious to our fruits have been unusually numerous, but it may well be asked whether this increase is not a meteorological effect, as was suggested by Mr. W. O. Flagg, in his ad interim report to the Illinois State Horticultural Society, rather than one caused by the increase of our products. The severe drouth of 1867, had a peculiarly injurious effect on many trees, and it seems quite evident that certain insects increase more rapidly in injured fruits and injured trees than in those which are healthy and vigorous. The part, indeed, which insects principally have to play in the economy of this world, is that of scavengers. They hasten the decay and dissolution of unhealthy vegetable organism, the quicker to convert it into mould, and make room for healthy plants; while they multiply at such a prodigious rate, that whenever the conditions are at all favorable to the increase of a particular species, that species appears as if by magic, over vast districts of country, and commits sad havoc to either orchard or field crops, as the case may be.

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