The following samples of starches were received too late for a chemical examination, but were examined microscopically:

Two samples from Pee Dee Manufacturing Company, Rockingham. Both were found as represented to be-corn starch.

One sample from McAden Mills was found as represented to be-corn starch. One sample from Charlotte Cotton Mills was found as represented to becorn starch.

One sample (N.) starch from Charlotte Cotton Mills was found as represented to be-corn starch.

INSECT ENEMIES OF CORN.

BY FRANKLIN SHERMAN, JR., ENTOMOLOGIST.

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS.

At the outset it must be remembered that corn is a crop of low commercial value. The value of its product per acre is so low that expensive measures are not justifiable, except where such treatment is to prevent the insects from spreading over larger areas in the field. It is not practicable to spray a cornfield to kill insects, yet it is practicable and often advisable to spray a few rows along the edge of a field when the chinch bug, or army worm, is just getting started. The low value of the crop renders it difficult or even impossible to combat some of the pests satisfactorily.

Corn is grown in such large areas and there are so many individual plants in a field, that it is usually unprofitable to adopt any method which calls for the treatment of individual plants, except, as stated before, in cases where such treatment will prevent the insects from spreading more widely through the field.

Beetle at work in corn stalk at right. Injured stalk at left. Natural size.
(Photograph by H. H. Hume.)

These considerations show us plainly that in combating many of the insect pests of corn we must rely on such methods of culture and handling of the crop as shall render it least liable to insect injury. With any crop of low commercial value, such as corn, cotton, wheat and the like, prevention is the watchword in dealing with insect pests.

CULTURAL CONSIDERATIONS.

By changing or modifying the methods of culture, much may be done to avoid injury. This matter is so important that we will consider it more in detail.

Rotation. Any system by which corn follows grass or a growth of weeds is injurious, from the standpoint of insect pests. Where land just from sod is put in corn, the crop suffers more from wireworms, white grubs, root webworms and cutworms than it does when it follows a cultivated crop like cotton. Suppose we have a field now in sod which we wish to bring into cultivation: A system of rotation which will give the minimum amount of insect injury to the corn might be arranged as follows: First year, plant the field in a small grain, and after that in peas. Second year, cotton, potatoes, cabbage or other cultivated crops. Third year, corn (peas may also be grown with the corn). Fourth year, small grain and peas again, and so on. A shorter system may be used, but it is best to have corn at least two years removed from a growth of grass or weeds, and it is advisable to have it separated from small grain by one year in a cultivated crop. Of course, such a plan may not always be feasible, but it is best so far as avoiding insect injury is concerned, and the nearer we can come to it the better. The employment of peas in the rotation is beneficial from all points of view. Not only do they tend to improve the land, but they do not in any way render the corn more subject to insect injury. Corn following corn year after year is also favorable to the increase of certain insects, and should be avoided.

Fertilization.-We wish under this head to call attention to the fact that a crop of corn which has been put into healthy condition by fertilization, whether by commercial or farm manures, is better able to withstand and recover from insect attacks than one which has not been so aided. Here the peas serve a useful purpose. It has also been claimed that where heavy applications of kainit or other salty fertilizers are used, the wireworms, cutworms and other underground insects are checked to a considerable extent. Whether or not this is true has not been fully demonstrated.

Disposition of Remnants.-Throughout the Southern States it is a common custom to "pull" the fodder, leaving the stalks standing in the field with the shucks attached until the land is needed for other purposes, when they are beaten down and plowed under. Such a practice is detrimental from the standpoint of one who wishes to avoid insect injury. If the fodder were cut at the ground (or as close to it as practicable) and the stalks and leaves shredded or made into ensilage, a reduction of insect injury would result, and the value of the fodder and grain would both be increased by the process. Many insects find hibernating places in these stalks and husks. Chinch bugs, grain weevils and stalk borers are all favored by this custom of "pulling" and leaving the stalks, and all will be more or less reduced by abandoning the custom and making use of the shredder and the silo. Even the plowing out, raking together and burning of the stubs will sometimes be advisable.

The Ideal System.-Having gone into some detail with these cultural considerations, it is well now to summarize with a statement of the method to be followed where one hopes to incur the minimum amount of insect damage.

The field should be on land well drained and of sufficient elevation not to be subject to overflow. It should be at least two years out of sod, and the year previous to corn should have been in some hoed or cultivated crop. If there is much growth of weeds or grass on the land it should be plowed in the fall.

The land should be deeply plowed, well fertilized, and the corn should be given frequent and thorough cultivation. At harvest the stalk should be cut at the ground and shredded or made into ensilage.

The writer understands perfectly that such a system as this cannot always be carried out in all details, but he does claim that such a system will involve a minimum amount of insect injury; and the system has much to recommend it on other grounds. It would result in a greatly increased yield and value of the crop aside from any consideration of insects.

INSECT ENEMIES OF CORN.

WIREWORMS (Several Species). Order Coleoptera. Family Elaterida. (Also sometimes called "Drillworm.")

Description.—Slender, smooth, firm-bodied, yellowish-brown larvæ, attaining length of from one to two inches, which destroy the corn by eating the seed before it comes up, or by eating into the stalk of the plant just below the surface of the ground, causing the center of the growing part of the plant to die.

Injury in North Carolina.-Any insect which does its work underground is not likely to attract attention except in cases of very serious injury, consequently the few reports which we have had cannot show adequately the damage that these pests inflict. It seems quite certain, also, that some farmers confuse Wireworm injury with Budworm injury, so that what is sometimes attributed to one may in reality be due to the other.

FIG. 1.- Adult and larva of Wireworm. It is the larva or worm form
that does the damage. The adult beetle is known as a "Jack-snap-
per" and does no harm other than to lay the eggs.

(After Comstock and Slingerland.)

Life-history.-Wireworms are the young, or larvæ, of the beetles which are called "Jack-snappers," "Snap-jacks," "Click beetles," "Hominy-beaters," "Elaters," "Thumping-beetles," and other similar names. The beetles have these names because of their power to spring suddenly into the air when placed on the back. There are something like five hundred species of beetles belonging to the family (Elateridae) in the whole of North America, while our records show that fifty-nine species have already been recorded in North Carolina; and no doubt many more will be found later. The adult beetles are seldom, if ever, seriously injurious; but their larvæ are frequently so. The larvæ of many of the species live in rotten wood or under bark of dead trees, and others feed upon the seeds or tender roots of plants under the surface of the ground. The larvæ are so much alike that they cannot be identified, hence a species can only be named with certainty when it is in the adult (beetle) stage.

So far as we have been able to observe, the great bulk of Wireworm injury to corn in this State is by only a few species-probably not more than three or