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| Poulson's American Daily Advertiser.; Date: 07-28-1812; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Rural Economy:
-
TO FARMERS:
The
following method is recommended to preserve Wheat for years from the fly that
prevails more or less every year in Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania,
Delaware and Jersey, and more particularly on the Bays, Rivers and adjacent
country.[1]
Get your
wheat out of your straw as early as you possibly can; clean the straw well from
the chaff and wheat; if you have a barn, put your wheat away in bulk, leaving
the chaff with it. I knew wheat kept
several years during the Revolutionary War in this way free from all insects. -
Rats and mice cannot burrow in this bank, it will continually fall on
them. Those that have not barns may make
pens with logs, or fence rails; first laying logs or rails on the earth
sufficent to keep the damp from rising to injure the wheat; then cover the
floor twelve or eighteen inches thick with with straw well tread down - put
your wheat on this floor miced with all its chaff, and as you fill the pen,
line the sides well with straw; when you have filled your pen in this way,
stack your straw on the top of it, seeing that the straw extends well over the
top of the pen to carry off the rain water. E.
K. [2]
[1]
Asa Fitch. 1847. Diptera. C. Van Benthuysen and Co., Albany. [accessed July 23,
2013] http://archive.org/details/101187262.nlm.nih.gov
"The insect which we are about to
consider, has for a long period been, at times, a severe scourge, in every
district of our country. It is more formidable to us, says Dr. B. S. Barton,
than would be an army of twenty thousand Hessians, or of any other twenty thou sand
hirelings, supplied with all the implements of war. Hence it has forced itself
prominently to the notice both of agriculturists and men of science. No other
insect of the tens of thousands that teem in our land, has received a tithe of
the attention, or been chronicled with a tithe of the voluminousness that has
been assigned to this species. Our scientific journals, our agricultural
magazines, and our common newspapers, have each accorded to it a conspicuous place
in their columns. As may well be supposed, almost every point in its history,
has by one and another of its observers, been closely investigated, and laid
before the public. Very little that is new,
can, therefore, at this day be embodied in an account of this species. The most
that an observer can accomplish, is to add his testimony in confirmation of
facts that have been already announced. The most that a writer can aim at, is
to gather the various papers that are scattered through volumes sufficiently
numerous of themselves to form a library, sift from them whatever they contain of
importance, and arrange the facts thus acquired, into a connect ed and
symmetrical memoir. Such is the object of the present essay ; to carefully
review the various accounts that have been hitherto published, extract from
each the items of value which it contains, compare these with personal
observations made under favorable circumstances during the past twelve months,
and with the materials thus acquired, rite out a history of this species, more ample
in its details than any that has been hitherto attempted, and containing a
complete summary of all that is known of this insect down to the present day."
J. W. Chapin, Extension Small Grain Specialist, Department
of Entomology, Soils, and Plant Sciences, Clemson
University, Edisto Res. & Ed. Center, 64 Research
Road, Blackville, SC 29817. 803-284-3343-ext. 226 jchapin@clemson.edu.
[accessed July 23, 2013]
"The Hessian fly,
Mayetiola destructor (Say), got its common name from the belief that it was
introduced
to North America in the straw
bedding of Hessian mercenaries during the Revolutionary War. It was
first reported attacking
small grain on Long Island in 1779. By 1845 it was causing damage in Georgia
and
has remained a sporadic pest
of wheat in the South. Hessian fly can cause economic injury anywhere in
South Carolina, but fields in
the southern Coastal Plain usually have greater risk.
Annual damage exceeded $4
million dollars in several outbreaks from 1984 -1989. Contributing factors for
severe infestation include use of a susceptible variety, early planting,
unusually warm Nov. – Dec. weather, reduced tillage into wheat stubble,
volunteer wheat, and lack of rotation. Hessian fly attacks wheat, triticale,
barley, and rye in that order of damage severity. Oats are not affected."
[2] Poulson's
American Daily Advertiser.; Date: 07-28-1812; Volume: XLI; Issue: 11131; Page:
[2]; Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Transcribed by John Peter Thompson, July 23rd, 2013.
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