Notes on the Green Bug (Toxoptera graminum Rond.) in Texas

Abstract

THE following notes relate to the writer's first experimental work in Texas, which consisted of an investigational study of the green bug (Toxoptera graminum Rond.). Under appointment as entomological field assistant, the project was entered upon on May 6, 1907, and prosecuted until the end of the year, at Plano, Collin county. As a result of the sweeping outbreak of the green bug earlier in the year, the grain growers of northern Texas in particular, which country comprised the principal grain-producing section of the state, had suffered almost complete loss of their prospective wheat and oats crops. When the seriousness of the devastations first became apparent the grain dealers met and appealed for assistance towards determining measures for future control of the pest. In response the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station authorized an investigation, the means being provided by an Adams fund apportionment. The arrangements included the fitting up of a field station at Plano, for which the grain dealers rendered financial aid that deserves grateful acknowledgment. The locality is typical of the black prairie region on northern Texas, and up to this disaster grain growing had been carried on here ex-