will hinder or stop the progress
of an invasion. The bugs fall into the bottom of the furrow, and may
there be killed by dragging a log up and down the furrow. Write to the
Division of Entomology, Washington, for bulletins on the chinch bug.
Other methods of prevention are to be found in these bulletins.

[Illustration: FIG. 165. A PLANT LOUSE COLONY]

=The Plant Louse.= The plant louse is very small, but it multiplies with
very great rapidity. During the summer the young are born alive, and it
is only toward fall that eggs are laid. The individuals that hatch from
eggs are generally wingless females, and their young, born alive, are
both winged and wingless. The winged forms fly to other plants and start
new colonies. Plant lice mature in from eight to fourteen days.

The plant louse gives off a sweetish fluid of which some ants are very
fond. You may often see the ants stroking these lice to induce them to
give off a freer flow of the "honey dew." This is really a method of
milking. However friendly and useful these "cows" may be to the ant,
they are enemies to man in destroying so many of his plants.

_Treatment._ These are sucking insects. Poisons therefore do not avail.
They may be killed by spraying with kerosene emulsion or a strong soap
solution or with tobacco water. Lice on cabbages are easily killed by a
mixture of one pound of lye soap in four gallons of warm water.

[Illustration: FIG. 166. A CHEAP SPRAYING OUTFIT]

=The Squash Bug.= The squash bug does its greatest damage to young
plants. To such its attack is often fatal. On larger plants single
leaves may die. This insect is a serious enemy to a crop and is
particularly difficult to get rid of, since it belongs to the class of
sucking insects, not to the biting insects. For this reason poisons are
useless.

[Illustration: FIG. 167. A SQUASH BUG]

_Treatment._ About the only practicable remedy is to pick these insects
by hand. We can, however, protect our young plants by small nettings and
thus tide them over the most dangerous period of their lives. These bugs
greatly prefer the squash as food. You can therefore diminish their
attack on your melons, cucumbers, etc. by planting among the melons an
occasional squash plant as a "trap plant." Hand picking will be easier
on a few trap plants than over the whole field. A small board or large
leaf laid beside the young plant often furnishes night shelter for the
bugs. The bugs collected under the board