Insects And Human Welfare - An Account Of The More Important Relations Of Insects To The Health Of Man, To Agriculture, And To Forestry

INSECTS AND HUMAN WELFARE AN ACCOUNT OF THE MORE IMPORTANT RELATIONS OF INSECTS TO THE HEALTH OF RUN, TO AGRICULTURE, AND TO FORESTRY - 1920 - PREFACE - THE present volume is an attempt to present some of the principles and practices of economic entomology in a form that will illustrate the biological relationships of insects to their environment. Like-nearly all applied sciences, economic entomology was early developed as an art, with little reference to biology, aiming toward the empirical application of certain methods for the destruction or abatement of noxious insects. The past few decades have witnessed great changes whereby the field of the entomologist has been greatly extended, and he has been compelled, not unwillin ly, t o improve his methods of investigation and to take advantage of the rapid progress made not only in zoology and botany, but in medicine andSchemistry as well. He has naturally greatly improved his efficiency, and has been enabled to increase his usefulness to humanity many fold. The general public rarely appreciates fully the many economic problems in relation to insects which continually present themselves. Even the zoologist, be he morphologist, embryologist, geneticist or student of animal behavior, often regards the entomologist as a collector or cabinet naturalist, . who spends the greater part of his time impaling specimens upon slender pins, and continually rearranging them in corklined boxes. Unfortunately, this means toward an end seems to be a bugbear from which the entomologist may never escape, since he has to deal with a wonderfully varied and extensive series of animals. This very fact makes it difficult to deal with insects in the brief andgeneralized manner applicable to other groups of animals. As a consequence, entomological books and treatises naturally tend to assume encyclopaedic form. In the following pages I have considered few of the details which may be found in many other carefully prepared volumes, but have rather attempted to avoid, as consistently as possible, matters not directly necessary for a brief consideration of insects as they affect human welfare. Most of the material contained in the chapter on Insects and Public Health appeared in the Scientific Monthly, and in its recast and revised form is reprinted with their kind permission. The illustrations have come from several sources, the photographs almost entirely. from negatives made by the author of the maps, charts, etc., some have been made especially for the present book and others are redrawn or modified from various authors. Owing to changes in nomenclature during the past few years, many of our common insects now have different Latin names. All of these changes have not been made in the present book, as the author feels that they should become well established before they are presented to the non-expert reader. CH RLES THOMA B S R UES BUSSEY IK STITUTION HARVARD U NIVERSITY February, 1919 - CONTENTS - PAGE INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix CHAPTER I INSECTS A ND THE PUBLICH EALTH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 CHAPTER I1, INSECT AN S D THE FOOD S UPPLY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 9 - CHAPTER 111 FORESITN SECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 CHAPTER IV HOUSEHOLINDS ECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 CHAPTER V THEO UTLOO F K O R THE FUTURE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 00 INTRODUCTION. IN his ceaseless strides towards a domination of the material world, man has encountered many obstacles. Some of these are palpably of his own making...