Each Female Will Drop From
Thirty To Fifty Eggs, All At The Same Time, In A Mass Resembling A
Head Of Wheat.
As many as 50,000 eggs have been counted in a space
less than three and a half feet square.
During my sojourn in Entre Rios, the province where this insect seems
to come in greatest numbers, a law was passed that every man over the
age of fourteen years, whether native or foreigner, rich or poor, was
compelled to dig out and carry to Government depots, four pounds
weight of locusts' eggs. It was supposed that this energetic measure
would lessen their numbers. Many tons were collected and burnt, but,
I assure the reader, no appreciable difference whatever was made in
their legions. The young jumpers came, eating all before them, and
their numbers seemed infinite. Men dug trenches, kindled fires, and
burned millions of them. Ditches two yards wide and deep and two
hundred feet long were completely filled up by these living waves.
But all efforts were unavailing - the earth remained covered. A
Waldensian acquaintance suffered for several years from this fearful
plague. Some seasons he was not even able to get back so much as the
seed he planted. If the locusts passed him, it so happened that the
pampero wind blew with such terrific force that we have looked in
vain even for the straw. The latter was actually torn up by the roots
and whirled away, none knew whither. At other times large hailstones,
for which the country is noted, have destroyed everything, or tens of
thousands of green paroquets have done their destructive work.
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