Word: bolling
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...deep South last week, boll weevils began to stir for their attack upon the 1930 cotton crop. From ground cracks, from old cotton stalks, from patches of dead grass and weeds, the continental swarm of little quarter-inch beetles crawled out of hibernation to meet the warming sun, to twitch and test the long, sturdy snouts with which they will bore into billions of green cotton bolls this summer. Patient planters, breaking up their ground for the new crop, plowed legions of the pest back into the ground to destruction. But legions more crawled out prepared to multiply. Not plows...
...Boll Weevil crossed the Rio Grande from Mexico in 1892, within 30 years had established itself as a permanent infestation of the whole cotton-growing South. The females lay their eggs within the unripe pods, the grubs devour the green lint and within three weeks are ready to breed themselves, In 1921, before the ravage of the weevil had been fairly discounted, the pest destroyed six million bales of cotton, cut that year's crop yield to less than eight million dollars, a disturbingly low record...
Fortnight ago from Athens, Ga., came word that Dr. H. J. Miller, professor of botany at the University of Georgia, had found an insect parasite known as bracon mellitor which he believes can be used to combat Boll Weevil. Its larvae will devour weevil larvae inside the bolls without damaging the cotton. Familiar to all entomologists is the general principle of pest control by parasites.* But before he could put his discovery into common use Dr. Miller had to hit upon a commercially practical method of spreading bracon mellitor larvae through weevil-infested cotton fields...
Paradoxically, many a southern planter views with alarm the possibility of controlling or eradicating Boll Weevil. In the South are two schools of weevil thought. One school laments the curse which reduces the cotton yield per acre, increases production cost, is already discounted in the market price. No less stoutly the other group holds that the weevil is really a disguised blessing, "the best thing that evuh happened to the South, Suh! Why, if it weren't for boll weevil, Cotton would be selling for fo' cents a pound right...
...price of wheat touched the lowest levels on the present crop and cotton crashed to the worst prices since 1927. In wheat the situation seemed a natural one of supply and demand. In cotton the decline was somewhat justified by cold which is said to have killed the boll weevil in large areas. But what caused cotton to drop precipitately was apparently "an unfortunate misunderstanding." Briefly, the "unfortunate misunderstanding" seems to have taken place as follows...