Plague of Females

In northern Mississippi last week first one farmer and then another found himself beclouded in a swarm of dancing, biting, infinitesimal gnats. Oldtimers, swatting at the little pests, knew that an old plague had returned, bringing irritation to man, and danger, perhaps painful death, to his beasts.

Before levees were thrown up to keep the river from overflowing, buffalo gnats (simnliidae) used to deposit their eggs in the shallow waters of the annual inundation. As the larvae hatched and took the air, clouds of gnats would spread over the surrounding countryside, feeding on its fauna. Only the female gnat bites, affecting the victim like the puncture of a blunt, hot awl, and leaves a dull agony in its train.

The past winter, milder than most, permitted buffalo gnats to breed in the streams, hitherto too cold for them. Therefore, after 20 years of immunity, the lower Mississippi valley is suffering again.

As the week wore on, the swarms grew thicker. They swept through Mississippi, into Arkansas and Louisiana. Hordes of the stinging females would select a mule or cow, settle on it, ride out its frantic, bucking efforts to escape, and leave it dead. Reports began to come in: 125 mules killed in Coahoma County alone. There two days later were 400 mules and cattle dead. Around Helena, Ark., 500 farm animals expired in the lowlands. More & more deaths were recorded to the southward.

Frightened livestockmen fought through the swarms to set smudges and dump oil on all exposed water. A few. fearing an epidemic of anthrax might follow, inoculated their stock. At Yazoo City, Miss., someone oiled his mules with axle grease; they were not bitten. The news spread and soon most mules in the adjacent territory were slick and glistening.

Oldtimers said the gnats would soon move down the river and die. Apprehensive, farmers south of the afflicted area hastened protective preparations.

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