190(5.] 



PUBLIC DOCUMENT No. 73. 



21 



Brockton, "West Bridge-water, Bridgewater, Middleborough, 

 Lakeville, Wareham and Plymouth. 



Outside this line a complete belt of towns has been scouted 

 without finding the gypsy moth. Briefly, the whole of 

 Essex County, over one-half of Middlesex County, half of 

 Norfolk County and practically the entire county of Plym- 

 outh were found to be infested. As against 359 square 

 miles of territory infested in 1900, we now have a total of 

 2,224 square miles occupied by the gypsy moth in varying 

 numbers. In other words, the territory to-day is nearly 

 six times as great as when the work of the State Board of 

 Agriculture was abandoned. (See map.) 



Presented in tabular form, the infested district by periods 

 is o-iven below : 



The present infested district embraces nearly one-fourth 

 of the entire area of the State. While, as previously stated, 

 a row of towns along the outer border has been scouted 

 without finding evidence of the moth, it should not be in- 

 ferred that the insect does not occur in these towns or even 

 in places farther from the known infested district. It should 

 be remembered that a scouting of a week's duration in the 

 caterpillar season may not disclose the presence of the moth 

 when it is in small numbers, but that it may be readily 

 detected later after its buff egg clusters have been laid and 

 are revealed by the falling of the leaves. The fact that a 

 summer scouting reveals no moths is at best but negative 

 evidence. 



The infestations found varied greatly in extent, growing 

 less as the distance from the central infested district in- 

 creased. The section south of Boston, uninfested in 1900 

 and now completely infested, well illustrates this point. 



