624 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



THE EIIROPKAN CORN BORER. 

 PEE8ENT STATl'S OF PEST IN UNITED STATES AND CANADA. 



The European coimi borer was rather fully considered in the annual 

 report of this hoard for 1910. Its status in the United States remain 

 sunstantially unchanjijed duriiij^ the season of 1920. Tlie additions 

 to the infested territory have i)een limited to tlie inclusion of 

 some 150 townships in Massaeimsetts, New Hampshire, and in 

 eastern and Western New York, merely extending locally the range 

 of last 3'ear. No new areas of infestation have been found in these 

 States, nor has any infestation by this insect been located in the 

 Mississippi Valley in connection with the surveys following up the 

 movement of imported broom corn to various liroom factories in the 

 Middle West. The insect has not reappeared in Erie County, Pa., 

 where it was determined last year, and may possibly have been 

 exterminated at that point. 



The important development of the corn borer situation during the 

 year has been the discovery of two wide infestations in southern 

 Ontario, Canada, bordering Lake Erie, one having an extent of per- 

 haps 50 miles near Niagara, and the other of nearly 100 miles center- 

 ing at St. Thomas, Ontario. The origin of the insect in Ontario 

 seems to have been in connection with a broom factory formerly 

 operated at St. Thomas, which in 1909 used enormous quantities 

 of foreign broom corn and was at that time the largest broom factory 

 in Canada. In this Canadian area of infestation corn is grown on a 

 commercial scale, chiefl}^ of the flint varieties, which in tihe United 

 States have proved especially susceptible to the attacks of the insect. 

 While the insect was widely distril)uted in the Province of Ontario, 

 field damage of considerable amount seemed to be limited to the 

 center of the larger area near the town of St. Thomas. In this area 

 certain fields exliibited an amount of damage greater tlian that 

 shown in any of the New York fields, not however large as compared 

 with other important corn enemies. For example, the actual grain 

 loss due to the borers feeding in the ears alone was estimated by the 

 Canadian authorities as between 3 aad 4 per cent in the worst in- 

 fested field, and a!)out one-half of that percentage in the next worst 

 infested field, the latter field of the dent variety. 



REVISION OP THE DOMESTIC CORN BORER QUARANTINE. 



A new quarantine to prevent interstate shipment of carriers of the 

 corn borer was promulgated by the Secretary of Agriculture, effective 

 Marcn 29, 1920, against the States of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, 

 'New York, and Pennsylvania. The quarantine applies only to such 

 portions of those States as are now or may later become actually 

 infested, although authority is reserved to extend at any time the 

 areas officially designated as infested, to cover any extensions of 

 spread. No restrictions are placed on shipments from points in the 

 quarantined States outside oi the infested areas. 



The articles specifically covered in the quarantine are corn and' 

 broom corn, including all parts of the stalk, celery, green beans in the 

 pod, beets with tops, spinach, rhubarb, oat and rye straw as such or 

 when used as packing, cut flowers or entire plants of chrysanthemums, 

 aster, cosmos, zinnia, and hollyhock, and cut flowers or entire plants 

 of gladiolus and dalilia, except the bulbs without stems. The restric- 



