BUREAU OF ENTOMOLOGY. 513 



in the towns of Meriden, Berlin, and Xew Britain, but no evidence 

 of the existence of the gipsy moth has been found in these towns. It 

 is hoped to continue this line of scouting operations to the Massachu- 

 setts state line in the towns through which a great deal of traffic 

 passes from the infested area in Massachusetts to Xew York. This is 

 one of the principal automobile routes in New England. All effort 

 to ascertain how the gipsy moth reached Wallingford has been vain. 

 The colony has existed for about three or four years, and possibly 

 longer, entirely undiscovered until last December. About 10,000 egg 

 clusters w^ere destroyed before hatching time. The State is doing all 

 of the work in the infested area. 



The brown-tail moth has been reported from Thompson, in the 

 northeast corner of the State, and also at Putnam, a few miles south 

 of Thompson. It is possible that this region south of the Massachu- 

 setts line is rather generally infested. 



GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 



There have been employed throughout the year from 300 to nearly 

 500 men. First-class men have been difficult to get, and in February 

 an increase was made in the wages of all of the older men, of from 

 1 to 3 cents per hour. There have been in use 10 gasoline-power 

 spraying machines, of 400 to 500 gallons capacity, capable of dis- 

 charging 3.000 to 4,000 gallons per day, and about 40 tons of arsenate 

 of lead have been used during the past spraying season. 



The use of burlap bands for trapping the caterpillars on the tree 

 trunks has been discontinued, and tree tanglefoot has been substi- 

 tuted, 20 tons being used during the summer work of 1910. In an 

 effort to reduce the cost of this operation, similar substances have 

 been introduced from Europe, but have not proved to be as effective 

 as the tanglefoot in the prevention of the crawling of the caterpillars. 



Some investigations have been begun in regard to certain points 

 connected wnth the life history of both the brown-tail moth and the 

 gipsy moth, which, although hitherto considered settled, now seem 

 open to some doubt. 



The principal subject of this kind which has received attention 

 has been undertaken in an effort to explain the presence of the gipsy 

 moth in isolated woodland colonies wdiich it could not possibly have 

 reached by the crawling of the caterpillars and which it is most 

 unlikely to have reached by being carried accidentally on the gar- 

 ments of persons penetrating the woods. Thus a series of experi- 

 ments has been carried on in a most careful way to determine 

 whether the newly hatched gipsy moth caterpillars may be distributed 

 by the wind, and it has been possible to prove during the summer 

 that the newly hatched caterpillars have been carried in this way 

 over a distance of 1,800 feet. 



The methods used in the entire work, together with new observa- 

 tions bearinc upon the work, have been summarized in a bulletin 

 about to be published, ontitlod " Keport on the Field Work against 

 the Gipsy Moth and the Brown-tail Moth," by D. :M. Rogers and 

 A. F. Bu'rgess. One new point brouglit out is that August spraying 

 is an excellent method for the control of the brown-tail moth. The 

 collection of the winter wel)s, whicli is the method universally adopted 

 in Europe and whicli has also been generally practiced in this 



73477°— AGE 1910 33 



