116 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



sucli, to a large degree, and become a problem in social dynamics. The 

 question of what an insect will do is not a difficult one, after we have 

 learned its full history and habits, but what men will do toward control- 

 ling its movements or preventing its ravages is at present a more com- 

 plex question. It is a question that has come to us with the growth of 

 horticulture as a profession, and the increase in population, and it seems 

 to me that it will continue to force itself upon us more and more as these 

 factors increase in importance, and I am speaking to you with an eye to 

 the future as well as the present. And, while this subject may at the pres- 

 ent day be more imj)ortant in some states than in others, it can not be 

 termed a local one, and is, therefore, of a national character. You can 

 spray your orchards in spring with arsenical poisons, for the codlin moth, 

 and destroy by far the larger percentage of the first brood of larvae; but 

 3'onr neighbor on either side of you, who does not, will surely add 

 materially to the second brood, which you can not fight at all. We know 

 that the plum curculio will scent out a plum orchard for miles, making 

 its way against the wind which brings the odor. I have seen rose bugs, 

 Macroilactylus suhspinosus, emerge from a patch of sandy land and make 

 straight for a peach orchard and grape vineyard, both situated on clay 

 lands, where the pests can not breed. Last year, in the grape vineyards, 

 in the famous Euclid district, while fighting the grape root worm. 

 Fidia riticida, almost from the start people began to ask nie if, after they 

 had conquered the pest in their own vineyards, it would not come from 

 the others, as it most assuredly would. 



I do not mean to say that we can overcome the insect pests of our 

 orchards and farms by making laws against them, or harboring them, 

 but it seems to me that we have carried individual efforts far enough to 

 now demand something more. The use of arsenical poisons, as we now 

 apply them, has passed the experimental stage, as has also the use of 

 kerosene emulsion, where, from the nature of the insects we wish to 

 destroy, ])oisons can not be used. I am quite sure that in the future car- 

 bon bisulphide is to work wonders in the management of subterranean 

 insects, just as it has revolutionized our management of those that attack 

 stored grain, and which a few years ago we were absolutely unable to 

 destroy. How many of us have read, again and again, the old recipe for 

 destroying the weevil in barns, viz., burn the barn. Now it is one of the 

 easiest things in the world to clear a bin or elevator of grain-infesting 

 insects. I am satisfied that future experiment will develop some way 

 of using ihis carbon bisulphide in a manner to destroy many of our root 

 insects. There are, indeed, many ways whereby we can improve the 

 methods to be used in individual efforts to destroy insect pests, but it 

 looks to me as though we had arrived at n ]><»int where we ai-e much in 

 the condition of a detachment of an army that had puslied forward to an 

 advancedi)ositiori,whicliitmiglit properly continuetohold nnd strengthen 

 while the nuiin body was being brought ni) and into line. So far. 

 since the fighting of insect pests began in this country, it has been done 

 bya comparatively small detachment of the great army of horticulturists, 

 and it looks as though it was about time that these last should be brought 

 into action, to aid and support those who have been for years in the front, 

 and alone at that. It is true that we have very much to learn about fight- 

 ing insects, but we have acquired a sufficient amount of information to 



