No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 161 



This is attested by the hundreds of letters we have received from 

 persons who claim from hundreds to thousands of dollars worth of 

 property saved for the writers by the assistance of this office. It 

 is highly gratifying to know that our work is giving such good re- 

 sults. It should be continued but on a more extensive scale, and to 

 do this properly an adequate appropriation should be made by the 

 next Legislature. 



6. INSPECTIONS OF IMPORTED PLANTS, SEEDS AND FRUITS. 



Owing to the liability of insects that are very destructive in other 

 States or counties to be brought into this State at any time on im- 

 ported trees, shrubs,, seeds or fruits, it is important that inspec- 

 tions should be made of such importations. We are in readiness to 

 inspect them when it is possible to do so, but there is great difficulty 

 in learning of the importations, as the importers and transportation 

 companies do not send the desired information to this office. It is 

 to be hoped that some plan can be evolved by which it will be nec- 

 essary for importers and transportation companies to notify our 

 Department of importations of trees, shrubs, plants and seeds from 

 other States, especially from foreign countries, in order that they 

 can be inspected to prevent the introduction of such serious pests 

 as the Black Scale, the West Indian Peach Scale, the Gypsy Moth, 

 the Brown-tail Moth, and other exceedingly destructive pests 

 which are not at present found in this State, but which are liable 

 to be brought within our borders at any time and prove more des- 

 tructive than any pest we now have if due vigilance be not taken 

 to prevent it. 



7. MAKING COLLECTIONS. 



We must have collections for comparison and further study of 

 the distribution of insects, life histories, habits, economic effects, 

 enemies, etc., in order to give us keys to practical methods of treat- 

 ing beneficial and injurious insects and other animal organisms. 

 We receive many specimens for name and classification, with re- 

 quests for detailed information concerning them. They can not be 

 given readily in many cases, because they are broken or in imper- 

 fect condition of preservation or immature, but when we have in our 

 own collections properly preserved specimens for comparison with 

 the others sent to us, they generally can be named even from frag- 

 ments. The name is the key to the literature, and the literature is 

 the basis of the life history studies and may indicate practical ex- 

 periments and remedies. We can not possibly conduct the work of 

 this office properly without such named collections. Also, in mak- 

 ing collections we must study not only the injurious insects them- 

 selves, but the predacoous insects, which feed upon them, the 

 internal parasites which attack them, and the enemies of other kinds 

 which devour them or destroy them. 



While the time of no one person has been given exclusively or 

 even mostly to make collection, we have collected when possible 

 and have lost no opportunity to preserve such specimens as contri- 

 butors have sent and which are desired to aid in our stu- 

 dies. The colleotions made during the past year amounted to three 

 thousand, five hundred and eighty, and the accession numbers in our 



