The Bulletin. 31 



serious insect pests and plant diseases, and to prevent, so far as may be 

 practicable, the sale of infested trees. The actual work of inspection is 

 done by the Entomologist or his assistants. 



San Jose Scale. — The one pest above all others which the nursery 

 inspections are intended to control is the San Jose Scale, a small, incon- 

 spicuous insect which does great damage when it becomes established in 

 orchards. If a tree is infested with this insect at the time it comes from 

 the nursery, it may show no signs of decline then, but it will usually die 

 in from one to four years, and during that time the insect is likely to 

 become established on neighboring trees. As the San Jose Scale is not 

 easily observed until the trees have become badly infested, it can be 

 readily seen that every precaution should be taken that infested trees 

 shall not be sent out from the nurseries, and the grower himself should 

 exercise every care to see that infested trees are not sent to him. 



Certificate Should Accompany Every Delivery. — Every delivery of nur- 

 sery stock sent to any purchaser in this State is required by law to be 

 accompanied by a certificate of inspection, which states that the nursery 

 from which the stock was sent has been inspected and is apparently free 

 from the San Jose Scale, or other dangerous pests. The wording of the 

 certificate is usually printed on a card or shipping tag and attached to 

 the box or bundle. And the certificate must bear the name (either 

 written or printed) of the State Entomologist, State Horticulturist, 

 State Nursery Inspector or other duly qualified officer of the State, or 

 State Experiment Station, where the nursery is located. 



Requirements for Certification. — While the certificates issued in all the 

 States indicate that the nursery is "apparently free from San Jose. Scale/' 

 etc. (or words to that effect), this cannot be taken as a guarantee that it 

 is free, for the reasons which we have already explained. It may be that 

 not one of the individual trees in the shipment was actually inspected, as 

 the most that the inspector can do is to go into all parts of the nursery 

 and inspect occasional trees or groups of trees. And the statement that 

 the nursery "is apparently free" is not to be taken literally. So far as 

 we know, there is not a single eastern State in which real close inspec- 

 tions are actually made which carries out to the letter the idea implied 

 in that statement. If only one or two, or a few scale-infested trees are 

 found, it is a usual thing to. destroy those trees, closely inspect all around 

 them, and if no more scale is found, the certificate is issued. In some 

 States a further precaution is taken, in that the inspector or his agent 

 personally does the work of fumigating (explained later) the stock when 

 it is dug. In some cases, where the nursery is not too large, and the 

 infestation is quite bad, arrangements are made to have the inspector or 

 his agents inspect every individual tree when the stock is dug. . By these 

 various means the purchaser receives considerable protection, though of 

 course it is not perfect. Despite the fact that the wording of the certifi- 

 cate cannot be relied on literally to the letter, it is perhaps best to have 

 the wording as it is, for a nurseryman will know that his nursery must 

 be kept reasonably free, at least, in order to get a certificate entitling him 

 to do business. It frequently happens that an entire field or block of 

 nursery stock is found to be so generally infested that the whole lot has 

 to be condemned and destroved before the nursery can receive a certifi- 



