November 9, 1912 



HORTICULTUEE 



633 



NEW ENGLAND NURSERIES VINDI- 

 CATED. 



There has been a great deal of 

 "scare talk" in the papers of late 

 about a proposed quarantine in New 

 England against the further spread of 

 gypsy and brown-tail moths. On the 

 30th of October a hearing was held 

 in Washington, D. C, which the writer 

 attended. For the relief of the minds 

 of the New England nurserymen as 

 well as others who may be interested, 

 I am writing these lines regarding the 

 situation. 



The New England nurserymen may 

 rest assured that the Department at 

 Washington will do nothing to place 

 » undue hardship upon their business. 

 They are well satisfied with the thor- 

 oughness of the inspection made un- 

 der the direction of Dr. H. T. Fernald 

 In Massachusetts, which is at present 

 the chief battle-ground. What they do 

 want is to enlarge the scope of the 

 inspection so as to include all mate- 

 rial subject to infestation, such as 

 telegraph poles, railroad ties, building 

 material, Christmas ti-ees and greens. 



Every one at all conversant with the 

 nursery situation in Massachusetts 

 recognizes the fact that the chances 

 of disseminating the- pests by means 

 of nursery stock are very small as 

 compared with other means of distri- 

 bution. It is these other means which 

 are occupying the attention of the 

 Federal authorities and which were 

 the occasion of the call for the hear- 

 ing of October 30th. That there may 

 be no uncertainty about this, I wish 

 to introduce remarks made by Dr. L. 

 O. Howard, Chief of the United States 

 Bureau of Entomology, at the hearing 

 October 30th before the Federal Hor- 

 ticultural Board at Washington, D. C, 

 as follows: 



"Mr. Cliairman, just a moment. I wisli 

 to go on record with tlie statement that 

 three tunes, at least, I have visited Mr. 



■ 's nurseries without his knowledge, 



or in his absence, and I have seen this 

 careful State inspection going on. It is 

 certainly done in a perfectly efficient way 

 by a large and competent force. I feel so 

 assured of the absolute reliability of this 

 inspection that I wish it placed ou the 

 records of this meeting, that if I were a 

 New York purchaser of nursery stock, I 

 would buy mv stock from these nurseries 

 with the feeling that I would be quite as 

 safe as I should it I were to order from 

 an uninfested state." 



These remarks were greeted by ap- 

 plause because they came so unex- 

 pectedly and were spoken with such 

 sincerity. It was a great tribute to 

 Dr. H. T. Fernald and his eflRcient 

 lieutenants. 



And what is true of the nurseries 

 referred to is equally true of all others 

 in the state over which Dr. Fernald 

 has jurisdiction. Moreover, it was 

 with no intention of comparison among 

 the New England States that these re- 

 marks were made; but it happened 

 that, at that time, the discussion was 

 centered on Massachusetts. In justice 

 to all concerned, let it be said that 

 very little, if any, infection is to be 

 found in other parts of New England 

 where nurseries doing an interstate 

 business are located. Let the general 

 public rest assured that there is no 

 occasion for undue alarm over the in- 

 troduction of these pests by means of 

 nursery stock from New England. 

 Field inspection is made several times 

 during the season, and when stock is 

 brought to the packing-sheds it is 



MILTONIA VEXILLARIA WESTONBIRT VARIETY. 



A unique plant and fine specimen, 

 carrying eight spikes with thirty-three 

 flowers. Exhibited in the Col. Hol- 



ford group at the Royal International 

 Exhibition; gardener, H. G. Alexan- 

 der, 



again inspected, plant by plant, as a 

 further precaution. 



That these pests will ultimately get 

 into every state in the Union, I have 

 no doubt; it is only a matter of time. 

 But it is automobiles, steam and elec- 

 tric cars, etc., that disseminate the 

 gypsy moth and the winds that dis- 

 tribute the brown-tail. No amount o( 

 legislation can prevent the possibility 

 of spreading them by these means. 

 Ultimately, I predict that they will be 

 found everywhere, but by that time 

 we shall have lost our terror over 

 them, for the parasites will have be- 

 come so prevalent as to hold them in 

 check. I predict that our children 

 will regard these pests with far less 

 alarm than do we of this generation. 

 Fifteen years ago, the San Jose scale 

 was regarded with more alarm than it 

 is today, and yet, I regard the San 

 Jose scale as the greater evil of the 

 two. I know of no parasite which is 

 holding that in check, as in the case 

 of these moths. 



In certain parts of Europe they have 

 had these pests for centuries and yet 

 they are given no more heed than is 

 given in this country to the tent cater- 

 pillar. The parasitic life is there fully 

 developed. It will be here in due 

 course of time. Meanwhile, let us 

 keep working at our task; for it is as 

 true in the horticultural world as in 

 the political that "Eternal vigilance is 

 the price of liberty." 



W. H. WYMAN. 



A VISIT TO ADRIAN, MICH. 



Notwithstanding the heavy pressure 

 of business 35 Detroit florists broke 

 away from the daily turmoil and 

 boarded a special Pullman car at 9 

 A. M., October 29th, to visit the well- 

 known chrysanthemum specialist, El- 

 mer D. Smith. Arriving there they 

 found a similar number of visitors 

 from Cleveland and Toledo, besides E. 

 G. Hill of Richmond, Ind.. and Mr. 

 Karins of H. A. Dreer, Philadelphia. 



These constituted a heavy line-up of 



very critical judges, but what they 

 saw in novelties far surpassed their 

 expectations and unanimous was their 

 admiration of such things as Chryso- 

 Icra which was voted the best ever. 

 Smith Sensation, a silvery pink, Nao- 

 mah, a large white, Roman Gold, a 

 very fine yellow bronze all received 

 points away up in the nineties. Ra- 

 niapo, a large yellow, was also most 

 favorably commented upon and really 

 looked great just ready for a trip to 

 the St. Paul show to gladden the 

 hearts of visitors there. 



While one could write for hours 

 en the floral wonders housed at Mr, 

 Smith's place we do not forget to men- 

 tion the very aptly named straw-col- 

 ored variety. Aesthetic. 



While Mr. Graham of Cleveland 

 most properly expressed the thanks of 

 the visitors, E. G. Hill most aptly 

 expressed the thought that the work 

 of Mr. Smith in raising those superb 

 novelties helps all of us to offer to 

 the public not only new flowers, but 

 we are enabled to create more artistic 

 combinations which after all is the 

 foundation upon which to build larger 

 demand, FRANK DANZER. 



NEW ROSE MRS. CHARLES RUS- 

 SELL. 



Our cover page this week is de- 

 voted to a portrait of the sterling new 

 rose raised at and to be disseminated 

 by Waban Rose Conservatories, Na- 

 tick, Mass., and which under its desig- 

 nation as Mrs. Charles Russell has 

 already attained a great popularity 

 among the flower fanciers of Boston 

 and also of New York. This rose, its 

 origin, etc., was the subject of an in- 

 teresting article by George C. Watson 

 in our issue of last week and we would 

 respectfully advise those of our read- 

 ers who did not peruse it to do so as 

 there is no question that this fine rose 

 has a brilliant future as a profitable 

 forcing rose and, in many respects, 

 as a rival for American Beauty. 



