150 ' THE EEPORT OF THE Xo. 36 



Educational Work. 



In addition to having our ten inspectors collect as many nests as possible from 

 the trees, we plan to have them carry on as much educational work as possible, in 

 order to persuade growers to examine their own trees and collect Brown-tail nests 

 and to spray. All of our inspectors have all available data in regard to spraying 

 right at their finger tips, and they are instructed to see the owner of every property 

 giving over five BroAvn-tail nests, and endeavor to get him to spray his trees the 

 next season. 



More Spraying Campaigns. 



The one thing outside of the work of our own inspectors in collecting nests 

 that has had an appreciable effect in Brown-tail control has been the campaign for 

 more spraying. In this we have the co-operation of the United Fruit Companies, 

 whose warehouses extend over the whole fruit district, and of the Dominion Fru,it 

 Inspectors, who, under the Dominion Fruit Commissioner, Mr. D. Jolinson, are 

 now inspecting most of the fruit in the orchards and warehouses instead of at 

 Halifax, so they come in direct contact with the growers and are_a tremendous 

 power in causing more spraying to be done. I am this winter spending two or three 

 days with each of these inspectors, visiting warehouses, etc., and keeping them 

 supplied with data on spraying. Mr. Johnson tells me that he wants his inspectors 

 to be an educative rather tlian a police force— that they can do more good in show- 

 ing people how to grow better fruit than, as he puts it, " going at the grower with a 

 club to fine him if possible." 



This attitude deserves the very highest commendation, and in teaching the 

 Nova Scotia growers how to produce good fruit he must teach them liow to control 

 Brown-tails, for spraying, which controls the Brown-tail, is absolutely necessary in 

 the production of good fruit in Nova Scotia. 



The manager of the United Fruit Companies, Mr. A. E. McMalion, and his 

 officials have been untiring in their efforts to get more and better spraying done, 

 and their work has been particularly effective. About 60 per cent, of the total 

 crop of Nova Scotia is liandled through the 48 warehouses of the Companies, and 

 all of the spraying material for their members is purchased by them. On their 

 60-ton order of lead arsenate, with other spraying material in proportion, they are 

 able to get the very finest prices possible, and they give their members the full 

 benefit of these prices and sell to non-members at a price that will barely cover ex- 

 penses, preferring to take their profit in the benefits their ^members will receive 

 from having their neighbors spray. The Fruit Companies' Inspectors, who visit 

 every warehouse at least once a week, the warehouse managers and the packing fore- 

 men are every one active advocates of spraying, and persuade a great many people 

 to spray by calling them into the warehouse when their poor lots are being packed 

 out and comparing them with other well-sprayed lots. 



The companies are also proving themselves of great value in the spraying 

 campaign, by changing the methods of charging the cost of packing. In all of 

 the warehouses, no matter under what system they are run, the culls, owing to the 

 difficulty in apportioning them, are confiscated by the company and sold to be 

 credited against general cost of packing. In most of the old companies the 

 members were charged on the pack out of apples, that is, a member who delivered 

 50 barrels of apples from the trees which packed out 40 barrels of shipping apples, 

 paid the same as the member who delivered TOO barrels, which packed out 40 

 barrels of shipping apples, the culls in both cases being confiscated, the larger 



