74 JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 5 



total annual value of all plant importations in recent years has been 

 a little over two million dollars, and the latest customs statistics avail- 

 able indicate that less than one fourth of this relates to nursery 

 stock, namely, trees, shrubs, and ornamentals, including seedlings. 

 Roughly, therefore, one fourth of the total number of shipments 

 should be subject to careful examination. The standard trade in 

 greenhouse materials and bulbs is subject to comparatively little risk of 

 introducing new dangerous pests. 



One of the worst features of the situation is the importation by 

 department and five-and-ten-cent stores of foreign ornamental nursery 

 stock, which very often is not reported, and which state inspectors 

 have the greatest difficulty in tracing. Nursery stock from abroad is 

 also sent to this country to be sold under the hammer at various 

 auctioneer establishments in large cities, and in both of these cases it 

 is almost impossible to trace such stock or make any adequate inspec- 

 tion of it. In this city, such stock has been examined by agents of this 

 Bureau under difficulty and without any real authority, and has in 

 several instances been found infested with dangerous insects. 



FOREIGN IMPORTATIONS INTO THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 



The conditions of commercial importations consigned to Washington 

 either direct or in bond, and the current inspection work of the Bureau 

 of Entomology relating to fruits, seeds, and plants imported by the 

 Department of Agriculture, may be interesting as illustrating more 

 pointedly the dangers which are common to the whole country. 



Customs advices relating to 63 commercial importations to the 

 District of Columbia have been received this year, and so far as 

 possible these plants have been inspected. There is, however, no law 

 for the District of Columbia which authorizes such inspection, and 

 any examination made must necessarily be by the courtesy of the 

 importers. This has sometimes been refused or is often grudgingly 

 given, and at best has been without any special effort on the part of 

 the importers to facilitate or promote thorough inspection. The 

 worst feature of such imported stock is the masses of cheap ornamentals 

 which are brought in and sold by department stores or under the ham- 

 mer by auctioneers; and this condition applies to most of the other 

 large cities of this country. In one instance of the present year an 

 auction firm was courteous enough to allow the Department to destroy 

 a large quantity of young spruce trees imported from Holland and 

 which were badly infested with the spruce aphid, Lachnus juniperi 

 Fab., an insect not known to occur in the United States. 



