August, '12] HERMS: SANITARIAN AND ENTOMOLOGY 355 



industry in California is extremely promising, due principally to favor- 

 able climatic conditions, and is rapidly spreading to all parts of the 

 great interior valley. The climate is not at all inferior to that of the 

 Smyrna district of Asia Minor, where the bulk of the finest figs of the 

 world are now produced. The valley of the Meander, the seat of the 

 great Smyrna fig industry, has a much moister climate and in some 

 respects is inferior to that of portions of California. The rain fall is 

 three or four times greater than that of the central San Joaquin valley, 

 where in this state the industry has at present its greatest develop- 

 ment. The rain however falls mostly from November to April with 

 occasional showers and dew in summer, making irrigation unnecessary. 

 One drawback in that country is that once in three or four years a 

 frost occurs w^iich is severe enough to destroy the caprifigs, when the 

 growers are obliged to draw supplies from the frost free islands of the 

 Mediterranean. 



The ideal climate for Smyrna fig culture is one in which the winters 

 are mild enough to permit the Blastophaga to live through without 

 injury and freedom from early fall rains. The Smyrna figs ripen and 

 dry on the tree in September, October and November and then fall 

 to the ground, only the large figs require further exposure to the sun. 

 Dry weather at this period is therefore indispensible. As these condi- 

 tions jDrevail nowhere else in the United States, except in California 

 and a part of Southern Arizona, these would seem to be the regions 

 in which the industry will have its greatest development. 



ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY FROM THE VIEW POINT OF 

 THE SANITARIAN 



(Abslracl) 



By W. B. Herms, University of California 



Entomology as a specific science was not known to our grandfathers^ 

 and the economic application as related to horticulture in the control 

 of plant diseases is a development of this generation, while the applica- 

 tion of entomology in the control of human and animal diseases, in 

 public hygiene and sanitation, is the development of the last very few 

 years. The new science of Medical Entomology is perhaps barely 

 five years old and we, here on the Pacific Coast, have had a large share 

 in its systematic development. The unique position geographically 

 which California in particular occupies with reference to the entire 

 world, provides an opportunity for observation and experiment not 



