Feb. '08] JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 13 



ceived its logical setting? This may be true of many other sciences 

 entering into composite agriculture ; yet the peculiar relation of ento- 

 mology to agriculture is conspicuous. Were this not true, the rapid 

 strides that have been made in associating the two would have been 

 impossible. 



You will agree with me that with economic entomology unsatisfac- 

 torily associated, its future imperfectly projected, and with meager 

 means for the preparation of persons for the work, the pioneers of this 

 science merit commendation not usually accorded them. It is true 

 that many of the men who took positions as entomologists of experi- 

 ment stations in the beginning were better prepared for many other 

 lines of work, but the wealth of opportunity for observation and in- 

 vestigation, and their application of these to agricultural progress, 

 could hardly be mistaken. Now and then errors of observation were 

 made and recorded, some of which unfortunately have been perpet- 

 uated by quotation to this time. It was to be expected, too, that cer- 

 tain easy methods and successful lines should drift economic entomolo- 

 gical thought and activity into definite directions and veil for a time 

 the real value of biological as well as ecological investigations and 

 their application to preventive and remedial relief. The biting and 

 sucking mouth parts were for a time the only recognized parts of an 

 insect's anatomy, and hellebore, Paris green, and coal oil emulsion the 

 standard substances in insect warfare. 



The conceptions of the scope of entomological research as related to 

 agricultural development have gradually but surely been expanded, 

 until now a worker in this field finds himself involved in problems of 

 very much wider range than the superficial anatomy of a common in- 

 sect enemy of a local crop, or the compounding of a standard insecti- 

 cide. Insects are related to diseases of live stock, as hosts of sporozoic 

 organisms and nematodes, or as disseminators of diseases of bacterial 

 origin; the importing and distributing of predatory and parasitic 

 forms, and the adjusting of these to new conditions and even new 

 hosts ; the exact relation of insects to fruit and seed development ; and 

 the interrelation of insects, as in the case of ants and aphids, are all 

 modern problems of economic entomology. While these questions are 

 associated, either directly or indirectly, with agriculture, and are of 

 great importance, I wish at this time to consider to what extent the 

 student of economic entomology, in order to apply his knowledge to 

 the best advantage, should be also a student of agriculture. 



Within recent years deep-seated problems in connection with the 

 occurrence of insects and allied forms have given prominence to lines 

 of investigation of unusual merit in point of results. During the past 

 season the army worm again appeared in destructive numbers in many 



