Pomona College Journal of Entomology 



Volume II MAY 1910 Number 2 



FUMIGATION STUDIES-II 

 DOES ORDINARY CONTRACT FUMIGATION PAY? 



WRIGHT M. PIERCE 



Very little information has ever been published on the cost of fumigation. 

 The contractor naturally wishes to make the maximum profit, while the 

 grower must labor to reduce the cost to a minimum. For any well founded 

 deductions we need complete detailed figures from many sources, and we 

 are hoping that this paper may arouse enough interest among the growers 

 to induce them to obtain and send to us their fumigation accounts in detail. 

 Our own observations were confined to a few outfits working in the neigh- 

 borhood of Claremont. Even these limited and variable data make some 

 facts in the whole matter very evident, the principal being that throughout 

 the county there appear to be no standards governing either the work or 

 the cost of it. Three cases are presented herewith, the trees in all cases being 

 understood as averaging an ordinary medium size, and the fumigation for 

 black scale. 



Outfit A. 



This outfit contracted to fumigate 10 acres, using 22 hours of work. 

 The cost to the fumigator was as follows : 



183 pounds of cyanide at .26 $47.58 



183 pounds acid at .2 3.66 



22 hours of work at $1.95 42.90 



giving a total of $94.14. The grower was charged $158 for the joli, leaving 

 a profit of $63.86 to the fumigator. The tents, in this case, were left over the 

 trees for forty-five minutes. The formula used was 1-1-3. 



