88 SOME INSECTS INJURIOUS TO FORESTS. 



PRESENT CONDITIONS AND OPPORTUNITIES. 



Unfortimately, the examples of management, or rather misman- 

 agement, which are contributing to an extension or increase of waste 

 are far in excess of those which under proper management are con- 

 tributing to the reverse. This is due in a large part to the conditions 

 that have prevailed in American forests in the past that have ren- 

 dered it impracticable to adopt improved policies of forest manage- 

 ment, but at present it is largely due to a lack of appreciation of the 

 importance of the subject, and of the opportunities to prevent such 

 losses, when it is not only practicable but possible to do so, and when 

 it will, at the same time, yield large returns on the necessary addi- 

 tional expense. This is especially true in thousands of farmers' wood- 

 lots and private holdings in the States east of the Mississippi Eiver, 

 in which from 25 to 90 per cent of all of the serious injury of the 

 past can be prevented in the future with little or no additional ex- 

 pense over that required for ordinary good forest management. 



Forest Entomology as Applied to American Forests. 



It is only within the past eleven years that any attempt has been 

 made toward a systematic investigation of the insect enemies of the 

 forest trees and forest products of the entire country. The state of 

 knowledge of the subject previous to that time can be judged by the 

 fact that a number of the most destructive enemies of forest trees are 

 found to be new to science, and that nothing whatever was known 

 of the habits and seasonal history of a large number of the more im- 

 portant known species which are common enemies of forest trees and 

 forest products, w^hile scarcely anything was known in regard to 

 practical methods of controlling the principal enemies of the forest 

 and its products, or of preventing losses from their ravages as applied 

 to conditions in this country. 



present knowledge. 



AVithin the past ten years forest-insect investigations have been con- 

 ducted by the Bureau of Entomology of the Department of Agricul- 

 ture in all of the principal forest regions of the United States, and 

 have led to the following results: 



Results of investigations. — Satisfactory progress has been made 

 toward the attainment of some of the fundamental objects of the in- 

 vestigations, one of which has been the laying of a substantial founda- 

 tion for forest entomology in this country on which future progress 

 can be made along the lines of acquiring, disseminating, and applying 

 information of immediate practical value in the protection of our 

 forest resources. 



Acquired and new information. — The principal insect enemies of 

 the forests and forest products of North America have become 



