4o8 AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. 



Taking Five-Mile Beach as a whole, there is nothing to pre- 

 vent clearing the island by the simplest ditching and filling opera- 

 tions. There are some wide shallow ditches now, in some places, 

 that have been allowed to become choked with grass and rushes. 

 There is probably not a square foot of mud bottom or low sod on 

 the island that does not have its complement of mosquito eggs. 

 Wherever water lodges over these wrigglers will develop, though 

 without doubt most of them perish because the water does not 

 remain long enough to allow them to come to maturity. I doubt 

 whether any considerable number of specimens reach the beach 

 from the mainland. I am much more ready to believe that there 

 is a migration the other way. The only real danger of incoming 

 swarms is at Two-Mile Beach, though at times the lower end of 

 Seven-Mile Beach may send in a supply. 



The work of general improvement which is now under way is 

 all good and tends toward lessening the number of breeding 

 places. But it might pay to leave some of the outlying streets 

 unfinished and apply the money and work to abate the mosquito 

 pest. The fresh water swamps in the centre of the island may 

 be ignored at present. 



The highland has been several times referred to and its condi- 

 tions were studied by Mr. Viereck from Cape May to Burleigh. 

 All along the edge there is the usual breeding area before the flat 

 marsh begins, but no very bad places were found, and there is ex- 

 cellent natural drainage, which needs only a little intelligent ex- 

 tension to reach all danger points. The fresh water and sphag- 

 num moss swamp areas breed none of the dominant mosquitoes. 

 This narrow strip at the edge of the mainland in all probability 

 supplies the interior of the peninsula, reinforcing the larger 

 swarms which come from Cape May, more directly south. 



d. SEVEN-MILE be;ach. 



This has Avalon at its northern end, Peermont less than a mile 

 south, and Stone Harbor a little south of the center. This latter 

 place is the terminal point of the railroad which extends from 

 Ocean City about twenty miles to the northeast. Southwest of 

 Stone Harbor is a stretch of three miles on which Life Saving 

 Station No. 35 is the only inhabited point. 



Mr. Viereck writes concerning this stretch as follows : "Seven- 

 Mile Beach is widest between Avalon and Peermont and for 

 some distance south of Peermont. It is this part of the island 

 which is more complicated than any place yet visited. The car- 

 dinal physical features are, from the beach inward, depressions 



