Ui(3 ]ioi)e of being able to do some effective work against it. I 

 mention this pest because it practically wiped out the tamarack 

 in northern New England as a commercial tree, though after the 

 pest had passed there were single trees and also considerable 

 areas left that w^ere not touched at all. We heard little of it, 

 because there was lots of timber everywhere else, and people 

 were not interested. It was not brought 'home to them as the 

 Avork of this chestnut disease is here in Pennsylvania. Yet the 

 ti-ee was not wiped out entirely, and I cannot believe that, even 

 thougli this blight disease may spread ever so widely through 

 tlie Appalachians, that the chestnut will become extinct. 



The second and better known devastation of forests by an in- 

 sect was that of the Nun or Spruce Moth which appeared over 

 considerable areas of the spruce forests in southern Germany in 

 1891 and 02. Bavaria alone spent over three hundred and 

 seventy-five thousand dollars in combating this insect and finally 

 by tlie use of bands or rings of viscous tar on the trees prevented 

 tlie upward movement of the larvae from the ground and thus 

 Uie pest was destroyed. Great areas of forests were clear cut 

 and the market was glutted with spruce poles and logs of certain 

 sizes. Dr. Endres, the great forest statistician of Munich, re- 

 ports that even though there was an apparent over-supply of 

 timber from these clear cuttings, yet the market did not suffer 

 and a good average price was received for all material. The 

 methods followed in Europe for combating either insect or fun- 

 gous pests are hardly applicable here because of their denser 

 l)0|mlation, choajxT labor and smaller and more accessi)»](' for- 

 est areas. 



Much was accomplished in Bavaria and the states of south- 

 western Germany by the clear cutting of the forests in broad 

 strips. In replanting these strips some attempt was made to 

 replace the spruce l)y species not susceptible to injury by the 

 moth. This, however, was not followed out to any large extent, 

 because the spruce is the most profitable tree for southern Ger- 

 many. I believe that no system we may use in wiping out this 

 chestnut disease, if we are able to do it, will preclude the use of 

 chestnut in our future forest management. The forester is going 

 to grow the tree from which he can make the most money, if the 



