116 FIRST BOOK OF FORESTRY 



bark and even the wood of the newly felled stem. Above and 

 around us we notice flies, wasps, millers, and butterflies, and 

 a world of smaller winged insects restlessly flitting about. 



Insects. Of all animals this vast army of the "little 

 people" are by far the most dangerous enemies of the for- 

 ests. Thus, the bark beetle, in the early seventies, ruined 

 over twenty-two thousand acres of spruce in Bohemia 

 alone ; the caterpillar of the nun moth devastated in East 

 Prussia, between 1853 and 1863, over two hundred and 

 sixty thousand acres, killing more than four and a half 

 million cords of timber. In our own country the gypsy 

 moth has become the terror of woodlands in Massachusetts, 

 and nearly a million dollars of state money alone has been 

 expended in fighting it. The bark beetles have destroyed 

 enormous quantities of timber in Maryland, in the Vir- 

 ginias, and in North Carolina; the larva of a sawfly has 

 destroyed the tamarack in the Adirondacks ; the tent cater- 

 pillar is ravaging many of our hardwoods ; while tussock 

 moth and bagworm are ruining thousands of shade trees 

 as well as trees of the woodlands. 



The " little people " accomplish these great feats of 

 destruction through their ability to multiply very rapidly 

 and thus to act in immense numbers. The mother bark 

 beetle of this spring may be represented by half a million 

 of her offspring before the end of the second season; and. 

 even the leaf-eating moth may have four hundred thousand 

 descendants in a period of only three years. 



