STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 10/ 



Now there is another thing which comes up and stares the 

 fruit growers of this state in the face as one of the serious prob- 

 lems to be considered, and that is the matter of greater storage 

 capacity. In my part of the State there are scores of farmers 

 who, in an ordinary year, when fruit is abundant, cannot take 

 care of it after they get it picked. They have to sell it. They 

 have to get rid of it for just what they can get. The result is 

 that they injure all the other fruit growers in the State, because 

 it reduces the price by the quantity of fruit that is thrown upon 

 the market before it is ready to be sold. Those matters I fee! 

 like briefly calling attention to. I am very glad to meet you 

 and want you one and all to give the new officers of this society 

 a better support than you have ever given the former officers. I 

 assure you they will appreciate it, and I can assure you that 

 their work in the State of Maine will be much more effective 

 than it has been in the past. I think you. 



THE GYPSY MOTH. 



By Capt. E. E. Philbrook, Portland. 

 (Stereopticon Lecture.) 



Ladies and Gentlemen: 



Before attempting to show you any of the pictures, I will try 

 to give you a brief history of the gypsy moth work that has 

 already been done. 



The gypsy moth was first introduced into this country by one 

 Louis Trouvelot, a French astronomer, who resided in the town 

 of Medford, Mass. He imported from the old country some of 

 the gypsy moth caterpillars, with the intention of crossing them 

 with some of our native insects, in the hope of producing a silk- 

 bearing caterpillar of commercial value. But by accident the 

 caterpillars escaped and took to the woods of Medford, where 

 they remained about twenty years before the work was taken 

 up by the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture. The work 

 was carried on for ten years, and at the end of that time the 

 department had been so successful in their efforts to exterminate 

 the gypsy moth that the politicians of the legislature decided 

 that no more money was needed, — that there were no more 



