102 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Under such circumstances as these, we must recognize that 

 the future of market gardening is a most important one. 

 And as it grows we meet another problem, one already met 

 in other lines, viz., a direct continuation of crop acreage. 

 If I might illustrate my thought, it would be something like 

 this : if an insect desires a particular food plant to attack 

 (let it be the strawberry plant, for example), after the food 

 supply for it and its descendants on one patch becomes ex- 

 hausted, it will have to hunt to find the next area to supply 

 it with that food. 



We have a record of wheat fields running up to over 

 twenty-five thousand acres in one strip. Allow an insect to 

 start at one corner of that field, and it wall need no time to 

 hunt for the next wheat field. Such a field will allow the 

 insect an abundance of food on which to grow and multiply 

 and spread. In the same way the increased acreage of market 

 gardens has provided a condition for a rapid increase in num- 

 bers of our injurious insect pests. We wish to increase our 

 acreage of these crops without directly increasing thereby 

 the rapid multiplication of insect pests, so that in time they 

 will overwhelm these particular crops. This question needs 

 careful consideration and study. 



I have been very much interested yesterday and to-day to 

 hear remarks such as this : " Now, this is the practical side 

 of it. We will leave the theoretical side for the experiment 

 stations and the college men." This is a pretty severe criti- 

 cism, and, unfortunately, there is altogether too much truth 

 in it, and I speak as a college man. There is too much the- 

 oretical work in the colleges and experiment stations of this 

 country which has not yet been presented in a practical way 

 for the people to use. 



Now, I would like to say that the day has not come when 

 theoretical work can be avoided. If we follow the life his- 

 tory of an insect, as has no doul)t been frequently done 

 before you, from the egg through the various changes until 

 the adult is developed and has laid its eggs for another cycle 

 of life, we must do that with scientific care ; for the insect is 

 continualh" struggling with its own enemies, which will seize 

 any opportunity to attack and kill it. In just the same way 



