362 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



shows that certain families living in the infested district in 

 Newton have been accustomed in the past nine years to visit 

 and receive visits from other families living in generally 

 infested localities in Arlington. 



The colony in Georgetown centres on the site of an aban- 

 doned farm, where for several years a Melrose poultry 

 dealer was accustomed to make stays of considerable length. 

 His home place at Melrose was for years overrun with the 

 moth, and it was his practice to leave his wagon and poultry 

 crates standing near infested trees for considerable periods 

 of time. Having disposed of a load of poultry, he would 

 return to Georgetown and collect another stock of fowls in 

 that vicinity, calling frequently at the farm mentioned. 

 There can be but little doubt that this continued traffic was 

 the means of transporting the moth to Georgetown. 



The condition at Newton well illustrates one evil of re- 

 duced appropriations. With the pressure of work else- 

 where, the Board has never been able to do more, since the 

 hurried, preliminary survey of 1891, than to inspect the 

 northern strip of Newton contiguous to the infested towns 

 of Brighton, Waltham and Watertown ; to examine a few 

 localities elsewhere in the city most liable to infestation ; 

 and to inspect the adjoining West Roxbury district of 

 Boston and the town of Brookline, and the main routes of 

 travel and localities most exposed to infestation in Weston, 

 Wellesley, Needham and Dedham. 



Since we have never been able to obtain sufficient funds 

 to permit a thorough examination of all the outlying towns, 

 we have early appreciated and adopted the suggestion made 

 by Dr. L. O. Howard, entomologist of the United States 

 Department of Agriculture, in his comprehensive report on 

 the work against the gypsy moth.* 



A bulletin describing the habits and appearance of the 

 moth was prepared, as suggested by Dr. Howard, and dis- 

 tributed throughout the towns adjacent to the infested dis- 

 trict. In this way public attention has been called to all 

 unusual insect damages. The value of this procedure has 

 been shown in the finding of the Newton colony, which was 



* " The Gypsy Moth in America," Bulletin No. 11, new series, Division of Ento- 

 mology, United States Department of Agriculture, 1897. 



