162 BOAKD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON GYPSY MOTH, INSECTS 

 AND BIRDS. 



[Read and accepted at the Annual Meeting, Jan. 12, 1909.] 



Your committee continues to take an unabated interest in 

 the suppressing of the gypsy and brown-tail moths, having 

 both individually and as a committee visited the infested 

 area at various times during the year, and endeavored to 

 keep in as close touch as possible with the work. On June 

 30, 1908, your committee, together with many other mem- 

 bers of the Board, made a visit of inspection to the infested 

 territory, beginning with the north shore woods, in Beverly, 

 at and near the Montserrat railroad station. Here we wit- 

 nessed a very interesting demonstration of what might be 

 done with power pumps for spraying, and noted the general 

 condition of the territory in that vicinity. From there your 

 committee went to the laboratory of the superintendent in 

 charge of the work, at Melrose Highlands, where the experi- 

 ments in connection with the breeding of parasites, both 

 imported and domestic, are being carried on, and made a 

 careful inspection of this work. 



We are convinced that the work of the year has brought 

 excellent results, so far as a system which we never approved, 

 of divided authority and responsibility, could bring such 

 results. Your committee is not prepared to say that the work 

 is on a firm footing as yet, for while we readily acknowledge 

 that excellent work has been done in the residential sections 

 and along the roadways, we cannot but feel that the un- 

 checked, or practically unchecked, spread of the gypsy moth 

 in the central woodlands forms a menace to the woodland 

 and orchards of the State which is far from being under 

 the control that we would like to see exist. We would not 



