74 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



Photograph by S. B. Dttwiler. 



FROM GARDEN TO WOODLAND 



A garden of an estate at Ipswich, Massachusetts, in which infected currant bushes are growing. The 

 white pine in the background were planted in 1903 and in the spring of 1916 all of them showed infection. 



(3) East of the Hudson River the problem is much 

 more serious, and here the disease is unlikely ever to be 

 eradicated. Here the effect of the disease is essentially 

 to make the pine tree a cultivated plant, dependent for 

 its existence upon the destruction of currants and goose- 

 berries. It will have to be determined for communities 

 or for larger areas whether the people prefer to grow white 

 pine trees or currant and gooseberry bushes, for the two 

 are now incompatible. The probable solution of this prob- 

 lem is that certain areas will be found in New England 

 where the currant and gooseberry can be eradicated and 

 the white pine grown. And there will doubtless be other 

 localities where the eradication of currants and goose- 

 berries is commercially impracticable and where the grow- 

 ing of white pine will have to be given up. 



The entire problem is, however, but 

 one phase of a larger problem, which 

 may be stated as follows: Does free 

 trade in plant diseases and insect pests 

 pay? Is it an economically sound na- 

 tional policy? Is the entire importing 

 nursery business worth as much to the 

 country as the damage which it causes? 

 Let us not deceive ourselves. Not a 

 single plant disease or insect pest that 

 has once become established in this coun- 

 try has been eradicated or is ever likely 

 to be. No matter how well controlled, 

 it remains in every case a permanent 

 tax against the economic resources of 

 the nation. If we succeed in controlling 

 the white pine blister rust we may be 

 sure that other diseases and pests will 

 be introduced, which will be just as 

 serious, for we know definitely that the 

 undesirable plant immigrants are not all here yet. It is 

 as important to safeguard the country against further 

 invasions of this kind as to control this or any other 

 disease or pest that has already been carelessly per- 

 mitted to establish itself. 



I 



I 



Photograph by J. Franklin Collins. 



DISEASE PLAINLY INDICATED 



Eighty-one per cent of the trees surrounding this on a quarter-acre plot in Maine s 

 re infected with the pine blister disease and of these 12 per cent were dead in = 

 November. 1916. nil 1 



THE SITUATION TODAY 



The United States Senate has added $300,000 

 to the Agricultural Appropriation Bill for the 

 eradication or control of the White Pine Blister 

 Disease. 



$150,000 of this amount will not be available 

 until states in the pine belt provide state appro- 

 priations then it will be used in state coopera- 

 tive work. 



1 



The United States Senate has also amended 

 the Plant Quarantine Act to permit the Secretary 

 of Agriculture to quarantine any State, Territory 

 or District of the United States, or any section 

 thereof, to prevent the spread of the disease. 



Massachusetts asks a $60,000 state appro- 

 priation to fight it. 



New York requires $30,000. 

 Minnesota desires $25,000. 

 Maine asks for $20,000. 

 New Hampshire asks for $28,000. 

 Vermont wants $2,000. 

 Connecticut requests $15,000. 

 Rhode Island wishes $5,000. 

 Wisconsin needs $25,000. 

 Pennsylvania demands $10,000. 

 Canada expects $50,000. 



