21 



TREK- INHABITING INSECT PESTS. 



There is, it is said, not less than seventy-tive kinds 

 of injuiious insects inhabiting the apple orchard. Be- 

 fore the apple and other fruit trees were introduced 

 to America, many of these insect enemies lived on sucb 

 forest trees as the oak, elm, wild cherry, maple, ash 

 and willow. 



Forest trees are, as Dr. Packard states, "oarticularly lia- 

 ble to depredations of insects, certain species of which attack 

 the roots, others the bark, some the wood, many the leaves 

 and a few the fruit and nuts. 



The oak harbors between 500 and 600 kinds of insects; the 

 hickories afford maintenance to 140 recorded species, the birch 

 to over 100 species, the maple 85. the poplar 72, while the pine 

 yields nourishment to over 100 different kinds." 



BIRDS AND MAMMALS AS A CLASS ARE BENEFICIAL. 



There is, however, no doubt that certain species of 

 birds and mammals are detrimental and their fondness 

 for domestic fowls and game — both furred and feath 

 ered — as well as various kinds of small wild song birds 

 is such that no one who is acquainted with their true 

 life-histories will attempt to defend them. The num 

 ber (species) of poultry and game devouring animals, 

 dressed either in coats of light-weight feathers or of 

 soft warm fur, is small as compared with the species 

 which are serviceable or neutral. 



It is unwise to overlook the great benefits conferrea 

 by the majority of our birds and mammals in th^ 

 cultivated field, the meadow, the forest and the or 

 chard, by destroying the troublesome rodents and mul- 

 titudes of insects, which, as Dr. Elliott Cones well 

 says: "singly are insignificant, but collectively a 

 scourge, wiiicli prey upon the hopes of the fruit grower, 

 and which if undisturbed would bring his care to 

 nought." 



