34 DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



foot of ground, giving especial attention to swamps, along 

 streams, walls, etc. Following this method we eradicated 

 13,466 acres, removing 16,045 bushes in the Hanover district, 

 and 8,075 acres in the Barre district, where 245,110 bushes 

 were destroyed. The last Legislature passed a bill for $8,000 

 providing reimbursement, under certain conditions, to persons 

 who lost currants or gooseberries through the action of the 

 State Nursery Inspector in 1917-18 in attempting to check the 

 spread of the blister rust. This was very helpful, and satisfied 

 to some extent the owners who were obliged to lose healthy, 

 undiseased bushes in the chosen eradication areas. 



The European Corn Borer. . 

 We are now confronted with the European corn borer, a 

 decidedly new pest, one that attacks garden crops, and, from 

 present indications, appears to be capable of causing greater 

 damage and be more difficult to control than any previously 

 imported pest. This borer^was first noticed in the vicinity of 

 Medford in the summer of 1917. A careful investigation and 

 study of the insect shows it to have an unlimited supply of 

 food plants. As it feeds inside, it is protected from sprays, is 

 apparently not affected by extreme cold, and produces two 

 generations each season. Garden plants, both flower and vege- 

 table, such as hollyhocks, dahlias, beets, celery, potato and 

 tomato vines, all weeds of the same nature as barn-yard grass, 

 burdock, ragweed, etc., together with both sweet and field corn, 

 furnish food and hibernating quarters for this pest. The 

 infested area is now comparatively small, comprising thirty- 

 four towns mainly north and west of Boston, and everything 

 possible should be done to fight this borer in its present habitat. 

 The outbreak of this pest has emphasized the fact that this 

 Department should have broad powers to deal with these out- 

 breaks as they arise, and I recommend the broadening of the 

 powers of the nursery inspection law to accomplish this. 



Apiary Inspection. 

 The work of this division has been along the usual lines and 

 has been carried on by Dr. Burton N. Gates of Amherst, with 

 the assistance of three deputy apiary inspectors, Messrs. O. F. 



