396 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



the cities of Washington, Baltimore and Albany are using these high- 

 power tree sprayers and others are bound to follow. 



By being able to throw a stream over the tallest of our shade trees 

 from the ground, and hence eliminating the cost of climbing, not only is 

 the great expense of labor overcome, but a whole street can be sprayed 

 during the same length of time formerly required for the treatment of 

 but a few trees. Our latest device is to substitute auto trucks for horses 

 in our highway, shade-tree, park and city work which is proving very 

 satisfactory. The same power that drives the auto also does the spraying. 



With our present spraying equipment of all kinds in Massachusetts 

 alone, I believe we use in a single season nearly 1,000 tons of arsenate of 

 lead. The State Forester's contract for lead the past year was 500 tons. 



One would hardly expect that such a pest as the gypsy moth would 

 be an aid to the introduction of forestry methods in the treatment of our 

 woodlands. Rather, one would expect it to be the reverse, but such is 

 not the case. 



When the office for the suppression of the gypsy moth and that of the 

 State Forester were united in 1908, the writer strongly advocated that 

 forest thinnings and improvement cuttings would be of great assistance 

 in combating the depredations of this pest. He argued that not only 

 would the woodlands be in a better physiological condition for having 

 the weakened and suppressed trees removed, and hence better able to 

 stand the stripping of the caterpillars, but in addition the operations of 

 hand suppression and spraying could be more cheaply performed because 

 the superfluous trees would be taken out. Such cuttings thereafter as 

 were made directly by the department were supervised by trained for- 

 esters, and at the same time he urged municipalities and private owners 

 to do as much of this work as possible and to make use of his assistants. 



Within the past year or two scientific facts have come to light which 

 vastly add to the importance of modern forestry practice as a control to 

 the gypsy moth. Mr. Burgess, an entomologist of the United States 

 Bureau of Entomology, who was doing co-operative work with the Massa- 

 chusetts State Forester, in studying the feeding habits of the gypsy moth 

 in the laboratory and the field, found that this insect is by no means the 

 omnivorous feeder that it is commonly supposed to be; that although it 

 does eat the leaves of a large variety of trees, it actually thrives best on 

 only a few, and that if deprived of this favorite food entirely, soon suc- 

 cumbs to parasitic enemies. 



These experiments of Mr. Burgess were supplemented by some observa- 

 tions of Mr. Fiske, another co-operating government entomologist, made 

 in Europe. Mr. Fiske returned to this country last year convinced that, 

 the chief reason for the comparative harmlessness of this insect in that 

 continent is due to the better silvicultural condition of the European 

 forests. This silvicultural condition has been brought about by centuries 

 of forestry practice. In addition, as already observed in Massachusetts 

 with white pine, its freedom from the pest in clear stands proved also 



