66 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [P. D. 4. 



work for at least four or five days or they would be obliged to 

 do something else. The committee recognized the validity of 

 this claim, but circumstances relating to the co-operative agree- 

 ment were such that little could be done, and work was reduced 

 to a minimum in nearly two-thirds of the towns of the State 

 in order to prosecute the eradication work. 



On this plan, therefore, the work has proceeded since the 1st 

 of August. Every town has been covered for cultivated Ribes 

 at least once, and most of them several times, and all diseased 

 plants taken out and destroyed. In addition, places where dis- 

 ease has appeared have been frequently revisited to make sure 

 latent cases appearing subsequently should not escape. As a 

 part of the inspection, a census of all cultivated currants and 

 gooseberries has also been taken. Undoubtedly some have been 

 overlooked, but from check counts made here and there it 

 seems probable that 85 to 90 per cent of all the cultivated 

 Ribes in the State have been enumerated. The knowledge thus 

 obtained should be very useful for any later work, besides indi- 

 cating quite definitely the importance of this industry in Massa- 

 chusetts. 



Results of the Work in 1917. 



With a local worker in each town this year it was possible to 

 learn much more fully of the condition of the towns than was 

 the case with scouting crews in 1916. How near the local man 

 came to inspecting every Ribes bush in the town is, of course, 

 open to question, but certainly the towns were more thoroughly 

 covered than heretofore. As a result of the work, the disease 

 was found this year on Ribes in 56 towns where it was not dis- 

 covered in 1916, while it was not found in 41 towns reported as 

 having it in 1916. This means that slight infections last year 

 in 56 towns were not found by scouting parties, or else were 

 not present that year but developed this season. It al-o im- 

 plies that in 41 towns the infected Ribes found and destroyed 

 last year were only sporadic cases and did not reappear. 

 Whether they existed long enough in those towns to infect the 

 pines before their discovery and removal can only be learned 

 by continued watching in those places until any such infections 

 shall have had time to develop. 



Outside of the eradication areas about 30,000 diseased Ribes 



