No. 4.] THE GYPSY MOTH. 325 



enormous quantities of the eggs of the moth were destroyed 

 in these woods in Novem1)er, nearly all the good weather of 

 December was lost. This was a great misfortune, for it has 

 left this excellent work but little more than half done, and it 

 will now be a difficult task to complete it before the eggs 

 hatch in the spring. 



Summary of the Year's Work. 



The figures given below represent such proportion of a 

 year's work as can be accurately tabulated. The trees were 

 mainly cut on the 1,010 acres of land, where the under- 

 brush was cut and burned. The buildings, fences and other 

 structures which are reported as infested were merely har- 

 boring or hiding places of the moth. Usually the eggs 

 were found upon, about or underneath these structures. 



It will be noticed that no figures giving the number of 

 the trees found infested or the numbers of the different 

 forms of the moth destroyed appear in these tables. This 

 may* be explained as follows : — 



Every effort has been made in the field work to economize 

 time and material, wherever it could be done without inter- 

 fering with the efficiency of the work. In woodlands most 

 infested, especially in the Middlesex Fells region, only 

 enough trees were marked to indicate the presence of the 

 moth. This was a great saving of time and white paint, 

 but it made a correct record of the number of trees found 

 infested in these colonies a practical impossibility. Where 

 only one tree in twenty was marked as infested during 1897, 

 no accurate account of infested trees could be made. This 

 invalidated the entire record of infested trees, and the time 

 ordinarily taken to count and record them has been saved. 



The record of the number of caterpillars and other forms 

 of the moth taken is not given, for in one or two of the 

 most densely infested localities the caterpillars were found 

 in such masses that any attempt to count them would have 

 been a great waste of time. Furthermore, it was necessary 

 to destroy them immediately, to prevent their spreading. 

 In many other colonies spraying was almost entirely de- 

 pended upon to destroy the caterpillars. In other cases 

 spraying and fire were used to destroy the caterpillars and 



