364 



WEST VIRGINIA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



having traveled over two thousand miles through West Virginia, Vir- 

 ginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania, and have gone into the heart of the 

 white pine and spruce regions in West Virginia, where I carefully exam- 

 ined every tree that I found showing the least indication of disease. After 

 thus thoroughly examining into the condition of the timber, I am confi- 

 dent that there is no spruce or pine dying in West Virginia, at least, from 

 the attack of insects. I am all the more convinced that this is so fr^m the 

 fact that I have not been able to find a single living example of the de- 

 structive pine bark beetle (Dendroctonus frontalis) in the State since 

 the spring of 1893. As this insect was the real cause of the trouble 

 referred to, I think I am perfectly safe in saying that it will be 

 many years before it is capable of making another destructive invasion, if 

 it ever does. 



While a large amount of timber was killed by the bark beetle in West 

 Virginia, their remain large quantities of healthy timber in this State, 

 especially of spruce. A large per cent of the yellow, scrub and pitch pine 

 was killed, but a much less per cent of the white pine, and only a small 

 per cent of the black spruce died. 



I am glad to note that much of the white pine, and I may say nearly all 

 the spruce that was killed by the bark beetle in 1891-2 is yet in a condi- 

 tion to make good second and common grades of lumber, and I think most 

 of it, especially the spruce, will remain in about the same condition for 

 one or two years ; therefore there will be an opportunity to save some of 

 it. 



(Signed) A. D. HOPKINS, 



Ent. W. Va. Experiment Station. 



Morgan town, W. Va. Nov., 1804. 



OBSERVATIONS IN 1895-6. 



Owing to the fact that the trouble which had affected the 

 pine and the spruce was considered to be over, and that I had 

 turned my attention to other lines of investigation, few obser- 

 vations were made in 1895, and I have only two or three that 

 may be worthy of mention in this connection. 



While in the Tibb's run forest on Oct. 29th, 1895, a dying 

 pitch pine was pointed out to me, which upon examination was 

 found to be infested with Tomicus calligraphus^ which, as indi- 

 cated by the balls of turpentine on the bark, had attacked the 

 tree while the bark was living. Two other trees were found on 

 July 2d about a half a mile or more from this one, One of 

 these was felled and examined and it was found to be infested 

 with bark beetles, but showed no indications that it had been 

 attacked while living. A small bark beetle,! which makes 

 galleries similar to that of the destructive bark beetle, was 

 especially common, One of the smallest species of the bark 



1. Pityophthorus confinis, Leo. 



