278 



Garden and Forest. 



[June 4, 1890. 



Maiden, Everett, Revere and Chelsea. It is admitted that it 

 has got into the Middlesex Fells, a natural park dear to every 

 naturalist and lover of nature about Boston, and there is little 

 doubt that the pest is within the limits of Cambridge. 



The greater range of the pest naturally necessitates increased 

 expense in the attempt to control it, and it is expected that the 

 Legislature before adjournment will grant another appropria- 

 tion at least as large as the first. 



Since the Commission was organized the destruction of the 

 Gypsy Moth has been vigorously pushed. The clusters of 

 eggs were first attacked. These were found on the trunks 

 and larger branches of trees and shrubs, on fences, walls, 

 buildings, piles of lumber, etc. The principal means used in 

 destroying them was lighted kerosene torches, by which the 

 eggs were burned in the positions in which they were found, 

 and the trunks and iimbs of the trees plainly show wherever 

 the torches were applied. This work was begun at the end of 

 March and was continued for several weeks. Sixty or seventy 

 men were employed and a hundred barrels of kerosene used. 

 In some cases it was found necessary to pull down stone and 

 other fences in order to get at the eggs. Many acres of in- 

 fested woodland have been cut down or have had all the 

 underwood removed and burned. 



Very early in May the young larvae were found to have 

 hatched from the eggs, and on the twelfth of the month spray- 

 ing the vegetation with insecticides was begun. At present a 

 dozen machines are at work, and this number is to be increased. 



Each equipment consists of a large cask or hogshead, 

 mounted upon a cart or wagon, a force pump and from 100 

 to 200 feet of hose with nozzles, besides ladders and some 

 other accessories. The poison chiefly used up to this time is 

 Paris Green, diluted to the proportion of one pound of Paris 

 Green to 150 gallons of water. Five men are employed with 

 each spraying apparatus. The law invests the Commission- 

 ers with the power to enter and work in any private property 

 in pursuit of the Gypsy Moth. Trees, shrubs, vines and gar- 

 den plants of every description are usually all sprayed, but it is 

 not intended or thought necessary to spray grain or grass and a 

 few similar crops. It will be necessary to do the spraying sev- 

 eral times over in order to clear the infested ground of all lar- 

 vae, and nobody expects that the desired results will be ac- 

 complished in one season. The law imposes a severe penalty 

 by fine and imprisonment upon any one who knowingly car- 

 ries the living insects to other places. But no systematic reg- 

 ulations have been made looking to the prevention of the fur- 

 ther spread of the pest. Some farmers, who carry large 

 quantities of manure, etc., out of Medford, have had to agree 

 to carefully examine their loads to see that none of the insects 

 are carried out with them when they pass beyond certain lim- 

 its of the town. I have not learned that any railroad train is 

 subject to examination before leaving. There are tanneries, 

 brickyards and other industries carried on at Medford, and 

 many freight cars are always about either with or waiting for 

 loads, and the possibility that in the course of the years in 

 which it has been in the town, the insect in any of its stages 

 has already been carried to far distant points can be un- 

 derstood by those who are familiar with the history of the 

 introduction and distribution of other obnoxious animals. It 

 is maintained by some that the sluggish habit of the large fe- 

 male moths is against its having spread far, and that such a 

 conspicuous insect could not have reached other places with- 

 out having been detected. But it is a remarkable fact that the 

 Gypsy Moth, within five miles of Boston, and which must have 

 been increasing for about twenty years, was for so long a time 

 never noticed or reported by an entomologist or distinguished 

 by any one from an ordinary native " moth miller." 



Professor C. V. Riley's success in combatting the Cottony 

 Cushion Scale in California by the importation of its Australian 

 parasites, very naturally raises the question whether a little 

 money spent in the introduction of some of the most effective 

 parasites of the Gypsy Moth in Europe may not finally be the 

 best way to keep it within reasonable bounds in this country. 



Indeed, it is stated that Mr. Trouvelot, who is known to have 

 been the unlucky agent in the introduction of the Gypsy Moth, 

 had to give up all his attempts at raising silkworms at Med- 

 ford on account of a fatal disease which he also accidentally 

 introduced, and which is said to have destroyed immense 

 numbers of other native species of insects besides the silk- 

 worms. It was supposed that the disease had destroyed all of 

 the escaped Gypsy Moths. 



If the Legislature makes further grants of money under the 

 almost absurd idea of compassing the extermination of the 

 pest, there is likely to be some disappointment in the results 

 after the lapse of a few years. But if the appropriations are 

 given with the understanding that they accomplish the tem- 



porary control of the insect in the infested region, the liberal 

 use of Paris Green is going to give Medford and surrounding 

 towns temporary freedom from foliage-eating insects of all 

 kinds, and, in consequence, the vegetation of the region should 

 be the fairest in the commonwealth. 



Arnold Arboretum. / • ^r- JdCK. 



What is an Orchid ? 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir. — Will some one tell me what properly constitutes an 

 Orchid? They are "peculiarly formed," I know, but so are 

 other Mowers which are not classed with this family of Orchid- 

 acecE. It was my childish belief that Orchids grew in the air 

 only, but this error of childhood is corrected by my acquaint- 

 ance with Orchis spectabilis and Cypripedium picbescens, also 

 Cypripedium acaule, all three of which are now growing in my 

 rockery. And last year I found in one of our charming lanes 

 the Spiranthes simplex — Ladies' Tresses — another earth-grow- 

 ing Orchid. 



Catskill, N. Y. ■£■■ A -D. 



[All Orchids are not "Air-plants," so called. Our native 

 species, without exception, grow in the ground, although 

 many of those which flourish in the tropics and which are 

 cultivated in temperate countries under glass receive their 

 nourishment from the moisture in the air. Plants of the 

 Orchid family differ from all others in the arrangement of 

 their organs of reproduction, which are united into a col- 

 umn composed of a single, or, in case of the Lady's Slip- 

 per, of two stamens coherent with or borne on the style 

 or thick fleshy stigma. The perianth of the flower is com- 

 posed of six divisions, arranged in two sets, each of three. 

 The three outer divisions are called sepals, and often resem- 

 ble in texture and color those of the inner set, called petals. 

 One of the inner set of these divisions differs from the others 

 in shape and direction, and is called the lip — the sack of 

 the Lady's Slipper. This is really the upper petal — that is, 

 the one next to the axis of the flower — but by a half twist 

 of the ovary it is made to appear as if it were the lowest. 

 These elements — sepals, petals, lip and column — varied 

 almost without limit in form and color, combine to pro- 

 duce the almost infinite number of widely differing forms 

 which are so fascinating in their oddity, quaintness and 

 beauty. Orchids are found in all warm and temperate 

 parts of the world, although they are more abundant in 

 the tropics than elsewhere. They are perennial plants, 

 often with tuber-bearing roots, and the peculiar structure 

 of their flowers renders impossible their unaided fertiliza- 

 tion, for which they depend on the visits of insects. — Ed.] 



Planting Street Ti-ees. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — Your article on street trees recalls an example sim- 

 ilar to the one you cite. I was engaged on some public works 

 in a western city and was consulted by the city government 

 about planting a principal avenue. In reply to an inquiry I 

 stated my terms for taking charge of the work, which were 

 pronounced satisfactory. A few days after I was informed that 

 the city government had found a man who had offered much 

 more favorable terms, which had been accepted. As I had to 

 pass through the avenue every day I could watch the progress 

 of the work. The trees were Elms, brought from the fields, 

 eight or ten inches in diameter, and, as I learned, were fur- 

 nished and planted for $16 each. They would average twenty- 

 five feet in height, but had been cut in so that they showed 

 only stumps of branches, and for roots each one had a knob 

 at the bottom which could almost have been put in a bushel- 

 basket. There was no preparation of the ground, but the 

 holes were dug large enough to receive the so-called roots, 

 and the trees were stuck in and the knobs buried. This was 

 in the spring, and 246 trees were thus planted at a cost of 

 $3,936. On the 31st of June of the following year only eighty- 

 four trees showed any sign of life, and not one of them would 

 have been suffered to remain in any properly cared for 

 grounds. One year later only thirty-one put out a leaf here 

 and there, and soon these were removed as worthless. 



No doubt some of the members of that City Council prided 

 themselves for looking closely after the public interests and 

 getting the avenue planted with such fine large trees at such a 

 low cost. 



Minneapolis, Minn. H. W. S. Cleveland. 



