HEARINGS BEFORE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE. 131 
we are trying to do out there in connection with the lines I have dis- 
cussed I want an increase of $1,000 for that laboratory, because we can 
not begin to meet the demands made upon our men there for work; 
we can not touch one-quarter of the problems we should be able to fur- 
nish help on for lack of money and lack of men. 
The Cuatrman. What is the experiment station out there doing; is 
it doing anything? 
Mr. Woops. Ou other lines it is, but not working on diseases at all; 
they have no pathologists. I can not say the work we are doing on 
diseases is being done by them. The station is thoroughly familiar 
with it, however, and we work in perfect harmony with the station 
along these lines. 
Mr. Bowrsr. But not in cooperation 
Mr. Woops. But not in cooperation. 
The Cuarrman. They haye no pathologist? 
Mr. Woops. They have no pathologist. 
The Cuarrman. I should think that with their great fruit industry 
they would have an expert man. 
Mr. Woops. They should have an expert pathologist. There is 
enough work on the Pacific coast for several of them. 
Mr. Strttman. The trouble there is the State does not add much to 
the $15,000 they get from the Government. 
Mr. Woops. In the Mississippi Valley we have a laboratory at St. 
Louis in connection with the botanical gardens, and from that labora- 
tory we are conducting the work on fruit diseases, and on various 
tree diseases in the Mississippi Valley region. We have several men 
located there. We are spending now about $9,000 in that region, 
from that laboratory as a center, and we want an increase of a thou- 
sand dollars on that work because, there again, the demands are very 
much greater than we can come anywhere near meeting; and a grad- 
ual growth will be necessary in those stations probably for some time 
yet. In connection with that work out there we are cooperating with 
the Bureau of Forestry in the study of forest-tree diseases, and 
especially in the problem of methods of treating construction timber; 
that is, fence posts and all sorts of construction timber. 
The CoarrmMan. Ties? 
Mr. Woops. Railroad ties, yes; and telegraph poles and everything 
of that kind. Weare impregnating them with materials to prevent 
the entrance and decay produced by these parasitic fungi. The decay 
in timber is produced by parasitic plants which get in the pores of 
timbers and destroy it. If you can stop this on plants we can stop it 
on lumber. The creosoting process is in quite general use, but it is 
very expensive for the ordinary farmer, and what we are after now is 
some method of treating the timber which is cheaper, some method 
by which fence posts and things of that kind can be treated cheap 
enough to be put into general use and made available to the great mass 
of the farmers of the country. 
The Coarrman. Why is it generally supposed that the charring of 
fence posts will prevent decay, or at least postpone decay for a certain 
length of time? ; 
Mr. Woops. That is quite effective. In the first place, the charring 
process kills all the parasites on the surface of the wood, and also 
closes the pores of the wood so water can not get through, and then 
if an organism lights on the charcoal it can not get in, because there 
is no nourishment for it. 
