PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-THIED FRUIT-GROWERS " CONVENTION. 131 



tenth of California's. She supports an actively investigating State 

 Entomologist at a cost of about $7,500 a year. To be sure, this entomolo- 

 gist has to study mosquitoes and field crops and dairy pests as well as 

 fruit pests. 



Nebraska's horticultural and agricultural annual product is about 

 equal to California's fruit product alone*. She supports an investigat- 

 ing State Entomologist's office at an expense of $4,000 a year. 



Minnesota's annual total agricultural product is worth $150,000,000 

 a year, perhaps twice the value of California's fruits. She expends 

 something more than $10,000 a year for investigating insect pests. 



The State of New York supports an investigating State Entomologist's 

 staff at an expense of approximately $10,000 a year ; and the entomolog- 

 ical work of the two experiment stations at Geneva and Cornell costs 

 $10,000 a year more. All this is over and above the $25,000 a year 

 expended for nursery and orchard inspection work and quarantining. 



I could tell you of other states. It would be tiresome. The point is, 

 other states have recognized the worth-whileness of having thorough 

 scientific study of their insect pests that they may fight them effectively. 

 California does not do this. We pay out several thousands a year for 

 quarantine work. We pay practically nothing for thorough, original 

 investigation of the characteristics and ways of our enemies, that we 

 may learn of our vulnerable points and direct our practical efforts 

 against them successfully. 



Some questions may be asked. Are our pests in California all dif- 

 ferent from the ones in other states? If not, why not take advantage 

 of the investigations of other states and thus get our knowledge for 

 nothing. Answer: Many of the California pests are different from 

 those of the Middle West and East. Those that are not have different 

 habits and seasons and ways, as indeed a moment's reflection on our 

 radically different seasonal and general climatic conditions will suggest 

 to any of us. 



Another question. What is the money used for that is appropriated 

 to the insect-pest side of the Horticultural Commissioner's work? 

 Answer : Almost exclusively for quarantining, inspection and importa- 

 tion and rearing of beneficial insects. Not for discovering new facts, 

 not for long, thorough, scientific investigation of our pests. There 

 isn't money for both sides of the work, and quarantining, absolutely 

 imperative, uses it up. 



Still another question. What about the entomological department of 

 the State University? Answer: Primarily it is of necessity a teach- 

 ing department; the entomologist and his staff must first teach to large 

 classes of more or less uninterested freshmen and sophomores the rudi- 

 ments of entomology. Then must go time and energy to the compiling 



