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JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 



[Vol. 8 



PART II PAPERS AND DISCUSSIONS 



Peesident H. T. Fernald: I will ask first Vice-president Herrick 

 to take the chair. 



Vice-President Herrick: We v^^ll hsten to the annual address of 

 the President. 



SOME PRESENT NEEDS IN ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 



By H. T. Fernald, Amherst, Mass. 



The wonderful progress of economic entomology during the past half 

 century in this country, and more recently in other lands, has to a 

 large extent, after all, been pioneer work and the farther exploration 

 has advanced, the broader the territory has been found to be. Who 

 foresaw at the time of Dr. Riley's first presidential address in 1890, 

 that twenty years later entomologists would be studying pellagra, 

 typhoid, and other diseases to determine the relation insects bear to 

 them, or that the importation of parasites and the study of insect dis- 

 eases would perhaps lead to successful methods of control? A few of 

 those having the broadest vision perhaps, but onh^ a few. Todaj^ if we 

 examine the fields of investigation awaiting the worker no limits 

 seem in sight, and each year to come is liable to bring with it the first 

 steps in paths hitherto untrodden. 



Stated briefly, the present needs of the economic entomologist ap- 

 pear to group themselves under two main heads. These are: first, 

 more complete and accurate investigation of subjects which have al- 

 ready been more or less studied; and second, the investigation of new 

 territory ; w^hile correlated with both are certain needs which are neces- 

 sary to the successful prosecution of either. To consider som.e of the 

 subjects under these heads is my purpose today. 



It has been said that we do not know everything which should be 

 known about even one insect. I well remember that when the book 

 on the gypsy moth appeared in 1896 someone remarked — I think at 

 one of these meetings — that it was the nearest to a monograph of an 

 insect which had ever appeared. But if we examine the wonderful 

 contributions to the life, habits, enemies and methods of control of 

 this pest which have since appeared, it becomes at once evident how 

 far it fell short of being what it was supposed to be. Since the appear- 

 ance of that book the labors of State and United States workers have 

 probably doubled our knowledge of this insect, and still there is much 

 more awaiting discovery. 



