Appendix Ao 



REPORT OF A CONFERENCE HELD AT THE ROOMS OF THE 

 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE, BOSTON, MASS. 



March 4, 1891. 



Present: Profs. C. V. Riley and C. H. Fernald, Mr. Samuel 

 ScuDDER of Cambridge, Mayor Wiggin of Maiden, Selectmen 

 L. S. Gould of Melrose, W. C. Craig of Medford, and W. A. 

 Pierce of Arlington, Messrs. Shaler, Appleton and Sessions of 

 the Gypsy Moth Commission, and others. 



Professor Shaler. You know that about twenty years ago an 

 interesting Frenchman brought an interesting bug to this country. 

 His name was Trouvelot, and he brought the creature thinking to 

 introduce it as a valuable silk-worm. I begged him to destroy 

 his specimens, and at one time he said he had. It appears, how- 

 ever, that they got away from him. Last year I went before the 

 Legislature and begged for some money, advising them to put a hun- 

 dred thousand dollars at the disposition of a trustworthy commission. 

 They appropriated fifty thousand dollars and appointed a commission 

 which did a good deal of work and expended a good deal of money 

 and energy. I begged them to bend their energies to bringing in the 

 boundaries as far as possible, to pay the marliet price for eggs and 

 grubs, and to put their inspection work in progress ; but they went 

 into a miscellaneous sprinkling and burning over the whole terri- 

 tory. The result now is that, as nearly as I can ascertain, it 

 would take a line thirty miles long to enclose the area these insects 

 occupy. They are found in a territory of not far from fifty square 

 miles, though not all over it. I should think that not more than 

 ten square miles were solidly occupied. On the rest of it there 

 are colonies here and there. The situation seems to me discour- 

 aging in a certain way, but it is an encouraging fact that in about 

 twenty years they have not occupied more than about fifty square 

 miles, and it shows that they are not to be readily transported to a 

 great distance. Another encouraging fact is that, as far as I can 

 learn, save at two or three very limited points south of the Charles 

 River, the creature may be enclosed in this line on this side the 



