14 N. J. Mosquito Extermination Association 



ing with bird and rodent life. There were snipe, mud hens and 

 occasionally a flock of duck and always in season yellow legs. Musk- 

 rats were there in abundance and all gave one the appearance of a 

 land unknown to man. Many portions of the marsh were inacces- 

 sible and man seldom entered these fastnesses. One could scarcely 

 believe that so much wilderness and isolation could exist so near a 

 large city. I almost felt as if I were on an exploring expedition. It 

 seemed an endless task to ever drain it. As for mosquitoes, they 

 were breeding everywhere. 



I well recall the optimism of Professor Smith and his coadjutors, 

 "In a few years' time all would ,be cleaned up and a mosquitoless 

 county would result." A fair dream, but alas ! for all concerned, we 

 have been working faithfully these many years, and yet remains 

 much to do. 



At first it seemed that ditches with good outlets and connections 

 would solve the problem. The tide would flush while on the rise 

 and drainage would be taken care of on the ebb. Again new difficul- 

 ties arose, many portions of the meadows were too low to drain, at 

 other times a heavy rainfall for a number of days together with an 

 east wind would increase the upland flow and decrease the tide fall 

 in the ditches, so that they could not drain and thus even with our 

 ditches, ideal conditions for breeding would be present. 



Gradually it dawned upon our minds that some change must be 

 made. I remember well the day Mr. Brooks invited a few of us 

 to visit a diked-in project in the Bergen County marsh, near Ruther- 

 ford. To see, was to act, and we immediately began the building 

 of dikes and installation of tide gates. Today as a kind of evolution 

 in control work, we are using the ditches, dikes and tide gates. 

 Nearly all of our salt marsh is diked and tide gated. The ditch, com- 

 bined with dike and tide gates, seems to solve the salt marsh drain- 

 age problem. 



Of one thing we are sure and that is that standing water on the 

 marsh is always a menace, and sooner or later will breed. 



You all know of the varied implements brought into use in this 

 work. The old ditch cutting machine, the hand spade, the dredges, 

 and in these later days, the development of a ditch cleaning machine. 



I well remember the enthusiasm of our friend Spencer Miller 

 when he viewed the seven or eight miles of dikes we had installed 

 on our meadows. They were really substantial too, five feet at 

 the base, three feet high and two feet at the top. He said, "Doctor, 

 we will have to replace them with concrete dikes." Of course, the 



