62 N. J. Mosquito Extermination Association 



the winter ; which damaged all our drainage systems, this commission 

 reduced the Aedes sollicitans to the point where they were only a 

 nuisance in the sections which have not been drained. The wet 

 summer, unfortunately, produced numerous small breeding places 

 around the more thickly settled sections and resulted in enough 

 fresh water mosquitoes to make our pessimistic friends doubt the 

 benefit of the salt marsh work done by the commission. 



Maintenance work is one of the largest problems that confronts 

 us in Cape May County. Each year the amount of ditching installed 

 grows greater and the work necessary to keep the systems in order 

 increases, as also must the amount of money used in this work. In 

 another year it will be necessary for us to divide the county into 

 districts, each with an inspector and laborers responsible for the 

 conditions of that section. 



The sluices and tide gates which have to be placed at all marsh 

 lands on the Delaware Bay shore, although not a difficult problem 

 to install, use up the greater part of our appropriations and thus 

 keep us from advancing as rapidly as we would like with the new 

 ditching systems. 



At the beginning of the 1920 season for mosquito control work 

 the commission was confronted by a serious problem. The great 

 amount of ditching installed in the various marshes throughout the 

 county was badly blocked by the debris from the great storm tides 

 and required immediate attention; the labor question was serious 

 and a sufficient force, to do the work rapidly, practically unobtain- 

 able. 



Due to these conditions it was decided to adopt a policy of first 

 cleaning all the old ditching systems and putting them in perfect 

 working order and to use what time and money there was left for 

 permanent work. 



The balance of the season, after the completion of the mainte- 

 nance work, was spent in new ditching. 117,451 feet were dug in 

 various parts of the county. Cape May has about 54,000 acres of 

 marsh lands, 45,000 acres of this being salt marsh. About two- 

 thirds of this will have been drained at the end of the present season. 



The board of freeholders appropriated $15,000 to this commis- 

 sion; which has been applied entirely to the draining of the salt 

 marsh meadows for the control of the sollicitans, the most numer- 

 our species in this county. The drainage of the marshes will re- 

 quire several years for completion but the number of mosquitoes is 

 decreasing each year as the work is extended and when the work is 



