16 
BULLETIN 1307, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
of oil. The 11>ii<> seed handled by this mill averaged l.'l'A per cent of oil; 
the T.>21 seed, 14 per cent. Good seed formerly weighed, on an average, 25 
tons per carload ; now a carload is found to weigh hut HI to ~'2 tons. 
PRECAUTIONS TAKEN TO PREVENT THE INTRODUCTION OF THE 
PINK BOLLWORM INTO THE UNITED STATES 
With the approval of the plant quarantine act on August 20, 1912, 
the Department of Agriculture for the first time obtained authority 
to regulate the importations of plants and plant products from for- 
eign countries and to take the steps necessary to prevent the intro- 
duction of injurious insects and plant diseases by such importations. 
The pink bollworm was one of the first insects to be considered after 
the plant quarantine act went into operation. Its foreign status and 
its menace to American cotton were first brought to the attention of 
the Federal Horticultural Board in April, 1918, and on May 20 of 
that year a formal hearing was called at Washington to consider 
the advisability of prohibiting the importation of cottonseed from 
all foreign countries. A quarantine was promulgated on May 28, 
1913, to take effect on July 1 of that year. This quarantine forbade 
the importation into the United States of cottonseed of every species 
and variety, and cottonseed hulls from any foreign locality and 
country excepting the Imperial Valley in the State of Lower Cali- 
fornia in Mexico. The importation from this region in Mexico was 
covered by regulations. The importance of this action was shown in 
May, 1913, by the receipt in Arizona of a shipment of 500 pounds 
of Egyptian seed which was found to have an infestation by the 
pink bollworm of about 20 per cent. Thanks to the quarantine law 
of Arizona and the activity of A. W. Morrill, the State entomologist, 
the whole shipment was destroyed by fire. 
A little later (August 18, 1913), on the recommendation of ex- 
perts of the Bureaus of Entomology and Plant Industry of this 
department, this quarantine was amended to provide, under regula- 
tion, for the entry, for milling only, of cottonseed from the States of 
Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas, Mexico. A still later amendment per- 
mitted the introduction of seed from other of the northern States of 
Mexico. 
The reasons advanced for allowing the regulated entry of Mexican 
cottonseed were that no insects which were not found in the United 
States were known to occur in Mexico, and that the culture of cotton 
there is more or less continuous with that in the United States. The 
absence of any cotton pests in the Republic of Mexico which did not 
occur in the United States at that time had been established by field 
inspections by several of the entomologists of the department. 
To protect the United States from the possible entry of the pink 
bollworm from the Territory of Hawaii, a domestic quarantine was 
promulgated June 24, 1913, prohibiting the importation of cotton- 
seed and cottonseed hulls from this territory. 
It was thought that the United States was sufficiently safeguarded 
against the pink bollworm by the quarantines against cottonseed 
as such, but it soon came to notice that considerable quantities of 
seed were coming to the United States in bales of lint. A careful 
examination of picker waste from a large number of bales of 
Egyptian cotton was made. It was found that considerable num- 
bers of seeds passed around the rollers in the gins and some between 
