14 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICUI/TURE, 1951 
and linters of 1 ] j pounds were conditionally released from the certi- 
6ca1 ion requirements. 
Quarantine-enforcement activities about normal 
More than 3 million bales of cotton was ginned at the L,700 gins 
operating under supervision of pink bollworm Inspectors. Nearly 
3uch gins are equipped with cottonseed beaters to kill pink boll- 
worms as a continuous process of ginning. In addition. 43 oil mills 
are authorized to treat seeds produced at some 750 other L r in>. More 
than 1 million tons of cottonseed was treated at L r ins or oil mills hav- 
ing approved beat-sterilization or fumigation equipment. 
Inspectors at two highway inspection stations on the border of the 
regulated area in the Lower Rio Grande Valley inspected 76,000 ve- 
hicles and intercepted i^.N(M) lots of cotton or Cotton product- likely 
to harbor pink bollworm-. 
Control activities in Mexico parallel those in United States 
Stalk destruction in l ( x>" was carried out as effectively in adjacent 
area- of Mexico as aero— the border. Individual cotton-planting 
permit- were i--ued to 23,000 growers in the Matamoros region cover- 
ing an e-timated 800,000 acres. August 31 was set as the mandatory 
deadline for stalk destruction, the same as that in effect for adjacent 
areas in this country. Wei] over '•>'.> percent of the stalks in the Mat- 
amoros region were destroyed by the end of August 
Under authority of a Presidential decree, there is being organized 
in each agricultural region an official agency to be known as the 
Patronato de Investigation, Fomento y Dexensa Agricola. These 
agencies will replace the regional agricultural committee-. 
Advances in the use of insect icides as a supplement to control by cul- 
tural practices continued in the Laguna area of Mexico. Mi. re cot- 
ton growers made early applications of insecticides to control the 
insects t bat appear first, thus gett ing a good crop set before pink boll- 
worms built up to damaging numbers. 
Eradication of wild cotton lessens threat to Cotton Belt 
Nearly 37,000 acre- were surveyed in the southern Florida coastal 
area- and 1.11,500 wild cotton plant- were removed during the year. 
Only •-'l'o pink bollworms were recovered from T_\ LOO squares, blooms, 
and bolls examined, or an average infestation of 0.5 percent. This 
w.-i- a drastic reduction from the heavy infestation found in January 
L950, when there wa- an average of )•_' percent in some sections. In- 
spections north of Everglades City showed that there is a wide area 
between the infested wild cotton area- and the portion of Florida 
where cotton is grown a- an annual crop. The immediate threat of 
spread of i he pink bollworm from this coastal area to domestic cotton- 
producing areas in Alabama and ( Georgia bas been averted. 
FOREST INSECTS 
All-Oiii \\ ;ir Waned igaiBBl Engelmann Spruce Beetle in Colorado 
The most extensive campaign on record to control an outbreak of 
tree-killing beetles was initiated in the Engelmann spruce forests 
