40 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, 1934 
The value of maintaining a transit-inspection program cannot be measured by 
the number of interceptions alone, as commercial shippers are well informed con- 
cerning the transit-inspection work and consequently make every attempt to 
comply with the quarantine regulations and avoid the interception and return 
of their shipments. Experience has shown that when the shipments of restricted 
articles out of any quarantined area are not checked regularly, shippers become 
careless, and pests may be distributed to new localities as a result. 
In connection with cooperation with the States, the transit inspectors report 
to the State authorities shipments observed moving in violation of State quaran- 
tine requirements, although in the absence of statutory authority, such shipments 
are not intercepted and returned. Similar reports are made to State officials, 
as well as to the Post Office Department, with respect to parcel-post shipments of 
plant materials which do not bear a valid State nursery-inspection certificate 
in accordance with postal laws and regulations and State nursery-inspection 
requirements. Express and freight shipments which are not properly certified 
are also reported to the State officials. As a result of several years of this coop- 
erative type of work it is noted that there has been a decided decrease in the 
numbers of noncertified or improperly certified shipments observed moving 
through transit-inspection points. 
In addition to the work outlined, the transit-inspection organization has been 
engaged from time to time in related activities at destination markets. Among 
these have been the supervision of sterilization of fruit exposed to fruit-fly infesta- 
tion where the fruit concerned is shipped to destination markets and treated there 
rather than at the point of origin. During the season when freight trains are 
particularly likely to be responsible for transporting Japanese beetles to new 
localities, the cleaning of refrigerator cars that have come from infested areas has 
been supervised by the transit inspectors, who have also seen to the destruction 
of the refuse. Japanese beetles also are sometimes carried with nonagricultural 
freight or unrestricted articles, such as potatoes, where their association with the 
product is entirely incidental, due to the clinging of the beetles to the outside of 
the sacks, and as far as time permitted, the transit inspectors have checked on 
products of this kind from infested areas. 
In addition to the information given in table 14, 16,000 pounds of freight were 
inspected at Boston, and 60,311 pounds at Chicago. At Jacksonville, Fla., 
650,287 waybills and 247,371 car lots were checked to determine whether 
the shipments might need to be inspected for compliance with plant-quarantine 
regulations. At Chicago similar information was secured through telephone calls 
and the checking of waybills covering 13,710 freight shipments weighing 4,137,185 
pounds; and 175 empty cars from the area regulated under the Japanese beetle 
quarantine were inspected at that point to determine whether they had been 
cleaned sufficiently to free them from Japanese beetles. 
In addition to the figures shown in table 15, the transit inspectors intercepted 
84 shipments moving intrastate in violation of State quarantines relating to 
pests covered by Federal quarantines. Of these interceptions, 1 was made at 
Albany, 4 at Boston, 2 at New Haven, 63 at New York, 10 at Philadelphia, 3 at 
Pittsburgh, and 1 at Washington. 
FOREIGN PLANT QUARANTINES 
Twenty-four foreign plant quarantines and regulatory orders of the Department 
prohibiting or restricting the entry of various plants and plant products into the 
United States, 8 domestic quarantines affecting the movement of such material 
between the Territories of Hawaii and Puerto Rico and continental United States, 
and 4 miscellaneous regulatory measures are enforced through the Division of 
Foreign Plant Quarantines by inspectors and collaborators stationed at the more 
important ports of entry and at foreign-mail distributing points, and working in 
close cooperation with employees of other Government departments. Detailed 
information on these quarantines and orders is available in other publications. 
Enforcement activities in connection with these quarantines and orders are 
more fully explained in succeeding sections and are accompanied by tables 
presenting in condensed form records indicating the scope of the work or sum- 
marizing its results. 
RECORDS OF IMPORTS OF RESTRICTED PLANTS AND PLANT PRODUCTS 
Under the various foreign quarantines and orders certain plants and plant 
products are restricted as to entry, are subject to inspection and, if necessary, 
disinfection, for the purpose of excluding plant diseases and insect pests. Among 
such restricted plants and plant products are nursery stock, plants, bulbs, and 
