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GIPSY MOTH AND BROWN<TAIL MOTH INVESTIGATIONS 
A, F, Burgess, Entomologist in Charge 
Continuing the effort to secure beneficial species ef parasites 
to aid in the fight against the gipsy and brown-tail months, Samuel §, 
Crossman and Ray T, Webber, of the Gipsy Moth Laboratory, Melrose 
Highlands, Mass,, will visit Europe during the spring. and summer of 
1923. Mr. Crossman spent several months in Europe in 1922 and asa 
result of his observations it has been deemed important it continue the 
work of importing, breeding, and colonizing beneficial European parasites 
of these two insects in this country. Most of the cowmtries in Europe 
where the gipsy moth and the brown-tail moth occur will be visited and an 
earnest effort made to collect and ship to the Laboratory at Melrose 
Highlands, Mass,, as large an amount of promising parasitic material as 
possible, 
Dr. John N, Summers, who visited Japan last year for the purpose 
of securing parasites of the gipsy moth in that country, wll leave for 
that country again in March to continue his studies of the gipsy moth 
and its parasites, He will collect and ship beneficial species to the 
United States for propagation and colonization within the gipsy moth- 
infested area. 
FOREST INSECT INVESTIGATIONS 
A, D.. Hopkins, Forest Entomologist in Charge 
In southern Oregon and northern California the Federal Government 
and private timber owners, under the direction of the Bureau of Entomolo- 
gy, Branch of Forest Insects, are cooperating to control an epidemic of 
- the western pine beetle (Dendroctonus brevicomis Lec.). This epidemic 
extends over an area a little larger than the State of Delaware, in which, 
in the last ten years, the beetle has killed over a billion board feet of 
merchantable yellow pine timber valued at over $3,600,000, or fifty times 
as much as has been killed by fire on the area during the same period, 
In the work of the past year, 200 square miles of the project area 
was cleaned up; 11,449 infested trees containing 12,187,790 board feet 
were felled and the bark containing the broods of destructive beetles 
burned. This required a labor force of approximately 200 men working for 
two months during the spring and two months again in the fall, and cost 
$55, 246.19 to all agencies involved, The surveys conducted by the bureau 
in the late fall showed that the work had been very successful and had 
reduced the infestation 72 per cent in the areas worked, so that in one 
year enough timber had been saved to pay the costs of the work, and future 
reduction will be net profit. 
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