diseases are far more widespread and destructive than was suspected in this country before the work was begun.

Particular attention has been paid to the occurrence of disease in Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, since there was especial need of information in these States. The devastation of apiaries which comes to light in this work is surprising. It is frequently difficult to get any information concerning a county other than that beekeeping has been practically wiped out. To obtain samples from the various regions containing disease entails an enormous amount of correspondence and the sending out of thousands of circulars, but the results seem to justify the effort. The sending out of letters and circulars of inquiry is in itself beneficial, since by this means bee keepers are induced to examine their colonies carefully and often find disease where it was not suspected. Their attention, is also called to a danger which many do not know to exist and they are thereby put on their guard.

This work has also proved most valuable, since the data gained in this way assist apiary inspectors in their work, and also assist in enabling bee keepers to have inspection laws passed. If bee keepers can get reliable information concerning the character and treatment of brood diseases the loss is naturally greatly reduced.

A protozoan (Nosema apis), the reported cause of a supposedly infectious dysentery of bees, has been studied, and it is not considered that it is as yet definitely proved that this organism is the cause of the disease.

Work on the development of the bee has been continued, and studies of the egg have been practically completed.

Cooperation has been entered into with the State entomologist of Maryland in making a survey of beekeeping conditions in that State, and this work has been completed. Cooperative work of a similar character in Pennsylvania has been continued. The expert in charge of apiculture has assisted in the establishment of apiary inspection in Ontario by giving a short course of lectures to the bee inspectors at the Ontario Agricultural College at Guelph. This was considered important for the reason that we need protection against possible importation of diseases from Canada. He also assisted in establishing a course in apiculture at Syracuse University, and represented the bureau at the annual meeting of the National Bee Keepers' Association at Albany and at the meetings of the Michigan and Illinois Bee Keepers' Associations.

UNCLASSIFIED WORK.

As happens every year, a great deal of work has been done in different directions which can not be classified under the main sections. Investigations of pecan insects and of insects injurious to ornamental plants and shade trees have been continued. The bureau has been called upon to give advice in the matter of shade-tree insects from many cities in the country.

As mentioned in previous reports, the work of the specialists of the bureau in the determination of specimens sent in by State entomologists and other workers in practical entomology has been very large. This has occupied a great deal of time, but since it has a very im

23165°-AGB 1911- -34

portant bearing upon the work of the State entomologists, teachers of economic entomology, and others engaged in practical work, it not only can hardly be avoided, but it has ultimately a considerable value. During the fiscal year nearly 30,000 specimens were determined for these workers.

The correspondence of the bureau continues to increase, and in addition to correspondence by circulars more than 32,500 letters have been written during the fiscal year.

There has also been a large increase in the publications of the bureau, 75 separate numbers having been issued during the year.

PROPOSED WORK FOR THE FISCAL YEAR 1912.

The main lines of field work against the gipsy and brown-tail moths under way at the close of the fiscal year 1911 will be continued, and in conjunction with the Massachusetts State forester's office and the town authorities an attempt will be made to exterminate the gipsy moth in a belt 10 to 15 miles wide along the western infested border in Massachusetts, and a series of towns along the western and northern borders of the New Hampshire and Maine infestations will receive the same attention. At present there seems to be little hope of preventing the spread to the eastward in Maine. Scouting throughout the suspected territory in all of the New England States will be continued, and the inspection of forest products, and possibly of other suspected material shipped from the infested area, will be continued. In July, during the flight of the brown-tail moth, small forces of men were stationed at several points to examine boats and trains for adult brown-tail moths attracted to the lights of these conveyances, and which otherwise would be taken to points where the insects are not known to exist.

With regard to the importation of parasites of the gipsy moth and the brown-tail moth, the bulk of the importations will be still further reduced, and more careful studies will be made to determine the spread and mutiplication of those species already established, and more diligent search will be made for those parasites introduced and liberated which have not yet been recovered. The admirable success of the agent who spent the last half of the previous fiscal year in Italy, which so far exceeded any previous efforts of the kind, indicates that it will probably be desirable to make the same intensive studies and the same careful effort to import parasites not yet established, from one or more favorable points.

With the boll weevil, the experiments to determine the feasibility of some plan for its control other than the burning of the plants in the fall will require a large amount of attention, and this investigation will be extended to include a number of suggestions that have come to light as the result of previous work. The poison experiments will be continued, as well as the work with the boll-weevil parasites. The results of the winter shipment of parasites from Texas to Louisiana will be carefully followed up. The exact status of the boll weevil throughout the infested area will be determined as usual and agents will trace the dispersion to determine the extent of the summer and autumn flights of the insect. Attention will be paid to the testing of new remedies and machines. More than a score of these means of control are now awaiting tests.

The work against tobacco insects will be continued and expanded, and experiments in the control of the sugar-cane borer will be conducted on a larger scale. The study of the rice weevil will be carried on further, and the work on the Argentine ant and the cotton red spider will also be continued along the same lines as during the previous year.

With forest insects, the demonstration work in the Northwest will be expanded, and a strong effort will be made to secure the cooperation of the timber owners in the South in order to carry on effective work against the southern pine beetle.

With deciduous fruit insects, several of the investigations recently begun and already indicated will be continued. Codling-moth studies are planned for the Southwest in addition to the work in the Allegheny Mountain region. The plum-curculio investigations will be practically concluded in the season of 1911. A specific study of the insect enemies of nuts on the tree will be begun in the South and will be later extended to the Pacific coast. Work on the woolly apple aphis and the apple-tree borers will be given considerable attention, and if practicable it is planned to begin a specific study of the insects damaging nurseries and of the efficiency of hydrocyanic-acid gas fumigation as practiced by nurserymen on deciduous fruit-tree nursery stock. The grape Phylloxera investigations will be continued, and more demonstration work will be given to the pear thrips in California.

With cereal and forage insects, the same problems will continue under investigation, and especial attention will be paid to the alfalfa weevil, which continues to spread and for which no satisfactory remedy has yet been found.

With insects affecting vegetable crops, the work of the past fiscal year will be carried on upon practically the same lines.

With insects affecting citrus crops, the fiscal year 1912 should complete the white fly investigation, except in so far as further efforts will be necessary to introduce and establish the parasitic and predaceous enemies of the white fly discovered in central India. The work with different oily, soapy, or other sprays, carried on experimentally and also on orchard or demonstration scale, should be completed during the coming winter. Some special investigations of newly discovered citrus and subtropical pests in Florida will be undertaken, and the investigation of the orange thrips will be continued.

Under the head of "Insects in their direct relation to the health of man and domestic animals," the work on the spotted-fever tick of the Northwest will be concluded in the autumn. The United States Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service has taken up this work at the request of the State Board of Health of Montana and the services of the bureau will be no longer needed. Work on the southern cattle tick and other southern ticks will be continued, however, and such experimental work as can be done with the house fly and mosquitoes will be carried on.

There will be no great innovations in the work on insects injurious to stored products, and the inspection work will be continued as thoroughly as possible in the absence of a national law.

In bee culture, the increase in the appropriation makes it possible to take up certain lines of work which have been much needed. The

investigation of bee diseases will again receive the principal attention of the service and will be enlarged along much the same lines as heretofore, with the addition of further experiments in the treatment of both infectious diseases. Several practical problems, such as the production of comb honey and the wintering of bees, will be begun in the hope of devising better methods as well as to make known generally the best methods now employed. The study of the sense organs of bees will be begun, and a study of wax secretion will be conducted to learn the conditions under which wax is most rapidly secreted and the activities of the bees during comb building.

PLANS FOR WORK RECOMMENDED FOR THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1913.

It was my intention to recommend a considerable increase in the estimates for this bureau for the fiscal year 1913, but I am understand that it is your desire and the desire of the chairman of the Committee on Agriculture of the House of Representatives that no increases shall be submitted, and I therefore recommend that the estimates for this bureau be the same as those for the fiscal year 1912.

REPORT OF THE CHIEF OF THE BUREAU OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY.

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,

BUREAU OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY, Washington, D. C., October 17, 1911.

SIR: I have the honor to submit herewith a report on the work of the Biological Survey for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1911, with an outline of the work for 1912.

Respectfully,

Hon. JAMES WILSON,

Secretary of Agriculture.

HENRY W. HENSHAW,
Chief, Biological Survey.

WORK OF THE BIOLOGICAL SURVEY.

INCREASING THE NUMBER OF NATIVE BIRDS.

During the year circulars have been issued calling attention to the fact that certain of our native birds appear to be diminishing in numbers. This applies particularly to game birds, but it is true also of some of the more valuable insectivorous species and of shorebirds. Moreover, it is doubtful if, taking the country as a whole, any of our native species are increasing, except perhaps in restricted localities. This is the more deplorable, inasmuch as now, more than ever, there is pressing need of the services of insectivorous birds to hold in check the constantly increasing numbers of insects imported from abroad or that cross our borders from adjacent territory. As these destructive foreign insects are rarely accompanied by the enemies which check their increase in their native habitat, they soon multiply till they become veritable pests. Nature has provided in this country a sufficient number of species for the work of keeping insects in check, including the various swallows, flycatchers, thrushes, woodpeckers, sparrows, and others, and it remains for us by vigorous and concerted effort not only to protect the useful species, but to enable them to so increase that their warfare against the insect hosts shall be thoroughly effective. This can best be effected in four ways:

(1) By providing artificial nesting sites for the species that nest in hollow trees or in the cornices and cavities of buildings. To some slight extent this is already being done in this country, but to obtain appreciable results provision must be made on a much larger scale. It is well within the capabilities of the average farmer boy, when furnished with a few necessary tools, to make nesting boxes for some