FOREST PESTS

Hokitika Guardian, 11 January 1929, Page 2

FOREST PESTS

METHODS OF CONTROL,

THE PROPOSED INSTITUTE

CHRISTCHURCH, Jan. 10

Further details of the proposal to set up an institute to prosecute research leading to the control of insect and fungus forost pests, was given to the 'conference of New Zealand nursery men last night by Mr C. N. Smith. Conservator of State Forests in Wellington and Nelson. He told them at the outset that tlx 1 whole tiling was in the air and that the Forestry Department would welcome suggestions and frank criticism on the proposal.

There was no doubt, be said, that forest insect and fungus pests would have to lie controlled and as yet very little was known about some of them. What they were eager to see was an institute working on the widest lines, not hound by red tape and working hand-iii-glove ivith the practical man, the timber grower, the timber merchant. plantation boards, and other interested bodies. People might think there was no need for a research station on such, a comprehensive scale, but he could assure them that the depredations caused by insects and fungi were very real and must he combated if forestry in this country was to he a success.

Mr Smith proceeded to show how these two enemies were already destroying much in our forests. For example, the seed of the oregon pine in New Zealand was useless, for propogation, as it was eaten out by a small fly. This bad been imported from America via Europe. This fly bad entered the, seed of other trees and is the post the Forestry Department had to combat. It also went to pondemsa and big quantities of the seed of these two trees were being lost each season. Resides the various grass-grubs there was the wircworni.. very common, but entymologists as yet knew nothing about it.

In grown trees pests were also common. Chhustehurch bad its oak scale but the parasites were fighting it well and oak aphis was another, though it affected rtrees only from an ornamental viewpoint, not commercially. One of the main problems was in conifers. Mr Smith said it was proposed that Dr Miller of the Cawtliron Institute, should father the institute if and when established, and it was hoped that there would be five entymologists working under him. He hoped nurserymen Would take an active interest in the proposal as they, perhaps, more than any other section of the people, must, fully realise what enemies insect and fungi pests were to forest trees.