Grasshoppers and Mormon cricket control-State and county expenditures, in cooperation with the Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine, crop years, 1945-461 1 Contributions listed above do not include the value of farmers' time for spreading bait to control grasshoppers or for building and maintaining chinch bug barriers. 2 Data not available. Mr. CANNON. I might ask you on what pests we lack cooperative control from the States. Mr. ROHWER. There are a number of pests for which there are no cooperative control programs, such as our common coddling moth, which is a farmer problem, and the only cooperation that we get from any of the public agencies there is cooperation in research activities. The same thing is true of the European corn borer, and the same is true of most of our important pests. For the boll weevil in the South there is no cooperative control program. The only things that are being done in relation to those pests are the development of information to acquaint the farmer on how. to better do the job, and much of that is carried on in cooperation with the States, as has been well illustrated in discussing the research programs that are a part of the Bureau's estimates. STATE SANITATION LAWS Mr. HORAN. Well, the State sanitation laws could be called a form of cooperation, could they not? Mr. ROHWER. I would not say so unless there was a similar effort being put out by the Federal Government. We have State sanitation laws that have a bearing on our work in the Lower Rio Grande Valley on the Mexican fruitfly, and they pull out the moribund and old groves down there, and that reduces our job in keeping that area clean from the Mexican fruitfly. INSPECTION STATIONS Mr. SHEPPARD. Do you not have cooperation in some of the States, at least, through the inspection stations that have a bearing on the over-all contamination program? Mr. ROHWER. Yes. Wherever we have Federal quarantines there is cooperation with the States in their State activities. We cooperate with some of the States in the enforcement of a few State quarantines against pests. Mr. SHEPPARD. Well, my question was directed more to this: I think what you have in mind, in accordance with your answer, is the fact that the States themselves have inspection stations scattered along the major arterial highways where they stop trucks, automobiles, and so forth. That is a State function in many instances, is it not? Mr. ROHWER. That is a State function which is designed to enforce the State quarantine as opposed to Federal quarantine. Mr. SHEPPARD. But it is a contributing factor, however, in the over-all control, is it not? Mr. ROHWER. Very definitely so, Mr. Congressman. Salaries and expenses, Entomology and Plant Quarantine, Agricultural Research Administration, insect investigations.. Salaries and expenses, Forest Service, national forest protection and management_ National Park Service, Department of the Interior... Total anticipated available, 1948. Budget estimate, 1949. Change, 1949 (to round off appropriation total) $10,000 100, 716 23, 975 134, 691 135, 000 +309 Mr. ANDERSEN. We will turn to subsection (c), on page 9 of the justifications, entitled, "Forest Pest Control Act." ALLOCATIONS TO INTERIOR Mr. Rohwer, it is noted that during the fiscal year 1948 some of these activities have been carried on on lands subject to the control of the Department of the Interior. Under the budget estimates for 1949 will the work be continued on the Department of the Interior lands, and under the control of an administration of which department will that work be carried on? Mr. ROHWER. The policy that will be used with reference to this subitem will be that which is set forth in the Forest Pest Control Act. The appropriations will be made to the Department of Agriculture, and they, in turn, will allocate them to the land-managing agency for doing the job of control on the land-managing agency's land. In other words, if there is a job of forest insect control on the Department of the Interior lands they get the allocation; and, certainly, from what we know now, the amount of money that they expended for that purpose, which was $23,975 in 1948, will come to them as an allotment from the Secretary on that basis for work in 1949. Similarly the same type of arrangement will be made for the Forest Service This fund is a pooled fund, through which funds will be allocated to the jobs that need to be done in proportion to their needs within the amount that is here provided but in accordance with their needs. DEFICIENCY REQUEST FOR CONTROL OF FOREST INSECTS I might at this time tell you that there is pending before the deficiency committee an estimate of $843,000 to help control forest insects on six major areas of national forests. One of them, in the Targhee National Forest area in Idaho and Wyoming, also involves land that is under the direction of the Department of the Interior. Another project, one in the Black Hills of South Dakota, involves some land that is under the direction of the Department of the Interior. These are outbreaks that are not unlike those that have happened before. It is believed to be highly important that we protect that timber. Those matters, of course, will be brought to the attention of the deficiency committee. Mr. ANDERSEN. It is noted in your green sheet break-down for 1948 that $100,716 was expended for this work from the appropriation for national forest protection and management. Will you please turn to page 35 of the justification notes, to the project statement beginning on that page and continuing through to the top of page 38, and indicate from which one of the 11 projects listed in that statement the item of $100,716 has been transferred. Mr. ROHWER. Mr. Loveridge. Mr. LOVERIDGE. That item, Mr. Chairman, was carried as a separate item last year. This year it has been deleted from our regular national forest protection and management items. It is now consolidated with this Forest Pest Control Act that Dr. Roywer has just explained. Mr. HORAN. For what did you ask the Department for gypsymoth control? Mr. ROHWER. The same amount, Mr. Horan, as in the budget. Mr. ANDERSEN. I think that is a satisfactory explanation, Mr. Loveridge. CONTROL WORK IN NATIONAL FORESTS My third question is: Please describe briefly the forest insect-control projects which have been carried on heretofore and which will be carried on if the budget request for this activity is granted. In what national forest areas have these activities occurred, what insects have been subject to the control measures, what species of forest trees have been subject to the injurious attacks of these insects, and, in general, what has been the measure of damages inflicted? Mr. ROHWER. That is a pretty good-sized order. That relates, Mr. Chairman, to, and goes back to, the appropriation that the Forest Service had which is transferred as a part of this item. It relates to the amount of money that was transferred from the Department of the Interior to this item and the $10,000 that was spent aside from the Bureau of Entomology. As a result of what we might refer to as inadequate detection surveys we find outbreaks of pests, mostly bark beetles; therefore they are attacking pine in many forest areas, and much timber is being destroyed. When we have found infestations, a control program is worked out on the basis of the best information available, and the program is carried out on the given insect that is involved. If it is a bark beetle that is attacking yellow pine, the best method of controlling it is to eliminate the infected trees in the winter or in the early spring while the broods of beetles are in there and burn them. If the insect is a defoliator like the tussock moth, we might apply insecticides, even from airplanes, as we have done. If it is the sawfly we might apply insecticides either by ground equipment or by airplane. It covers every part of the United States, but I think most of those expenditures in the Forest Service or in the Department of the Interior have been carried out in western areas or in the Great Lakes areas; and that comes back again, in part, to this item which we referred to before the deficiency committee. Those items are designed to protect forested areas in the national forests or on the Interior Service lands in which these forest pests are 71314-48-pt. 1- -59 causing destruction over a wide area, that were detected by a combination effort, and programs are being carried out against them. Mr. LOVERIDGE. I can answer a little more specifically and in more detail the chairman's question. You asked where these expenditures were made and what insects were attacking the forests. One hundred thousand dollars was allotted to the Forest Service In round figures, this is being used as follows: last year. California, $9,500 on bark-beetle control in ponderosa pine. Colorado, $7,100; bark beetle in ponderosa pine and in lodgepole pine. In Idaho, $7,500; bark-beetle infestation. Illinois, $7,500; sawfly infestation. Michigan, $8,500; sawfly and spittlebug infestation. Oregon, $5,000; bark beetle. The balance of these are all for barkbeetle control in ponderosa pine and lodgepole pine. Mr. HORAN. Are those mostly hammerhead beetles? Mr. LOVERIDGE. The larva is sometimes called a hammerhead; yes. Then, South Dakota, $32,000; Washington, $3,000; Utah, $2,000; and Wyoming, $2,000. This fund is used advantageously for the smaller infestations which we can catch immediately. If they get into larger areas, it is necessary for us to come before the committee, as we do for funds to cover the cost of controlling forest fires, and ask for a deficiency to catch them when they are on the run. AEROSOL TECHNIQUE OF APPLYING INSECTICIDES Mr. ANDERSEN. What Government bureau is entitled to the credit for the development of the aerosol technique of applying insecticides? Mr. ROHWER. That is quite a little way from forest insects, because we do not use it in the forest-insect program, but the Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine developed that method of the application of insecticides. It is covered by patents which were issued to employees of the Bureau and which were assigned to the Secretary of Agriculture, and all of these industrial aerosol bombs which involve the use of compressed gas are operated under license issued by the Department of Agriculture to the manufacturers. Those licenses are royalty-free, and nonexclusive, nontransferable and revocable. Mr. ANDERSEN. In other words, this really is a creature of your Bureau? Mr. ROHWER. Yes, sir. It was put into application during the war period and the discovery was made just at the beginning of the war. It was implemented through war means, by means of which many of the armed-forces people were kept rid of mosquitoes and flies both at home and abroad. PUBLIC SERVICE PATENTS Mr. SHEPPARD. I would like to ask my chairman, since the Congress is indicating a very definite effort to supplement our national income by every legitimate method that we can, if this would not possibly be a field of participation? |