Keeping' Out Bad Immigrants of Plant World
Federal Horticultural
Board Exercises Strict
Quarantine Over Insect
Pests in Plants, Diseased
Potatoes, Trees and
Shrubs —Danger in Cot
ton — Nursery Stock
Flowers Personnel of
the Board.
Special Correspondence
WASHINGTON, D. C
ALTHOUGH It may seem ridicu
lous to spend thousands of dol
lars annually to prevent one
little moth egg that could pass
through the eye of a camhrfc needle
from entering the country, the machin
ery of the Departments of Agriculture,
State, Treasury and Post Office are co
operating to keep out that little pest,
the pink cotton boll-worm.
The same agencies are united to ex
clude by quarantine diseased potatoes,
trees, shrubs and plants, and In so do
ing are accomplishing far more than
one would think toward holding down
the cost of Jiving.
♦
*. *
The "general staff" which conducts
the defense against plant disease Is
known as the federal horticultural
board and la composed of five high offi
cials of appropriate bureaus of th De
partment of Agriculture.
All alohg the fertile valley of the
Nile, where the luxuriant Egyptian cot
ton grows, planters are more worried
over the ruinous work of the pink boll
worm In their cotton fields than they
are over the greater devastation of the
European war.
In the consternation caused by the
loss of a fifth of their crop they have
thrown up the barriers and are exclud
ing all foreign cotton—an unnecessary
measure against the pest, with its life
cycle of destruction so firmly in posses
sion of their fields; but directed against
any further Insect Invaders.
The pink boll-worm was taken to
Egypt from India, where its wretched
family billions are still leaving their
baleful impress.
The tiny egg is deposited by the
mother moth uuon the growing plant
leaf, which becomes the food of the
larvae, emerging in ten clays from the
egg. Thene it eats its way Into the
heart of the cotton boll, where In this
destructive stage it spends about twen
ty days, until full grown, when It is
nearly half an inch long.
Jt has been feeding upon the cotton
seeds, and when about to transform
Into the pupa and become a moth again
It occupies the hull, from which it has
devoured the kernel. The worm's pink
ish color and its place of living have
given Jt the name "pink boll-worm."
*
* *
In about two weeks more the moth
emerges, a fragile Insect ahout three
quarters of an Inch In expanse, now a
grayish brown color with darker
splotches. In three or four days it
deposits Its eggs and lives ten days or
more; doing harm all its life and leav
ing behind it a multiplied evil suc
cession.
While the annual yield of American
Sea Island cotton, the best in the World,
is by no means enough to make all the
spool cotton, automobile tires and other
textiles requiring a grade better than
that of ordinary upland cotton, it" is
somewhat surprising to learn that 300,.
000 hales of Egyptian cotton contam
inated by the pink boll-worm are im
ported with impunity to the United
States.
This was made possible bv a sys
tem of fumigation originated by the
board and worked out on a commercial
scale by Its experts, by which every
bale is disinfected before distribution.
The cotton—a couple of hundred
bales at a time—is placed In a great
horisontai cylinder of heavy structural
steel, hermetically sealed and then the
air is pumped out until there is almost
a vacuum within. Hydrocyanic acid
gas is then admitted, and although the
bales are compressed before shipment
until they are almost as hard as blocks
United States Must Preserve Nitrates or Be at an 'Enemy's Mercy
Nitrates Necessary in
Making of Smokeless
Powder and High Ex
plosives ln Case of
War United States Might
Be Denied Shipments
From Chile—The Rem
edy a Plant to Fix the
Nitrogen of the Atmos
phere Congressional
Appropriation of Twenty
Millions for a Fixation
Plant—A Talk With a
National Authority on
Production of Nitrates.
Sped*) Correspondence
WASHINGTON. D. C.,
SHOULD war come to the United
States, and the powder and ex
plosives now on hand—and they
will not last long against a pow
erful enemy—are exhausted, the army,
if there be any, would have to fall
back upon the black powder of the
civil war.
The country would be utterly at tha
mercy of the invader, because there
would be no nitrates with which to
make smokeless powder and high ex
plosives. The first care of an enemy
strong enough to make a landing would
be to stop the shipping of nitrates
(saltpeter) from Chile>
*
* *
The military experts and'the scientific
bodies organized for preparedness have
seen this danger, and the last Congress,
in alarm, appropriated $1i0,000,000 to
erect, if the President so decides, a
plant to fix the nitrogen of the atmos
phere, that from the very element
which sustains life may be taken the
substance which is death's instrument
In Europe.
More power for a fixation plant which
ii ==n
INSPECTING SUSPECTED PLANTS FOR PESTS Olt SIGNS OP DISEASE.
of wood. It penetrates the cotton so
that all animal life, Including boll
worms In every stage, becomes extinct
In less than an hour and the cotton can
be sent without possibility of spreading
infection to any mill for manufacture.
* *
There are only four of these fumi
gating tanks In the country, one at
eaoh of the four porta of entry for cot
ton—New York, Newark. N. J.; Boston
and San Francisco. They are under
private ownership and are run as a
business proposition, a charge being
made for each bale of cotton sterilized.
The plant at Newark was built for its
owner's accommodation by one of the
great manufacturers located there, as
he uses vast quantities of the Egyptian
product in making spool cotton.
Although privately operated, these
tanks are under the closest of gov
ernment inspection. The bales must
be left In the receiving chambers a
certain time; the poisonous gas must
be of a positive strength; the appli
ances and chemicals tested and every
precaution must be taken to evacuate
the gas without rißk of life to the men
operating the plant.
One shipment of the Infested cotton
seed—and it is believed to be the only
one—is known to have entered this
country, and that was before the quar
antine was established. This lot was
taken to Arizona, where a state quar
antine was In force; the infestation
was detected and the whole lot burned.
It is believed that the pink pest has
not succeeded In running the blockade.
Since July, 1913, the board has quar
antined (ill cotton seed from foreign
countries, and has Intercepted several
lpts, all found to be infested with the
pink boll-worm.
One of the most pressing matters now
under the board's attention is the over
sight of potatoes coming into the coun
try to make up the 60,000,000-bushel
shortage in the American crop.
Naturally, our Canadian neighbor
wishes to shre In the high prices, and
his crop is wanted here; but the board
says; "No diseased stock may be
entered." m
Accordingly, this working plan has
been agreed upon between the two
countries; Canada may send potatoes
free from injurious disease find insect
pests to ports of entry designated by
this country. On arrival the tubers
are examined by federal inspectors, and
if found to be Infected are returned
will turn out In the form of ammonia
enough nitrate for use In war is re
quired than that furnished by the con
solidated waters of the great lakes
tumbling over Niagara. The cost of
operating such a plant is enormous;
nevertheless it must be met, unless
some better way of securing the Indls
pensable nitrates can be found.
At the instance of the War Depart
ment, Director Van H. Manning of the
bureau of mines has considered It well
worth while to dispatch the bureau's
f a . < , >• imam
' " 7 - .T '
lajHTj
i., .J
DR. J. W. TURRENTINE,
Chemical engineer, Deportment of
Agriculture.
(Phots by Hrri it Jswlng,)
chHf ohemist, Charles L. Parsons, to
Eufope lo Investigate how the warring
nations secure nitrates for their ex
plosives.
In spite of the quantities of ex
gloslves used on the thousand miles of
attle-front, less saltpeter from Chile
is passing through the Panama canal
to the alles than did during the first
year of the war, and the scientists have
found out the reason.
Dr. Parsons is now In London, and
he expects to visit France. Italy, Nor
way and Sweden. He is not going to
see what the allies are doing, but how
THE FEDERAL HORTICULTURAL BOARD. LEFT TO RIGHTS-CHARLES L. MARLATT, CHAIRMAN) WALTER
HUNTER, GEORGE B. SUDWORTH, WILLIAM A. ORTON, REUBEN C. ALTHOUSE. SECRETARY. KARL
KELLERMAN, ALSO A MEMBER, NOT PRESENT WHEN PHOTOGRAPH WAS TAKEN.
to the consignors at their expense. Po
tatoes are coming' Into the country In
such quantities that, although in the
main they are all right, carloads are
sent hack almost every day.
A disease known as potato wart or
canker having broken out in Great
Britain, Germany and Austro-Hungary,
the department issued its proclama
tion forbidding absolutely the Impor
tation of potatoes from other coun
tries.
Another thing which the board is
they are doing It. for he knows that
they get most of their nitrates by
using nests of by-Product ovens. which
save thousands of tons of nitrates
otherwise wasted in making many mil
lion tons of coke from soft coal.
The Germans, however, cut off from
foreign nitrates, have augmented their
supply by erecting a fixation plant
said to turn out ammonia at the rate
of 140,000 tons a year.
*
* *
It is generally supposed that Ger
many, before the war, obtained most
of the ammonia used for explosives
from Chile, and .that nearly all the
nitrates which came as a by-product
from coal were used to make fertilizer.
Owing to the relatively small farming
area of that country, high cultivation
is necessary to make the ground yield
crops that will feed the population
while the blockade continues.
But all the nitrates had to be used to
manufacture cannon food, and there
was none left for the cropa of 1915;
that is why they fell off. The fixation
plant filled the deficit; that is why the
cropa of HUB have been plentiful.
To obtain an accurate statement of
the nitrate situation recourse has been
had to one of the experts of the De
partment of Agriculture, Dr. J. W.
Turrentine, one of the national au
thorities gu the production of nitrates,
although he is more Interested In see
ing it used for agricuulture than for
war.
His training and his study of methods
and apparatus have made a chemical
engineer, rather than a laboratory
chemist, out of him. He has studied
all known sources of nitrates, and has
told how to obtain from domestic
sources an ample supply for all pur.
poses; namely, by the oxidation of
ammonia produced as a by-produat In
the process of caking bituminous coal.
"If one starts a fire of soft coal in
an open grate," said he, "at first col
ored gases are given out; the coal
turns a dull black and settles Into a
mass. That mass Is coke—soft coal
without the gases and volatile mat
ter.
"The gaaes. which here are the im
portant thing, contain ammonia, ben.
.sol, toluol, coal tar and other valu
able things, which may be recovered
as by-products from the coking proc
ess.
"Coking soft coal frees it from these
gases, gives it many of the desirable
qualities of anthracite and is a prere
quisite for Its use In the blast furnace
in the reduction of iron ore. The mistake
must not be made, however, of sup
posing that coke la only valuable for
making Iron and steel, for as a matter
_of fact the potential energy of soft ooai
flghtingr Is the importation of any
nursery stock which carries the white
pine blister rust, a tree disease ile.
structlve of both ornamental anil for
est pines.
This blight may be carried by all flve
leaved pines from Europe, Asia, Canada
and Newfoundland and all gooseberries
and currants from Canada. Their im<
portation is absolutely prohibited.
Cotton seed, except from some parts
of Mexico; the seed of aWtßator pears
; from Mexico and Central America, Hv-
WEST op Br-puoni;cT COKING OVENS. BY THEIR USE THE GAS FRO;
THE COAL, MAY BE CONVERTED INTO NITRATES.
Is increased by approximately 20. par
cent by utilising the gas and the coke
Separately.
' In this country during the past year
about 76,000,000 tons of soft ooal were
converted Into 56,000,000 tons of coke
at a loss of the greater part of the
difference between these quantities.
"One of the crasiest processes of na
tional waste has been that of letting
the gases In coke-making 'go up in
smoke' from the old-fashioned beehive
oven; for thereby during the past
twenty years by-products of the value
of hundreds of million* of dollar* have
been wasted.
"The primitive method of
coke was to dump into an oven, from
its shape vailed a 'beehive,' a oharge of
three tons or so of coal and burn It
with restricted air until the gases were
f ■ C , ~ ■ - rr , 11 ■ ■
i ( —~ij j- ... J • ! : i|
Jj •. jj I j'
MINIATURE VACUUM PISINFBCTISO TANK IN THE EXPERIMENTAL LABORATORY! COMMERCIAL TANKS AR]
BUILT AFTER THIS MODEL.
Ing eanes of sugar, all citrous nursery
stock (oranges, lemons, etc.), all In
dian corn or malse from oriental coun
tries and some less important plant
products may not be Imported at all,
because each is likely to carry some
disease which thus far has not broken
out in our native plants. This rule
is just as reasonable as it is to pre
vent the landing of passengers from
some port known to be full of such in
fectious disease as the bubonic plague.
These plant quarantines cover the
driven out of the oven top and wholly
lOft. The first step taken toward
economy was to conduct enough of this
escaping gas In the adjacent beehive
to warm up its charge of coal.
"Although Germay, England and
France have been using them a long
time, it was not until a few years ago
that American engineers Introduced
here by-product ovens by which all the
gas given off in the coking operation
is conveyed to tanks or holders, such
as m*,y be seen at any municipal gas
plants and thence utilised.
"The by-products from these gases
consist of coal tar, from which the
Clermans make the valuable aniline
dyes and which is largely used for
road building.
"From this gas American manufac
turers also get a supply of illuminat-
stock found tn certain localities or
certain diseased plants, but the over
sight of the board is extended to regu
late the entry of all woody.and certain
other plants and seeds imported.
*
* *
Nearly all European and some other
foreign countries maintain a rigid in
spection service of their nursery stock,
and importations from those places
are allowed on permits issued to the
importer by the department of agricul
ture. This involves a certificate by the
foreign impaction service that the
plants are free from disease and insect
pest*, whereupon they are admitted
through the customhouses, and may
be sent to any state in the Union.
The plants, however, are not free for
delivery, for nearly every state main
tains an inspection service which calls
for the examination of all imported
seeds and plants. The results of the
Inspection are reported by the state
examiners to the board, together with
the action, which In case of serious
pest or disease is the destruction of
the plants.
This state Inspection la generally
very thorough, and may be enforced by
the board, if not kept up to the stand
ard, by establishing a quarantine
against the products of that state.
No Importations of seeds or plants are
permitted from countries which do not
maintain (tn inspection service, except
in very small quantities for experi
mental purposes, and then the board
will grant a special permit upon which,
after satisfactory federal inspection,
they may be entered.
*
* *
Formerly many seeds and plants,
samples of cotton and the like, were
sent in through the mails—a very con
venient way for all concerned. The
board, however, has, with regret, abol.
ißhed it, because it is impossible to in
spect the packages in the mail; and no
matter how careful the senders were,
the contents were liable to carry infec
tions. If the senders were careless, the
danger was very great. Egyptian cot
ton seeds sent through the mails were
found to be contaminated as high as 20
per cent with the pink boll-worm.
Even for a total abstainer, a physi
clnn may order an exception for the
patient's good, and there is one excep
tion to this mailing order. Seeds and
plants may be sent to the Department
of Agriculture; Jor in that case they
are examined by experts, and if dis
eased are at once cremated.
The board maintains on the grounds
ing and fuel gas sufficient to supply
large communities, and they are actual
ly doing that very thing In several
parts of the country. They extract
benzol (56,000,000 gallons in 1916), a
substitute for gasoline, only more pow
erful. anu tuluol, which, in connection
with nitric acid, is used to form the
much-dreaded trinitrotoluol, the ex
plosive charge used in projectiles.
"But the by-product of the most In
terest to us Is ammonia, which when
oxidized under the proper conditions
gives the indispensabio nitric acid for
explosives, and, after treatment with
shlphurlq acid, produces the sulphate
ammonia of the fertilizer. Thus from
the coke oven we get nitric acid and
bensol, the two essentials of the most
diabolical explosives known.
"While statistics are uninteresting,
they are the shortest way and. there
fore, the best of telling some facts,
so I am using these figures to show
the growth of the coking Industry and
the relative growth of the by-product
recovery of ammonia; also the uses of
ammonia for commercial purposes.
"Irj 1900 the annual ammonia produc
tion of the United States by the coking
process, expressed In tons of sulphate
of ammonia, was 13,800 tons (3,400
tons of nitrogen); in 1915 it was
220,000, and the estimates for 1916 and
1917, based upon by-product ovens
erected and ordered are, respectively,
234,000 and 376,000 tons. But this repre
sents the ammonia produ.-t of less than
one-third of the soft coal coked annually
for the manufacture of iron. Apply
ing this, as in an emergency, the gov
ernment could do, to all coal coked
would result In more than 1,000,000
tons a year.
"The coal which Is coked, however,
represents but a small portion of the
soft coal used annually; and If there
is such a demand for ammonia as to
create a market, 'good business' will
Insist upon the coking of as much of
this coal as may be required, for the
coke has nearly all the fuel capacity
which the coal had and is freed froip
the gas which makes Its use unde
sirable In many places on account of
dirt and amoke under combustion and
eases which make It unsuitable for
household and other uses.
"In war emergency the government
coul<J take over this entire production;
it would prohibit the use of ra.v soft
coal, or take other measures to compel
the coking of all soft coal before flnr>l
consumption In taking this course it
of the department, near the east wing,
a small laboratory, where diseased
plants of all kinds' are taken. It con
tains a miniature disinfecting tank,
and is a most valuable adjunct.
The act creating the board provided
that it should consist of Ave members,
to be designated by the Secretary of
Agriculture, and that they should serve
without additional pay.
The Secretary appointed aB Its chair
man, Mr. Charles L. Marlatt of the bu
reau of ethnology; William A. Orton,
vice chairman, of the bureau of plant
industry; George B. Sudwbrth of the
forest service, Walter D. Hunter of
ethnology and Karl F. Kellerman, also
of plgnt industry, the other three mem
bers. Mr. Reuben C. Aithouse was
named as secretary of the board, and
upon his shoulders and his assistants
fall the details of the office and the
execution of the directions of the
board.
*
* *
The effectiveness of the various quar
antines, the satisfactory disinfecting of
cotton, the agreements with foreign
countries on especial subjects, tlje clos
ing of the foreign markets against
plants, seeds and samples have not been
attained without mature thought and
action by the board; nor without co
operation on the part of the federal de
partments—the Treasury, through its
customhouses; the Post Office; the In
terior, through the bureau of stand
ards, and the State, through its cort
sular offices; nor has the plant inspec
tion service of the states been lacking.
At tirst the restrictions were very em
barrassing to the importers, but the
board has recognized their troubles,
and they, in turn, appreciating the rea
sonableness of the demands, have ac
cepted the situation, and with few ex
ceptions are very willing to render all
possible assistance in excluding any
thing which will injure the country's
interest.
That this is not a small thing these
figures from nursery stock importations
tell: For the year ended June SO, 1914
(before the war), there were imported
7,800,000 fruit trees (6,690,000 from
France), 14,630,000 fruit tree stocks,
nearly 2,000,000 rosebushes, 1,600,000 or
namental trees, 842,000 coniferous
trees, besides .many other plant trees
not mentioned here.
One diseased lot means an Injury to
an entire community, one pest, like the
pink boll-worm, may deestroy a staple
crop, and the thin line of defense
against these possible invader. Is that
created by the committee with the un
wieldly name, "federal horticultural
board."
would be procuring quantities of benzol
Rnd toluol. In so doing; It would only
be enforcing a scheme for economy in
the ue of the great but not Inex
haustible natural product—coal.
"At present it takes about 100,000
tons of nitrogen, equivalent to 400,000
of ammonia sulphate, to supply the
fertilizer trade, about 4n,000 tons of
which are derived from the coking of
coal, and the rest (60,000) from animal
tankages, bone carbonization and the
cottonseed meal industry,
"Practically all the nitrates used In
the United States in high explosives
for purpose of peace and for war are
imported from Chile; and until the
price of domestic ammonia Is reduced
by a more abundant supply their im
portation may be expected. But in
event of war of such character that
Chilean shlprpents bo stopped, there
are ample quantities of nitrogen avail
able from soft coal, lignites', and even
peat, to make all the explosives that
could possibly he neaded.
"If there should not, particularly at
the outsat, be enough nitrates for mu
nitions and for fertilizer too, It must
be borne In mind that little fertilizer ia
used by the American farmer in raising
the staple articles—wheat, oorn, rye,
oats, -hay and cotton.
"The gas that' may be made from
coking coal In the by-product oven is
a large and cheap source of power
when used with gas engines. It can b*
generated wherever wanted and ap
plied U> Industrial use. In emergency
this power can be converted into cica
trical power for the fixation of nitro
gen from the atmosphere, as the Ger
mans, in their peculiar situation, have
found necessary, or for running muni
tion factories.
"I have not attempted in this Infor
mal talk to detail the various processes
or to discuss elaborately the coats and
quantities of coal, coke, ammonium,
■teal, rate of ammunition consumption,
or the many other Items which are in
volved in supplying the country with
nitrates in times of peace and of war.
"But I have studied the subject suf
ficiently to satisfy myself, and X be
lieve I have Riven facts enough to
show that the coal-coking by-producta
oven will produce all the nitrates
which may be needed In time of peace
fot agricultural purposes, and that if
war should befall and foreign supplies
become available, they could be made
in such emergency to increase their
output amply to supply munition fao
toriex to any dosired extent, even
through a war protracted many years."