An Entomologist's Dire Warning for Seattle Orchards
A local resident documents a massive infestation of scale and aphid pests, calling for a city-wide inspection to save Seattle’s fruit trees.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
I have of late inspected Seattle from center to circumference. I have now before me 100 twigs taken from 100 yards of this city, commencing at a point close to Grace M. E. church, near Lake Washington, thence to Jackson street, branching off on Bush, Sutter, Taylor and Wilford streets; returning to Jackson street and following it to Ninth; thence on Ninth to James; thence on James to Sixth, Fifth and Fourth, missing no yard in my line of investigation having any fruit, shade or ornamental trees. On examination what do I find? Here on the apple twig I find fifty scales, known to me as the 'cottony cushion scale.' I have just found them in incalculable numbers on apple, pear, plum and cherry trees and currant bushes, also on thorn, elm, poplar, willow and mountain ash trees. Now, holding another twig under my glass, what do I find? A living, crawling mass of little insects of a dark, russet brown color, covered with a down of cottony appearance. It is the woolly aphis. This insect confines its work of destruction to the apple tree. I have found them in countless millions on the wild crab tree of the forest. I am satisfied that we have in this city 1,000 for one that we had three years ago. I presume that many statements that I have herein made will be questioned as to their being the whole truth and nothing but the truth, I would suggest that Gov. McGraw select a committee, composed of himself as chairman, Prof. Johnson, entomologist of the state university, and all city editors. Then let that committee take a walk with me through a few of the yards of this city.
“My wife has just looked at them and she says that they are perfectly disgusting. So this is where we differ.”
Long before Seattle became an urban concrete landscape, it was a city of backyard orchards. William Brows' 1894 panic over scale insects captures a lost horticultural era, serving as a reminder that the health of the city's urban canopy has been a source of civic anxiety for over a century.
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