History: Gypsy Moths in Medford
House of Trouvelot, where the pest started.
Author: Lindsay Naber | Photos and information credited to local Medford Historian, Dee Morris.
The Gypsy Moth is a destructive and invasive species with a record of decimating hardwood trees in Medford. French professor Leopold Trouvelot brought this species to Medford in 1869, allegedly because he wanted to breed the North American moth with the Gypsy moth to create a hybrid for use in silk production. Trouvelot ignored warnings about the dangers of bringing the moth to America and did so anyway.
Willow Tree on Fellsway West, showing female moths laying their eggs.
While experimenting in Medford, Trouvelot lost some Gypsy caterpillars, which escaped into the woods. He informed city officials, but they ignored the concern at the time because the escaped caterpillars seemed harmless. This mistake resulted in a great monetary loss for the city, as twenty years later in 1989 Medford saw a huge Gypsy moth outbreak. The moths decimated the tree population and were a nuisance to the people.
The moths spread quickly and citizens were so worried about the situation that they suggested burning down the Middlesex Fells Reservation as a precautionary measure.
Individuals tried to control the moth populations by spraying Arsenic, removing eggs from infested trees by hand, and banding burlap around trees to stop caterpillars from progressing up the trunk. Despite their efforts, by 1922 every town and city in Massachusetts was infested with Gypsy Moths.
Men would tediously hand-pick the moths and eggs from infested trees.
Burlap banding around trees prevented the caterpillars from migrating to the tops of the trees.
Elizur Wright was a 19th century conservationist, mathematician, abolitionist, Medford resident, and one of the first champions of the Middlesex Fells Reservation. Throughout the 19th century, he witnessed the impact that increasing city density was having on the public land and water resources. During the Great Depression, many New Deal public works programs operated in Medford centered around logging efforts. The city faced contention between conservationists and logging workers who relied on cutting down trees to make their living. Luckily, the Fells survived the public works projects during this time, but was not guaranteed the same protection in the future.
Elizur Wright noticed this vulnerability, vitality and beauty of the Fells and became the visionary for a federally protected Reservation. Wright described the importance of the fells when he said,
““Keeping up a fit proportion of forests to arable land is the prime condition of human health. If trees go, men must decay. The nation that neglects its forests is surely destined to ruin.” ”
In his many attempts to protect the land, he purchased sections of the Fells and offered his land to the state, but the Massachusetts legislature did not pass any laws of protection. Wright passed away in 1985, shortly before the Middlesex fells reservation became recognized and protected by the government, but his legacy and the momentum he built to see the Fells become a reality are not forgotten.
Today, Gypsy Moths represent one of the largest threats to trees and forests in Massachusetts. In the 1950’s the state funded insecticide and DDT spraying, but it now relies on biological threats to kill the moths. In 1989, it was discovered that the Entomophaga maimaiga fungus kills the moths. This fungus is now employed to deal with particularly destructive Gypsy moth populations.
December, 1933: Newspaper article describes the tension between tree activists and those employed by logging efforts.
About the Author: Lindsay Naber is a Tufts University Student majoring in Environmental Engineering, and an intern at the Mystic River Watershed Association.