This book was originally published as a Russian edition in mid-1968. It represented the first single-volume discussion of chemical pest control and of the 'detailed chemistry of all modern, pesticide chemicals since D. E. H. Frear's classical book on this same'subject, first published in 1942 (van No- strand) with the latest (third) edition in 1955. Since 1955 many new pesti- cide chemicals have achieved commercial status, and many of the older ones have been supplanted. There is no up-to-date equivalent of this present volume in the world literature, with the exception of the encyclopedic and largely biologically oriented two-volume work "Chemie der Pflanzenschutz- und Schadlingsbekampfungsmittel" (R. Wegler, ed.) published by Springer- Verlag in 1970. Professor Melnikov has updated the 1968 Russian edition, with emphasis on the primary Russian sources yet with excellent world- wide coverage of the latest chemicals to approach field stature in modern chemical pest control, for the present translation.
