SECRETARY'S REPORT. 13 



lost either for the ground to thaw, or to become sufficiently dry and 

 warm to be worked to advantage. The crops are put in with no 

 delay, and once in, they proceed with rapid strides to maturity. 



On a farm of Mr. Gary's, at Houlton, I was shown thirty acres 

 of wheat, ten of which were sown April 17th to 20th. This, in the 

 latter part of July, was fully in milk, and past liability to injury 

 from the wheat midge or fly.* The rest was sown considerably 

 later and the grain not yet fully formed. Upon this, I was sorry 

 to see that the midge threatened to levy a serious contribution.! In 

 the neighborhood of Presque Isle, I was informed that oats, sown as 

 late as June 10th, usually ripened without injury from frost. With 

 regard to the usual period at which frosts occur, it was not ascer- 

 tained to differ materially, of late years, from other sections. In low 

 grounds frost is often noticeable at an early date, but on the higher 

 lands usually tilled, one sufficient seriously to check vegetation is 

 not expected before " the full of the moon in September," and this 

 period safely passed, not until some weeks, possibly a month later. 

 From the best information I could gather, frosts have not been so 

 early or destructive for the ten years past, as before that time, and 

 when the clearings were generally smaller and afforded little oppor- 

 tunity for circulation of air. The last week in August, 1842, there 

 occurred a frost which did considerable injury, especially to the 

 crops of such of the settlers as had been engaged in spring, in driv- 

 ing timber, and so had deferred their seed time to a period too late 

 for safety. June 4th, 1844, ice made as thick as window glass. 

 In 1845, the last spring frost occurred on the 31st of May. The 

 injury which ensued from the early and late frosts from 1842 to 

 1846, was. in many cases, of a serious character, and had a very 

 discouraging effect upon immigration. I did not learn of serious 

 injury since that period in any case where crops were put in at the 

 proper season. In some years frost has first occurred in Aroostook 

 several weeks after it appeared in Penobscot county, and I learn 

 that the present year no frost had occurred up to September 26th. 



The term, during which cattle required to be fed from winter 



* Vary generally in this State, but erroneously called " weevil;" a name which 

 properly belongs to another and very distinct insect, which attacks the matured 

 grain after being stored. 



1 1 have been gratified to learn since, that the actual injury proved to be trifling. 



