The Bulletin, 17 



CULTIVATION. 



Before tlie corn conies up the weeder or smoothing harrow should be 

 run over the field to break the crust and destroy any germinating weeds 

 and grasses. The use of the weeder may be continued till the corn is 

 several inches high and thus save considerable of the expense of culti- 

 vation. 



When the corn is too large for the weeder, a light running cultivator 

 should take its place and the surface kept carefully mulched till the 

 crop is safely beyond the possible injury of the midsummer drought. 



Most farmers "lay corn by" too soon. In the piedmont section, in 

 particular, where the midsummer drought is especially severe, it is not 

 uncommon to see corn "laid by" at tasseling time, when a drought of 

 four to six weeks may set in ; and a crop that promised fifty bushels per 

 acre may be cut down to a yield of fifteen bushels. It must be borne 

 in mind that one of the primary objects of the cultivation of corn is the 

 conservation of moisture. It must also be remembered that at tasseling 

 time the corn plant is taking up and using more soil moisture and plant 

 food than at any other time in its history. iSTow is the time the crop 

 needs the farmer most, as the results of the work of the whole season 

 may depend on a few final harrowings at this critical period in the 

 growth of the plant. ISTow is the time to conserve moisture in order to 

 mature the crop that is already on the land. What folly, then, to "lay 

 by" our crops and abandon them to their fate just at the time they need 

 us most and when a few extra workings will add so enormously to our 

 final harvest ! Some one has advised to "cultivate the corn crop till the 

 silk is dead on the end of the shoot," and this is not bad advice. Culti- 

 vate shallow, frequent, and late, is a motto that every farmer can safely 



adopt. 



HARVESTING. 



There have been rapid strides in the improvement of methods of get- 

 ting the corn crop oif the land during the last ten years in the South. 

 Every farmer remembers the twenty-two different operations necessary 

 to get the corn crop off the land preparatory to sowing wheat in North 

 Carolina twenty years ago. 



First the tops were cut, tied into bundles, loaded on the wagon, hauled 

 to the barn, and stored away in the barn loft. Then the fodder was 

 pulled from the remainder of the stalk, tied into bundles, loaded on the 

 wagon, hauled to the barn, and stored away in the loft. The corn was 

 then pulled, thrown on the ground in piles, loaded on the wagon, hauled 

 to the barn, unloaded in a long heap, husked and thrown into the wagon, 

 hauled to the crib and there stored away. The cornstalks were then cut, 

 put into piles and burned, making even twenty-two handlings of the 

 corn crop after it was matured. 



But now, with the advent of the corn binder, a harvesting machine 

 that can be operated by one man and two good horses, the crop is cut 



