PROCEEDINGS STATE AGRICULTURAL CONVENTION 161 



President Cameron : You will find the treasurer's report, gentle- 

 men, printed in this report, so it will not be necessary for the 

 treasurer to make his report. 



President Cameron : We have with us this morning, Mr. Chas. D. 

 Reed, Director of the Iowa Weather and Crops Service Bureau. I 

 take pleasure in introducing Mr. Reed to the convention at this time 

 who will give us a review of the work carried on by this Bureau. 



Mr. Reed: The winter preceding the crop season of 1922 was warmer 

 and slightly more moist than normal with snowfall of only 9.5 -inches 

 for the three winter months, which is the least of record and 2.5 inches 

 less than the winter of 1906-1907, which has heretofore held the record. 

 The storm of January 4th-5th left a coating of ice over the southern and 

 part of the central counties that remained for several days. Another ice 

 or "glaze" storm February 21st-23rd damaged fruit and shade trees. It 

 was feared that these two storms would kill considerable winter wheat 

 and tame grass but for some reason only two per cent of the winter 

 wheat was killed, which is far less than the average. 



Considerable precipitation in February and toward the last of March 

 made the soil too wet to work until well into April. Scarcely a begin- 

 ning had been made in spring seeding during the first 10 days of April, 

 but drying weather the rest of the month permitted rapid progress in 

 seeding and toward the close of the month there was some complaint in 

 the drier western counties that soil moisture was not sufficient to germi- 

 nate oats. Not much spring wheat was sown. 



The rather unusual warmth and moisture advanced vegetation rapidly 

 but did not swell the fruit buds to the danger point, and no frost dam- 

 age to fruit occurred. 



Live stock in general wintered well. Sows bred for spring pigs in- 

 creased 29 per cent over the preceding spring, but the superabundance 

 of cheap corn and the scarcity of ready cash to buy supplemental feeds, 

 caused the sows to be fed an unsuitable ration. Cholera, "flu" and 

 other diseases weakened the sows so that the size, vitality and uniformity 

 of litter were considerably reduced, and the unfavorable weather of 

 April caused considerable loss of pigs. Though May did not warm up 

 as rapidly as usual, it was dry and sunshiny and with the coming of 

 tender shoots of grass, the condition of sows and pigs improved rapidly. 



Preparations for corn planting proceeded without interference, except 

 in a few central and eastern counties where heavy local rains occurred 

 May 23rd-26th. Sixty per cent of the acreage was planted by May 15th, 

 and 96 per cent by June 1st. 



Drouth continued in June, the average rainfall for the month, 1.82 

 inches, being as little as June, 1911, when one of the more notable 

 drouths of the state set in. Temperatures were very high, the warmest 

 day of the year in the northwest portion of the state being June 23rd, 

 when temperatures of 100° or higher occurred. Inwood reported 104°. 

 Corn was not materially injured though the leaves curled some on hot 

 afternoons. By the close of the month the earliest corn was more than 

 waist high and about half of the crop was laid by. Oats headed very 

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