432 



GLKANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July 1 



ly conference. lUit I finally decided that I 

 liad better take in the last day, even if 1 

 did not do anv better. 1 have told you 

 about it elsewhere. Well, after I got out of 

 sight the team that was marking out the 

 ground was needed for drawing basswood 

 lumber from the hill to keep our machinery 

 going, because we were running nights just 

 then. Our farmwork is understood to be 

 secondary to the factory business, especially 

 when we "are running night and day. Well, 

 my good friend Leonard did not succeed in 

 getting the use of his team to mark out the 

 ground* until along in the afternoon; and 

 then he urged having two good men follow 

 right after him and i)lant corn at once. But 

 our teamster has so many calls in different 

 directions, especially in the rushing season, 

 that he can not always have his own way. 

 The foreman of the lumber-yard said there 

 woukl be demurrage on some of the cars of 

 lumber unless they were unloaded at once. 

 Then somebody suggested that if T were at 

 home I certainly would not object to letting 

 the corn go until morning. 



Let me say here, that, before I went away, 

 I noticed the barometer indicated rain, and 

 so I left orders to rush the corn-planting. 

 Leonard finally succeeded in getting two 

 men to plant about an acre before the whis- 

 tle blew for quitting. 



We went over to the conference, about 

 thirty miles away, with our automobiles; 

 and "in order to take in the closing address 

 of the evening the boys proposed to stay all 

 night and go home early in the morning. 

 But remembering what the barometer said, 

 I urged pretty vehemently that we would 

 better make the trip home by moonlight, 

 even if it did make us a little late. Before 

 morning our people were very glad the two 

 automobiles, pretty well loaded, did make 

 the trip in the night, for it was raining be- 

 fore daylight, and it kept raining, off and 

 on, for almost two treeks. In fact, it kept 

 the ground so wet that the first acre was up 

 and growing beautifully before we couhl 

 possibly plant the rest of the field; and 

 when we did plant the rest of it, it rained 

 again; and it was cold, as you may remem- 

 ber, almost up to the middle of .lune. At 

 least one-fourth of the second planting rot- 

 ted, and in low wet places every hill would 

 be missing for quite a piece. But that first 

 acre we planted l)efnre the rain had got ago- 

 ing, and it grew finely in spite of the cold 

 and rain. Something else also grew iinely. 

 It was the weeds all through that second 

 planting; antl when the folks proposed 

 planting a third time right in among the 

 weeds that were already an inch high or 

 more, I protested. It would ha\e been less 

 work to cultivate the second planting all up 

 and lit the ground all over again, and it 

 might have "been the wisest thing to do; 

 but as three-fourths of the field was up and 

 growing fairly well I decided to send two 

 men with nice sharp hoes to give that part 

 of the field a good hoeing. Wherever there 

 was only one stalk left in a liill we planted 

 some more corn by hand, \\here a hill 



was missing entirely we cul up the weeds 

 thoroughly and t/i< ii ])lanted with a hoe. 

 With a boy to drop, two men with a hoe 

 made fairly good si)eed. There was one ad- 

 vantage in planting with hoes. We could 

 have the four or five grains of corn spread 

 about more, and our exi)eriment stations 

 have decided that it is quite an advantage 

 to have the four stalks four or five inches 

 apart instead of having them all in a bunch 

 as the hand i)lanter often i)uts them. As it 

 is, the prospect is now, .lune 21, that we 

 shall have a very fair stand of corn; but it 

 came by three different plantings during a 

 period of two or three weeks. 



Now, the moral to my story is that the 

 successful farmer )nusf be up and wide- 

 awake, and on the alert. * I think it is bet- 

 ter to work over-hours when the ground is 

 ready and the barometer indicates a storm. 

 Bvit you know, of course, there is quite a 

 feeling. in some places to the effect that 

 "farm hands " shoukl not be asked to work 

 more than ten hours a day like other folks. 

 Circumstances often alter cases, and alter 

 them tremendously. I would willingly give 

 a good man, who is willing to work over- 

 hours occasionally better pay than one who 

 thinks he has got to stop, no matter where 

 you are, when quitting-time comes. Now, I 

 am not much of a farmer just now; but I 

 think I have learned some things from ex- 

 perience. Some of the older and successful 

 corn-growers may laugh at my experience. 

 But I think it will /lelp some of them. .lust 

 one word more: 



When my corn had to be planted the 

 third time, all our nicely selected and kept 

 seed corn was gone. The men started for the 

 crib to get some more. I said, "Not so till 

 I have tested it in the greenhouse;" and as it 

 was Saturday night, by Monday morning I 

 was ready to announce that the corn in the 

 crib was fit to i)lant. By preserving an 

 incubator temperature and the right amount 

 of moisture you can test seed corn in 48 to 

 72 hours. 



My second moral, and one that I have 

 been thinking over and praying over, is 

 along in the spiritual line. Is it the duty 

 of a busy farmer to leave his work at corn- 

 planting time to attend a State or county 

 conference of his church? I think we may 

 honestly make a mistake in both directions. 

 My good friend Leonard said I lost thirty 

 or forty dollars by not being on hand and 

 pushing things as I have been in the habit 

 of pushing all my life when I wanted to 



* Just as soon as a piece of ground is proi)erly fit- 

 ted for seed or plants, tlie seed or i)lants should go 

 in without waiting a single minute if possible. 1 

 have had some sad experience in years past, where 

 sometliine prevented jjutting in the seed the very 

 minute, you might almost say, the ground was 

 ready. In growing weather, weeds start very quick- 

 ly: and when tliey once gel a little ahead of the 

 crop it is a diflicult and expensive matter to get rid 

 of them. < )ne great reason why horse weeders are 

 not used more is that the weeds are permitted to 

 get a little the start of the crop: and this very thing 

 is why transplanting has many advantages. If the 

 weeds can be allowed to make a start, and t?ien 

 work the ground tlioroughly before putting in the 

 seed, of course that helps a great deal. 



