FARMERS' MONTHLY OF HAMPSHIRE COUNTY 



FARMERS' MONTHLY 



PUBLISHED BY THE 



Hampshire County Trustees for Aid to 

 Agriculture 



.STAFP 

 Rolnntl A. I'uyne, County Agent 

 Milllreil W. Itoicc, 



Home Denionstrntion Agent 

 NoriiKin I'. Wliippen, County Club Agent 

 Mjiry Diiiiontl, Clerk 

 Mary Sullivan, Asst. Clerk 



Office First ISiational Bank Building 



Northampton, Mass. 

 Entered a.3 second class matter Nov. 9. 

 1915, at the Post Offlce at Northampton, 

 Massachusetts, under the Act of March 

 8, 1879. 



"Notice of Entry" 

 "Acceptance tor mailing at special rate 

 of postage provided for in section 1103, 

 Act of October .3, 1917. Authorized Oc- 

 tober 31, 1917. 



I*riee, .^O cents a yc:ir 



Officers of the Trustees 



Charles E. Clark, President 

 Charles W. Wade, Vice-President 

 Warren M. King, Treasurer 

 Roland A. Payne, Secretary 



Trustees for County Aid to Agric ullure 



Edwin B. Clapp, Easthampton 



Charles E. Clark, Leeds 



Clarence E. Hodgkins, Northampton 



Milton S. Howes, Cummington 



Mrs. Clifton Johnson, Hadley 



Warren M. King, Northampton 



Charles W. Wade, Hatfield 



W. H. Atkins, Amherst 



L. L. Campbell, Northampton 



EAST APPROACHING NEW 



FARM ERA 



Prosperity Ahead for Farmers who 

 Build Soil Fertility 



The pendulum of farm prosperity has 

 already started its long swing to the 

 East, and the man on the farm who or- 

 ganizes his farming operations along 

 better business lines will be in position 

 to grasp the new and money-making op- 

 portunities. So believes .John B. Abbott, 

 dairy farmer of Bellows Falls, Vermont, 

 consulting agronomist for the National 

 Fertilizer Association, and formerly ex- 

 tension agronomist with the Massachu- 

 setts Agricultural College, Amherst. 



"The rea.son for the so-called decadence 

 of eastern agriculture," according to Mr. 

 Abbott, "was its inability to compete 

 with the exploitation of the virgin soil of 

 the West and the willingness of the 

 western farmer to produce and sell re- 

 gardless of cost and prices." 



"Conditions have changed, fortunately 

 for both eastern and western farmers. 

 The farmers of the Middle West and 

 West are now farming for present profits 

 and can no longer afford to flood the East 

 with farm products sold at prices far be- 

 low their real cost of production. 



"From now on;' Mr. Abbott points out, 

 "the East has to meet only the normal 

 competition of a settled farm region with 

 the cream of its virgin fertility expended 

 in the desperate struggle to hold title to 

 the land. What advantages the East 

 lacks in the way of prairie fields are off- 

 set by its nearness to market and the ever 

 increasing costs of production in and 

 transportation from more distant re- 

 gions. 



"The eastern farmers who see and pre- 

 pare to meet the approaching opportuni- 

 ties find themselves 'pioneers in an old 

 land.' Instead of the few simple tools 

 of the first pioneers, the modern pioneer 

 must make use of the many modern tools. 



"Chief of the tools of the modern pion- 

 eer is capital, both in the form of ma- 

 chinery and in the form of fertilizers and 

 lime, which are so absolutely essential to 

 overcome the bad effects of the lean years 

 and to bring the soil back to its former 

 productivity. 



"Have faith in eastern agriculture" is 

 Abbott's note of encouragement, "organ- 

 ize the farm on the basis of modern pro- 

 duction, capitalize it as it deserves, and 

 the reward will not fail." 



FALL PLOWING TO CONTROL 



INSECTS 



Fortunately, most of the insect pests 

 which are destructive to garden crops can 

 be controlled by timely applications of an 

 insecticide, and this fact evidently has 

 developed a tendency to ovei-look the 

 primary cause of severe insect injury, 

 namely, favorable conditions for the 

 multiplication of the insect. Nearly all 

 of the important insect pests of garden 

 crops spend the winter in the .soil, crop re- 

 fuse, or woods. A thorough clean-up in 

 the garden during the late fall and early 

 winter will kill a great many of these 

 pests, and late fall plowing will kill many 

 more. Both of these operations are well 

 worth while in the fight to produce qual- 

 ity crops. Why wait until it is necessary 

 to use expensive insecticides to protect 

 your crop when good farm practice will 

 often make spraying or dusting unneces- 

 sary? 



Some of the pests to which these sug- 

 gestions apply, are: 



IMPORTED CABBABE WORM— 

 spends the winter as a chrysalis among 

 old stalks and crop refuse. 



CABBAGE ROOT MA G(70T— hiber- 

 nates as puparium in .soil or in the old 

 I'oots or stumps of cabbage. 



CABBAGE A PH/.S'— hibernates as egg 

 on old leaves and stalks of cabbage. 



CABBAGE LOOPER— spends winter 

 in pupal stage in old leaves, stumps, and 

 rubbish of the cabbage field. 



HARLEQUIN CABBAGE BUG— win- 

 ters as adult insect in stalks, leaves, and 



refuse of cabbage field and nearby wood 

 patches. 



CrTiyO/?M.S'— hibernate as small 

 worms near the I'oots of the crop, woods, 

 or grasses, going deeper as the frost 

 penetrates the ground. 



TARNISHED PLANT BUG— same as 

 Harlequin Cabbage Bug. 



P( ) TA TO LEA FHOPPER—s p e n d s 

 winter as adult or egg in old leaves and 

 crop refuse. 



POT A TO FLEA BEETLE— winters 

 as adult in rubbish and trash about the 

 garden. 



COLORADA POTATO BEETLE— 

 winters as adult in soil. 



WHITE GRUBS— hibermite as grubs 

 from 7 to 14 inches below surface of 

 ground, usually in grass land. 



POTATO STALK BORER— spends 

 winter as adult beetle in old potato 

 stalks. 



COMMON STALK BORER— hiber- 

 nates as egg on stem of woods and 

 grasses in or near the garden. 



EUROPEAN CORN BORER— spends 

 winter as larva in corn stalks, stubblo, 

 and many of the common weeds. 



TOMATO HORN WORM— winters as 

 pupa a few inches below surface of soil. 



STRIPED CUCUMBER BEETLE— 

 spends the winter as adult in trash, re- 

 fuse, or in the soil. 



SQUASH BUG— same as Striped Cu- 

 cumber Beetle. 



SQUASH VINE BORER— winters as 

 larvae in cocoons 1 or 2 inches below sur- 

 face of ground. 



IMPORTED ONION MAGGOT— hi- 

 bernates either as adiilt fly in crop refuse, 

 or as puparium in .soil. 



ASPARAGUS BEETLES— pass the 

 winters in rubbish and crop refuse about 

 the asparagus field. 



This imposing list of insect pests whose 

 food bill is paid annually by the rnarket 

 gardeners is far from complete but it 

 should be sufficient to demonstrate the 

 value, entomologically speaking, of the 

 slogan, 



"CLEAN UP OR BE CLEANED UP." 



i-'e»\er CiKar.s Sinokell 



Continued from page 1, columTi ^ 

 that there is about twenty per cent ovei'- 

 production of tobacco at the present time. 

 The present supply is one and a half 

 years too heavy. By acreage reduction 

 alone, unless demand changes, the acre- 

 age would have to be cut forty per cent 

 to get back to normal in five years. 

 Present indications are that there will be 

 substantial reductions in the tobacco acre- 

 age ne.xt season. Some of this reduction 

 will be forced upon the grower because of 

 lack of credit. 



