94 



THE FARMER'S MONTHLY VISITOR. 



Blight— Mildew. 



We observe in the last two minibers of that 

 valuable agiicultuial jouinal publislied in Phila- 

 ilel|)liia, the Farmeis' Cabinet, that no inconsid- 

 erable J|)aie is (icciipied in presentiDg different 

 opinions, and in discussing the question ot tlif 

 ori"in of hiiglit and iinldew, which sorneliriies 

 so extensively injures tlie crops of small grain, 

 and, ot late vears, has [nearly destroyed beans 

 and pea?, onions and carrots, and even (jotntoes. 



In the May number of the Cabinet, Col. Ken- 

 derton Smith attributes the blight in the wheat 

 crops to the single cause of grass and weeds a- 

 niong the grain: he made up so ])lausible a 

 theory, that he has undoubtedly induced many to 

 omit sewing in their wheat fields the usual quan- 

 m\ ol see<l necessary to stock down their laud, 

 where it was intended for hay. 



But in the May number of the Cabinet, some 

 hall a dozen writers come out with different 

 opinions of this theory. One writer ("Jacob 

 Tryon, of Philadelphia,) does not doubt that this 

 theory is correct, and says that a friend of his in 

 Jersey who has "three fields of \yheal of ihe 

 greatest luxuriance," "all seeded with timothy" 

 or herdsgrass, and " remarkably thickly set," is 

 destined to disappointment and the loss of a crop 

 from that circumstance. 



Another writer, " Z. Y." of Gloucester county. 

 New Jersey, " a plain matter-of-fact man," from 

 his own experience the two last years, says there 

 is nothing in the theory of grass producing blight 

 His crop of 183y, with clover and timothy sown 

 upon the land, was more than twenty bushels, 

 per acre, of pimiip grain. His early-sown wher.t 

 bulb yeais produced well, while his late-sown 

 wheat was injured by mildew ; and he thinks 

 iiiuch depends upon early sowing. 



John Symouils, a farmer of Montgomery 

 county. Pa., in attempting to controvert Colonel 

 Smith's theory of mildew, (piotes froHi TuU's 

 Husbandry, an agricultural work, published in 

 England, by Cobbctt. Tull favors the sowing of 

 wheat iu drills to prevent blight, being thereby 

 able to let in the sun's rays and to give free mo- 

 tion to the air. He says — " The sun, with his 

 rays, supplies the part of thepii/«e: as in the hu- 

 man i'rame, to keep the sap in motion, and carry 

 on its circulation — as iu the heart's systole and 

 diastole. Wheat lioing, doubtless, originally a 

 native of a hot country, it requires, by its consti- 

 tution, a consideralile degree of heat to bring it 

 to perfection : and if much of that di?;jree ot 

 hiat be wanting, it will be the w eaker, and when 

 the solar rays cannot reach the lower parts of the 

 sialics, the loivest leaves and knots cannot do their 

 office: by these means that jiart, which, if it had 

 a due share of the smi's influence, wouhl be har- 

 dened, so as to perform the bones for the snji- 

 port of the stalk, becomes uiore like cartilage, 

 soft and weak, atul uiialjje to sustain the weigljl 

 of the ear; it yields and lets it lldl to the ground, 

 and then the grain is blighted." "In drilletl 

 wheat, the sunbeams are more duly distributed 

 to all parts (he continues) and, being rejlecled hj 

 tlic ground, wlmue the lower parts of the stalJcs musl 

 receive the greater share of heal, being nearer to the 

 poird of incidence, having no weeds to shadow them," 



James Goweii, Es(i., who read an essay before 

 the Philadel|)hia Society for promoting Agricul- 

 ture in Slay, iiives his opinion as follows: 



" I hold that the prevailing cause of blight in 

 this country, is the sudden heat and cold to which 

 tlie wheat is otten exposed in Juneand begiiming 

 of July : and this 1 will attempt to explain. The 

 wlieat plants, at the period of filling, naturally 

 send up, or yield most generous!}', the juices re- 

 quisite to furnish the heads wiili seed or grain; 

 this process will be more or less accelerated by 

 the action of the sun, in proportion as he is mild 

 or intense. If the heat be great, and of two or 

 three days' continuance, the ])!ants will be great- 

 ly excited; in this state, should the sun suddenly 

 withdraw, the wheal, ex|iosed perhaps to a N. VV. 

 orN. E. wind that sinks the temperature inslan- 

 tersome 20 <legrees— the chilling cold ct' whicii 

 no instniment can fully represent — aniinal and 

 vegetable life being only capable of realizing it 

 — is it to he wondered that so sudden a check to 

 the pulsations of the excited wheat plants should 

 prove tiital ? The cold wind blowing on the 

 iiead atul neck of the plant, chills it at the point 

 of exposure : the head becomes languid or tor- 

 pid, while from the density of the plants and the 



heat of the earth, there is a genial heat and 

 moisture from below — the fountain that supplied 

 the head kee|)s bubbling up and flowing on, but 

 the functions of the head, reservoir or coudeuser, 

 have ceased, and can take no more: in such a 

 case, the louiitain or conduits musl burst — both 

 or 1 iihir il" — and hence the rust that is observa- 

 ble on the iilaiits, which is b%d the oidtmrd sign of 

 the disease that preys upon the vitals ivithin. After 

 a lapse of a day or days, the sun returns, and 

 blazes on the diseased head, which, having 

 neither health nor moisture in it, cannot but 

 wither and die under his scorching influence." 



Alsernon Sydney Roberts read an essay before 

 the Philailelphia Society in June on this subject, 

 in which he opposes all the other theories. His 

 opinions are given in the following extract : 



"iMildevv or rust of wheat and rye, is a para- 

 sitic idaut, whose mode of existence in its inci- 

 pient stage we know not, but the causes which 

 call it into activity^are probably numerous — ex- 

 tremes of cold and heat ; moisture and rapid 

 evajioralion ; rank growth, especially when oc- 

 casioned by unfermented or fresh manure ; bad 

 condition of the ground, whether too rich or too 

 poor; the interference of other vegetable matter, 

 especially at the critical period of the grain's ma- 

 turing ; and in strong soil, where the wheat tillirs 

 freely, the use of too much seed, which leaves no 

 room for the sun's rays to penetrate the ground, 

 and give proper hardness and substance to the 

 straw. 



" And now the remedy, or rather prevention, for 

 remedy there is none. Change your system so 

 far as to avoid manuring inmiediately preceding 

 the crop of « heat. Get the ground in as mel- 

 low and jierfect order as possible ; fresh maniue 

 is a rapid generator of weeds and fungi, il shoulil 

 never be put on clean wheat groiuid. Use gi o I 

 seed (occH.sionally changed) and so early that it 

 may take root before winter sets in, and will 

 be so far advanced in the spring, when grass- 

 seed is sown, as to prevent a rapid vi?getation of 

 the latter, (if you still adhere to this part of tie 

 old system;) take great pains to spread your seed 

 evenly over the surface, and not so thick as to 

 overload the soil, a very common error of farmers 

 in this vicinity." 



We have thus presented the opi|iions of ^y- 

 erai gentlemen on the cause of blight and mil- 

 dew. None of them suit us so well as the ex- 

 planation verbally given us a few days since by 

 Hon. Sa.muf.1, Hatch, Senator from district No. 

 2, an old citizen of Exeter, and a native of Wells, 

 i\iaine. Mr. Hatch ia a cabinet maker by trade, 

 having successfully pursued that business so as 

 to be independent, after having given to three 

 sons a liberal education, one of whom haS been 

 a president of a college in Kentucky, and all of 

 whom are eminent as men of learniiig. The se- 

 cret of Mr. Hatch's success in life, we think, is, 

 that he has been in the habit of doing every thing 

 well. 



He has pursued the business of farming but to 

 a limited extent ; but he says he is the only man 

 iu Exeter who ever obtained a ]>remium for rais- 

 ing rye. For more than thirty years he has been 

 in the habit of cultivating a rye field. He says he 

 never sowed grass seed of any kind in his r3e 

 field ; but his field has frequently suffered from 

 bliirht. 



His theory is similar to that of Mr. Govven. — 

 Tlie l)light or mildew he states to take place 

 generally at a time when days are liot and nights 

 are cold ; the day beat throws up an uiutue pro- 

 portion of sap into the stalk — the close burden of 

 stalks shields the surface of tlie ground so that 

 it continues to force up the .sap through the night 

 while the chill strikes with fiill force upon the 

 stalk above. In this state of the atmosphere, the 

 slalk bursts just below one or more of the joints, 

 and at ouce arrests the further growth of the 

 grain. 



Mr. Hatch is of opinion that there is no remedy 

 for blight when the grain has arrived at a certain 

 jioint, and the weather favors the process. Rye 

 and wheat are more apt to escape when sown 

 early. Winter rye should always be put in the 

 ground before the first of September, if the 

 ground can he jiiepared: the earlier winter or 

 spring grain of all kinds is sown, the more likely 

 it will be to escape blight. The seed should, by 

 all means, be exchanged from the same ground 

 once every three or four years. 



Mr. Hatch has succeeded, by a simple process, 



every year, to make the flour from his rye hut 

 little inferior to that of wheat. He invariably 

 cuts it about lour or five days sooner than rye is 

 commouly cut, when the joint of the stalk is quite 

 green. It is first dried or rather hayed in the 

 field. Having plenty of room in his barn, which 

 is not like that of more extensive farmers, crowd- 

 ed with hay, the rye sheaves are. set about the 

 barn so that uo one sheaf rests upon another: 

 the doors and windows are thrown open that the 

 air may have free access, and the sheaves thus 

 remain about three weeks before they are thresh- 

 ed. Thus carefully dried and prepared, one man 

 in threshing will do the work of two men where 

 the rye is dried in the common method. After 

 the grain is threshed and cleansed from chuff, it 

 is removed to the house or granary, and is spread 

 where the drying air has access, ond is now and 

 then stirred for three weeks: iu that time, the 

 L'rain will have shrunk at least one liushel in 

 twenty. Afterwards the rye may be safely put 

 away in close bins or casks, assured that it will . 

 inake flour iierfectly sweet, imparting elasticity 

 and life and an excellent flavor to tlie bread into 

 which it is manufactured. Risen cakes made of 

 this flour will never fall from the upper crust. 



Much of the wheaten flour used is what is call- 

 ed running flour. It is caused by some injury to 

 the grain of whicli it is inaiiulaciured. Any ter- 

 ni( niation eftects the injury. If grain is not 

 properly cured when il is cut in the field — if it is 

 exposed after it is cut and cured in the sheaf to 

 damp — if it is kept close after it is threshed so as 

 to gather moisture — if it is suffered to heat after 

 it is floured — or even after the flour is made itilo 

 dough, if it is permitted to fijrment beyond a cer- 

 t.iin point; in either case, the article is worth 

 scirn ly half price. It is better economy to be 

 oarrrurof a /I'H/e, than to be careless of mucA : 

 qvalitij shotdd be first regarded, and when that 

 matter Ls well looked to we may increase the 

 quanlilj of our productions to any extent. 



Best Mode of applying Manure. 



At a late meeting of farmers and gardeners, at 

 FraminglKuii. l\ls. this inleresling sniyecl was ful- 

 ly discusscil. iMajor VVhecler uas of opinion that 

 none of the virliics of inaiuMe were ever lost by 

 di'eply burying them in tlie soil, fiir if less 

 advantage were derived the present year, morb 

 would be the result the next; he had buried 

 manure two feet deep in his garden, and even 

 then his crojis found it, having always noticed 

 that the deeper and more intimately mixed wiih 

 the .soil is the manure, the more able the plants 

 to resist the effects of drought. He did not be- 

 lieve that any valuable portion of the manure 

 washed down out of the reach of the roots of 

 plants; he thought they wouhl always extend as 

 low as the manures applied were found. 



Mr. N. Stone thought he had seen several in- 

 stances where the manures had been [ilaced too 

 deep, and mentioned several cases where a heavy 

 coat had been turned deep, and but little benefit 

 had been found from it at harvest, either in that 

 or the following year. 



Dr. Dean observed, that as all manures must 

 assume either a li(piid or a gaseous form before 

 they could become food for plants, he thought it 

 probable that we lo.st a valuable portion of lliein, 

 in consequence of their leaching down far below 

 the reach of plants when we buried them deep in 

 the soil, lie did not seewhy the liquid matter should 

 not descend with as much facility as water, and 

 he feared that it often sunk so low as to be of uo 

 use to the cultivator. He fully agreed with those 

 who conceived that we derive the greatest bene- 

 fit from our manures whin we take the trouble 

 to form compost heaps, and mingle extraneous 

 matter with the niamue iVoni the stables ; that in 

 such case we can lay them nearer the surface ; 

 that gases would alw'ays rise from them, and he 

 lost, when there were not plants on the ground 

 to absorb them. He therefore preferred to make 

 use of conifiost manure, and to bury those but 

 slig-htly in the soil. 



Major Wheeler could not conceive how any 

 valuable portion of manures could be lost by be- 

 ing biiiicd deeply ; he thought, if they were so 

 Iniricd as to prevent eva|ioration, they might be 

 ki'[ii a long time ; and if they did not operate so 

 powerfully dm iiig the first season, we must event- 

 ually, obtain the full benefit, for they could not 

 be lost. He said an experiment had been made 

 of leaching a quantity of manure through a body 



