The Lancaster Farmer. 



Dr. S. S. RATHVON, Editor. 



LANC-ASTER, PA., SEPTEMBER, 1882. 



Vol. XIV. No. 9. 



Editorial. 



STATE AND COUNTY FAIRS OF 1882. 



There are 47 State Fairs in the United 

 State.s and Canada — the latU'r liolding six, and 

 several of our States holding Iwo — for the 

 year 1882. 



Of county fairs notices of (ITl being held in 

 21 States have been published, and these are 

 conlined to the Korthern and Border States. 

 Of what the South is doing in this direction 

 we liave not been yet advised. Maine holds 

 17 county fairs ; Massachusetts, 29 ; Connec- 

 ticut, 20 ; New Hampshire, 1 : Verniout, 3 ; 

 Rhode Island, 2 ; New York, 48 ; New .Jersey, 

 10 ; Pennsylvania, 79 ; Illinois, 80 ; Indiana, 

 08 ; Iowa, 83 ; Michigan. 34 ; Ohio, G9 ; Kan- 

 sas, 33 ; Minnesota, 1 ; Wisconsin, 12 ; Ken- 

 tucky, 12 ; Maryland, 8 ; Delaware, 1 ; Vir- 

 ginia, 1 ; West "\^irginia, 1. The largest 

 number are held in Illinois, only 10 of the 

 counties holding "no fair," but many others 

 holding tico. Pennsylvania is tliird on the 

 list, 10 of her counties holding no fairs, namely, 

 Perry, Monroe, Mitllin, Huntingdon, Frank- 

 lin, Adams, Cambria, Cameron, Centre and 

 Lancaster. Lancaster, perhaps equals, if she 

 does not exceed all the other non-holding 

 counties jjut together in population, wealth 

 and agricultural resources — too rich, too popu- 

 lous, and too prominent, perhaps, to«eecZ such 

 an adjunct as a fair. If it were possible for 

 one wide-awake and observant individual to 

 visit all these 718 fairs, what a multitude of 

 life's phases would be brought under his 

 notice, and what a variety of local produc- 

 tions. There may be much labor, expense 

 and vexation of spirit attending these enter- 

 prises, but surely there must be some com- 

 pensation or they would not be continued. 



KITCHEN GARDEN FOR SEPTEMBER. 

 In the Middle States many and varied are 

 the duties which devolve on the gardener at 

 this season. Not only do the growing crops 

 demand attention, but seeds are to be sown to 

 provide the necessary plants for the ensuing 

 spring. Roots are to be divided and reset. 

 Strawberry beds planted, &c. Cabbage, .Jersey 

 Wakefield, and Landreth' Large York, sow, 

 to plant out in autumn, where the locality 

 admits, or box up in cold fiame, to keep till 

 planting time in spring ; the latter end of the 

 month will be time enough to sow in the lati- 

 tude of Lancaster county ; especially sow the 

 newly introduced sub-variety Bloomsdale ; 

 also Bloomsdale Brunswick, as a succession. 

 Turnips, the early Dutch and Red-topped may 

 be sown within the first half of this month, 

 if failure has attended earlier efforts. In 

 some sections the tty devours the early sowing. 

 They are less voracious after the nights be- 

 come cool and tlie dews heavy. Celery, earth 

 up. Corn salad, scurvy grass and chervil, sow 

 for winter salad. Lettuce, sow for spring 

 planting ; the plants to be kept during winter 

 in cold frames. The better sorts for autumn 

 sowing are the Dutch Butter, Royal Cabbage, 



Bloomsdale Early Sumiuer,and India. Spinach 

 .Sow early in the montli for autumn use ; later 

 winter and spring. Turnii)s and Rata Baga, 

 cultivate. 



Seed Purchasing a Matter of Confidence. 



It is cixlirthj so. The man who buys dry- 

 goods, groceries, corn or cotton, can, to a 

 very considerable extent, judge of the ([uality 

 and value of the article. This is not the case 

 witk seeds. Simjjly because a dealer says a 

 certain cabbage seed he holds in his hand is 

 "large late fiat Dutch" it does not follow 

 that it is so ; he may liave been deceived him- 

 self. No one can tell till valuable time and 

 labor has been expended on the crop. No 

 other commodity but drugs is so entirely a 

 matter of confidence. It behooves every one 

 to get his supplies from dealers of recog- 

 nized repute ; men who have a reputation .at 

 stake which they value. Cheapness at once 

 is sulhcient to raise a doubt both as to vitality 

 and quality. Good seeds have a value — they 

 cannot be clicap, in the common acceptation 

 of the word. — Lanclreth''s Rural Register. 



Of course the foregoing, in relation to seeds, 

 is not intended as a rellection upon any one 

 engaged in the seed business, except such as 

 pursue it fraudulently. A man who possessed 

 a great reputation as a seedsman would also 

 possess a greiit opportunity to perpetrate a 

 fraud, but he would soon be found out. Re- 

 tailers of seeds may intend no deception 

 whatever, and yet may most egregiously de- 

 ceive, because they may have been deceived 

 themselves. The best plan is either to buy 

 from the seedsman himself, or from his ac- 

 credited agent. Landrcth's sealed jiackages 

 we believe can be safely recommended to our 

 patrons. 



INSECT MIGRATIONS. 

 Nothing seems to be more indisputable, or 

 more fully autliontic.ated, than the migratory 

 habits of some species of insects — indeed, the 

 great African Locust ( Locusta miijratoriei] has 

 received its si)ecific name from that very 

 habit ; but, it must be borne in mind, that 

 insects do not migrate in the same sense that 

 birds do. Birds, except a few local species, 

 at the end of every summer season, migrate 

 to a warmer region of the earth than the one in 

 which they have passed the summer and reared 

 their broods, and this is especially the case 

 with insectivorems birds. In the northern 

 temperate zone, at least, they migrate south- 

 ward in the autumn of the year, and return 

 again to their old haunts in the spring, and it 

 is on record that the same pair have occupied 

 the same nest for different periods, covering 

 from five to fifteen years, or more. And, we 

 may infer, a priori, that those that pass the 

 summer in the south temper.ate zone, at the 

 end of the season, migrate northward, and 

 return again to their old haunts in the spring. 

 Although some of the birds that visit the 

 northern zones in the summer may leave the 

 continent altogether, and pass our winter sea- 

 son in the West India Islands, yet the larger 



number only remove to our Southern, or tlie 

 Mexican States, seemingly all the wliile hang- 

 ing on the Verge of spring. About live and 

 forty years ago we passed a winter in Oldham 

 county, Kentucky, and we were rather sur- 

 prised, during a few warm days in the first 

 half of .January, to find the woods and the 

 fields nunierously inhabited l)y Robins, Blue- 

 birds, Red-lieaded Woodpeckers, Flickers 

 (Golden-winged Woodpeckers) Black-birds, 

 Wrens, Sapsuckers, and a nnraber of other 

 familiar examples. After a week of balmy 

 spring weather there followed a sudden 

 change in the temperature ; a snow fell sudi- 

 cient to afl'ord tolerable sleighing for two or 

 three days, clearing up cold and freezing ; 

 after which not a single bird could be seen. 

 A similar warm spell occurred again about 

 th(^ loth of February, when the birds returned 

 with greatly augmented numbers, but retired 

 again before the cold bla.sts that ushered in 

 the month of March. We then left the State 

 and cannot say how soon the birds returned 

 again, but according to our observation they 

 seemed to be ail the while "waiting and watch- 

 ing" for the julvent of spring and summer. 

 It is not so with insects. When we say "not 

 so " in regard to insects, we mean that it is 

 not so in the same sense or degree, for there 

 .are some apinoximations among some insects 

 to the migratory habits of birds. 



Again, among mammals iuid among fishes 

 we find abundant testimony to this habit, and 

 especially In reference to the latter. Those 

 persons residing on or near the Susquehanna 

 river, in our own county, are well aware of 

 the upward migrations of the adult shad in 

 the spring, and the downward migrations of 

 the young shad in the fall. The seine fisheries, 

 for a long series of years, have proved the 

 former, and the fish pots, or "baskets," have 

 borne lamentalile evidence of the latter. This 

 has also been evinced to a considerable degree 

 in regard to rock-fish, carp, several species of 

 perch, and last, not least, the eels ; but in 

 this last instance the migratory periods are 

 reversed — that is, eels migrate towards the 

 head-waters of the streams when they are 

 young — from three to five or six inches in 

 length— and in the late spring; and migrate 

 downward, in the adnlt state, in the fall. 

 Both of these positions have been established 

 by testimony as incontrovertible as that re- 

 lating to sli.ad, although it has some excep- 

 tionable or modifying phases. But then, it 

 will be observed, in both of these cases, that 

 it is not the same individuals that go and re- 

 turn .again in either case, in which they great- 

 ly dilTer from migratory birds. 



As to mammals, from our early boy- 

 hood we were impressed with the stories of 

 the western migrations of squirrels, and 

 especially in the States of Ohio and Indi- 

 ana. These occurrences were frequent for a 

 long .series of years afterwards — the squirrels 

 even swimming across the Ohio and other 

 rivera in passing from one locality to another. 

 These animals were not only a nuisance, but 



