Crop Eeport for the Month of July, 1908. 



Office of State Board of Agriculture, 

 Boston, Mass., Aug. 1, 1908. 



In presenting the Crop Eeport for the month of July, 

 Bulletin No. 3 of the current series, we desire to call atten- 

 tion to the article on " Drainage/' at the close of the bulletin, 

 by Prof. Wm. P. Brooks, Director of the Massachusetts Agri- 

 cultural Experiment Station. There is a great deal of land 

 in Massachusetts which could be greatly improved by the 

 establishment of a system of artificial drainage, and this 

 article gives full instructions as to the installing of such 

 systems. Professor Brooks has had much practical experi- 

 ence with the work of farm drainage on the farm of the 

 Massachusetts Agricultural College, where many acres of 

 land have been reclaimed and improved by this means, and 

 is also fully posted on the theoretical side of the question. 



Progress of the Season. 



The Crop Reporting Board of the Bureau of Statistics of 

 the Department of Agriculture (Crop Reporter for July, 

 1907) finds the preliminary estimate of the acreage planted 

 in corn to be 100,996,000 acres, an increase of 1,065,000 

 acres, or 1.1 per cent, as compared with the final estimate 

 of the acreage planted last year. The average condition of 

 the com crop on July 1 was 82.8 per cent of a normal, as 

 compared with 80.2 on July 1, 1907, 87.5 on July 1, 1906, 

 and 85.6, the ten-year average on July 1. 



The average condition of spring wheat on July 1 was 89.4 

 per cent of a normal, as compared with 95 last month, 87.2 

 on July 1, 1907, and 87.6, the ten-year average on July 1. 

 The average condition of winter wheat at time of harvest 

 was 80.6, as compared with 86 on June 1, 78.3 at harvest, 

 1907, and 80.2, the average at the time of harvest for the 



