HAMPSHIRE COUNTY FARMERS' MONTHLY 



HAMPSHIR 



COUNTY CLUB WORK 



VARIETY IN CLUB NAMES 



North Amherst 



Thrifty Workers — Garment. 



Amherst 



It Can Be Done — Handicraft. 



Granby 



Faithful Workers — Garment. 

 Hadley Center 



Russell Bread Club— Food. 

 Hatfield Center 



T. E. W. Club— Garment. 

 Hatfield Center 



Star Club — Garment. 

 Hatfield Center 



Banner Club — Garment. 

 Huntington 



Handy Ten — Handicraft. 

 Pelham 



Busy Workers — Handicraft and 

 Garment. 

 Pelham 



Sunshine Girls — Garment. 

 Plainfield 



Home Helper Club — Handicraft, 

 Bread, Sewing. 

 South Hadley Center 



S. S. S. Club— Garment. 

 Westhampton 



Can't Be Beat — Garment. 

 Williamsburg 



Hilltown Sewing — Garment. 

 Cushman It-can-be-done — Handicraft. 

 Blue Meadow 



worker — Handicraft, garment. 

 Bondsville 



Franklin Willing Workers, — Handicraft. 

 Chesterfield Happy Seven — Garment. 



West Chesterfield 



Busy Seven — Garment and Handicraft. 

 Lithia 



We-will-try-try-again — Garment Handi- 

 craft. 

 Granby 



Busy Bee — Garment and Handicraft. 

 Hockanum 



Nail 'n Needle Nine — Garment Handi- 

 craft. 

 Russellville '22 Russellville. 



Hadley Center 



Hadley Bread Club— Food. 

 Bradstreet I will work — Garment. 



Bradstreet 



Busy Workers — Handicraft. 

 Huntington 



Willing Workers — Food. 

 Huntington Helpful Hands — Garment. 

 Packardville 



High Flyers — Food, Garment and 

 Handicraft. 

 Ware 7 



Useful Nine — Food, Garment and 

 Handicraft. 

 Chesterfield 



Not Shirk Hard Work — Handicraft 

 and Sewing. 

 Bondsville The 3-B Club— Sewing. 



CORN CHAMPION'S STORY 



My Corn Club Story 



I joined the corn club because I had 

 enjoyed the work in the club last year 

 and hoped to improve my woik by 

 avoiding mistakes I have made before. 

 Last yeai- I had forty bushels on half 

 an acre. This year by careful selection 

 of seed corn I tried to increase the yield 

 and at the same time have a larger per 

 cent of seed corn. 



I chose yellow dent corn because I be- 

 lieve from my experience of last year 

 that it has the advantage over flint corn. 

 It yields more fodder and the yield of 

 grain is al.so greater. 



I had one acre of land. The soil is a 

 heavy loam and is rather wet in seasons 

 when there is much rain. It was just 

 right for this year. Half of the plot was 

 a clover sod which is the best land for 

 corn as there will be more nitrogen in the 

 soil. The other half had tobacco on it 

 last year followed by a crop of rye. 



On May tenth the land was plowed 

 seven inches deep with a landside plow. 

 Then the land was wheelharrowed and 

 smoothed off with a spike-tooth harrow. 



For fertilizer I used fifteen loads of 

 stable manure or about four cords. I 

 put the manure on the pait on which to- 

 bacco was grown last year, before 

 plowing. The other part was put on 

 after plowing and harrowed under. The 

 corn started better on the part where the 

 manure had been put on after plowing, 

 grew faster, and I'ipened earlier than on 

 the part where the manure was plowed 

 under. I also put on 600 pounds of 6-4-4 

 fertilizer which cost twenty dollai's 

 ($20.00). It was sown broad cast which 

 I think is the best way because it is dis- 

 tributed all over the soil and not just in 

 the hill as in the hill method. 



I marked with a horse marker the field 

 out one way in rows three feet four 

 inches apart. It would have been better 

 to have marked it both ways but the field 

 was not wide enough. It is best to mark 

 both ways because it can be cultivated 

 cheaper. 



The seed corn I planted was some I 

 had raised last year. I picked out the 

 ears that were of medium size, well 

 matured and uniform in size and color. 

 I tested the seed with a long rag doll 

 tester. This is made by taking an old 

 piece of sheet ten inches wide and five 

 feet long, wet it and mark out with in- 

 delible pencil in squares and the number 

 the squares. Then roll up on a cob and 

 stand up in a pail with about two inches 

 of water in it. This is the best way to 

 test corn as it is easily and cheaply made. 

 My corn tests 99 per cent. 



Before I planted my corn I tarred it 



so that the crows' would not pull up the 

 seed as soon as it came up. I planted 

 my corn May 21st by hand in the marked 

 I'ows. I put four or five kernels in a 

 hill which is better than three because 

 one is not certain that all the kernels will 

 come up even if the corn does test 100%. 

 It took one peck of .seed to plant the acre. 

 My corn came up in less than a week and 

 there were very few hills missing. 



When the corn has been up a few days 

 I went over it with a weeder. A weeder 

 kills the small weeds and stirs up the soil 

 but does not hurt the corn. 



I cultivated and hoed my corn the 

 first time .June 11th and cultivated it 

 about once a week after that. I culti- 

 vated and hoed it the last time July 11th 

 and seeded it down at the same time. In 

 all I cultivated the crop five times and 

 hoed it three times. The total cost of 

 cultivation was .$10.40. 



One Saturday afternoon in August a 

 rain storm blew .some of the corn over 

 but did not break the stalks oif. The 

 next day a storm came from the other 

 way and blew the stalks up straight 

 again. 



When the corn was in the milk the 

 crows ate some of it on the farther side 

 of the piece. 



Some of the stalks grew to be eleven 

 feet high. The corn started glazing over 

 about August 25th. 



I cut my crop September 12th. It had 

 taken 114 days to mature, a short period 

 for this kind of corn, which often takes 

 ten or fiften days longer. I made a stack 

 by tying two hills together, .standing the 

 corn up against them and tying the 

 stocks with string around the top of the 

 stack. 



I started to husk my corn October 12th 

 by hand. It took 4.5 hours to husk it 

 making a cost of $13.50. There were 

 over 97 bushels on the acre. Out of this 

 I picked 23-2/7 bushels of seed corn 

 which I plan to sell in the spring. I 

 selected my seed corn when I husked it. 

 If I had taken more care I might have 

 picked out several bushels more of seed. 

 I had 5,840 pounds of stalks. I did not 

 weigh all the stalks but weighed several 

 stacks and took the average and multi- 

 plied by the number of stacks. 



To estimate the profit of my summer's 



work I added up costs which were 



$106. 91. The vaue of the corn and stalks 



were $211.68, making a profit of $104.67. 



Osborne West, 



Hadley, Mass. 



CLOVER LEAVES 



The Westhampton Garment Club held 

 a candy sale to help buy cloth for their 

 club work. Each girl in the club is 

 Continued on pa^s i*. coli;n-n 2 



