IMPORTANT PROBLEMS WHICH WEEDS MUST SOLVE. 27 



ripening. If the grain fields have been seeded down to grass or 

 clover they should be gone over a second time in September and 

 any visible weeds removed. If fall cultivation is to be done this 

 will not be necessary. Permanent pastures, fence-rows, borders of 

 woodlands, roadsides and other uncultivated tracts should also be 

 carefully looked after in late summer to prevent seeds from ma- 

 turing. When a farm has once become fairly clean a farm hand 

 should be able to go over it with hoe or spud at the rate of 10 acres 

 a day. If the hand receives $1.50 per day and goes over a 100 acre 

 farm twice each year, the entire cost of keeping the weeds in sub- 

 jection will not be over $30 to $40 per annum. With short rota- 

 tion of crops the whole; farm will not have to be gone over twice, as 

 the necessary cultivation, if properly done, will take care of the 

 weeds in certain fields. The cost of maintaining cleanliness de- 

 pends altogether on how thoroughly the work is done. If done 

 properly both work and cost will decrease rapidly from year to 

 year. 



14. STUDY THE WEEDS. No person can successfully fight weeds 

 or anything else Avithout knowing the nature of that which he is 

 lighting. Strive to learn thoroughly their methods of growth and 

 ways of spreading. After these are known any weed on a farm 

 can be controlled if fought constantly and in the proper manner. 

 Remember that the weed itself has many problems to solve, many 

 enemies to avoid. Before it can have fulfilled its mission on earth 

 that of producing another weed like itself the seed whence it 

 sprung must have escaped the attacks of birds, mice and other 

 enemies, else it would never have become a weed. The young 

 shoot must have escaped the hoe or scythe, the jaws of grub or 

 locust, the maw or hoof of cattle or horse. The flowers must have 

 opened and secured their fertilization; the fruit must have set and 

 ripened the seeds. They in their turn must have been scattered far 

 and wide to proper soil and place of growth. If the weed fails, 

 no matter how little, in any one of these things it is lost. Its chance 

 of reproducing its kind is gone. Take advantage of some one of 

 these problems which the weed has to solve and prevent its solu- 

 tion. Know the weeds first, then knock them out, 



15. MAKE BOTANY A COMMON SCHOOL STUDY. The chief busi- 

 ness of the farmer is to raise cultivated plants, with the leaves, the 

 seeds or the roots of which he feeds himself and the world. True 

 he feeds part of them to animals but "all flesh is grass." The 

 plant must ever precede the animal and gather from the soil for 

 the latter the food and store from the sun for it the energy neces- 



