1»4 



THE ILLINOIS FAHMER. 



May 



grain comes forward, in all cases ripening 

 several days in advance of that exposed to 

 the wind. Nor does the effects stop with 

 early maturity, the quantity and quality are 

 alike improved. In the fruit crop, iliis 

 effect is always the more decidedly apparent, 

 and so much so has this become apparent to 

 cultivators of fruit, that it is generally con- 

 ceded that shelter must be had from the 

 winds by timber belts, close planting ot low 

 beaded trees or high board fences; but this 

 latter has no beauty, is expensive, ;ind 

 should never take the place of timber belts, 

 so full of life and beauty. 



TREES ABOUT THE GARDEN AND HOTTSE. 



First they are beautiful, whether full 

 robed for summer, bending their bare arms 

 to the wintry blast, or opening their buds 

 under the weeping skies of April — they are 

 always beautiful and objects of delight about 

 the homestead. We pity the child cradled 

 where no trees adorn the dwelling, the mai- 

 den whose kaleidscope is not relieved by 

 these robed monuments of Grods kindly oare, 

 for her heart will be as desolate as the sur- 

 roundings of her home. When man builds 

 his home on the prairie and turns up its 

 kindly soil, the insect tribes follows in his 

 footsteps and are ready to prey upon iiis 

 labors, while in turn the birds prey upon 

 the insects, in accordance with the great 

 law of nature, permitting one race to supply 

 food for another. Thus the hand of man 

 supplies by his labor food for millions oip 

 insects, and which continue to increase with 

 wonderful rapidity, and were it not for his 

 friends, the birds, and some others among 

 the cannibal insects, his fields would soon be 

 divested of every green thing, and himself 

 turned out a pauper from his own home. 

 But few birds will visit the garden and house 

 grounds, unless there., are trees and shrubs 

 in which to build their nest's. It is there- 

 fore important in a business way, to plant 

 trees for the home of these our feathered 

 friends, that they may be at hand to pick up 

 the cut worm when he makes his attack upon 



our plants, to look after the wire worm when 

 the furrows are turned for the corn, to arrest 

 the borer when in the winged state she is 

 busy laying her eggs in the bark of the 

 delicate fruit tree, to guard with a watchful 

 eye the insect tribe that they do no harm, or 

 at least hold them in respectful check, that 

 they take no more than their share of the 

 labors of man. , . 



HEALTHFULNESS OF TREES. ■■'.'''- 



In the first breaking up of the prairie, 

 the decomposition of the matted roots of 

 the rank grass, often induces bilious dis- 

 eases, more especially if the new plowed 

 land lies to the west of the dwelling so that 

 the south-west wind wafts the iniasmatic 

 exhalations to its inmates. A narrow belt 

 of trees robed in their summer foilage, will 

 rob the air of its deleterious gasses which 

 the leaves decompose, and the family is thus 

 protected from its otherwise bad effects. In 

 like manner a belt of trees interposing be- 

 tween the homestead and a malarious marsh 

 or river bottom, will rob the air of its deadly 

 vapors. Would that our farmers might con- 

 sider these valuable traits of the leafy treas- 

 ures of the trees. 



It is said that an ounce of preventive is 

 worth a pound of cure, and in the case of 

 trees is eminently true. The trees by break- 

 ing the force of the chill winds of spring, 

 forwards and increases both garden and field 

 crops. They induce the birds to look after 

 the insects which otherwise would do as 

 much damage. By sheltering the home- 

 stead, it protects the family from the bad 

 effects of. poisonous gasses that rapid chan- 

 ffes of heat and moisture distil into the air, 

 but which the leaves always drink in when 

 they come in contact with their delicate tis- 

 sures. Fruit trees are always valuable as 

 well as profitable, and the cry that their 

 planting has become so common that in a 

 short time they will become unsaleable, is 

 but the old cry of the boy and wolf, with the 

 wolf left out, for the wolf never comes. 

 Forty years ago we heard this same predic- 



