260 



THE WHEAT CULTUHIST. 



growing season. The aim of the husbandman, there- 

 fore, should be to have his wheat plants grow, as much 

 as possible, before, and after these enemies flourish and 

 commit their ravages on the growing plants. Besides 

 the insects destructive to wheat that must be encoun- 

 tered in autumn, and those that it is desirable to shun 

 in the summer, before harvest, there are adverse circum- 

 stances which must be foreseen and guarded against, as 

 much as practicable, among which I may mention 

 drought, wet weather, and the sinister influence of the 

 freezing and thawing of the soil in winter. In addition 

 to these things, the habit of the wheat plant should 

 exercise a controlling influence in the mind of the 

 wheat-grower, in determining the most proper period 

 for sowing the seed for a crop of Avinter grain. The 

 wheat-grower must encounter hosts of formidable an- 

 tagonists, in autumn, in winter, in spring time, and in 

 summer. To outstrip one. dodge the other, circumvent 

 a third, take advantage of a fourth, to run the gauntlet, 

 so to speak, from September till the next harvest, liter- 

 ally surrounded by untold millions of insects that find 

 a rich subsistence on the germinating kernels, as soon 

 as they exhibit signs of vegetation, and that feed on 

 the tender blades, and extract the delicate juices from 

 the growing kernels, and to triumph over all the ad- 

 verse cii'cumstances and unpropitious influences of the 

 season, and to be able, by agricultural skill and judi- 

 cious management, to develop a large field of plump 

 wheat, waving in the breezes like a sea of gold, is, most 

 assuredly, a laudable employment. When we consider 

 how many destructive enemies growing wheat has, and 

 what a wonderfully fastidious plant wheat is, in regard 

 to the vegetable nutrition that the soil aflbrds, it seems 



