AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
331 
1882 .] 
A Rabbit Trap. 
Mr. S. R. McConn, Bates Co., Mo., sends us 
a sketch and description of an excellent rabbit 
trap. He writes : Rabbits are a great nuis¬ 
ance here, both in the garden and orchard, 
and a trap of the following kind put in a 
blackberry patch, or some place where they 
like to hide, will thin them out wonderfully. 
A common salt barrel, with a notch sawed 
■out at top, is set in the ground level with the 
top. There is an entrance box, four feet 
long, with side pieces seven inches wide—top 
and bottom four and a half or five inches. 
The bottom board is cut in two at b, and is 
somewhat narrower than in front, that it 
may tilt easily on a pivot at c. A small washer 
should be placed on each side of the trap at 
c, that it may not bind in tilting. The dis¬ 
tance from b to c should be somewhat longer 
than from c to d, that the board will fall back 
in place after being tipped. No bait is re¬ 
quired, because a rabbit (hare) is always look¬ 
ing for a place of security. The bottom of the 
box should be even with the top of the ground 
at the entrance to the top of the barrel. The 
barrel should be covered closely with a board, 
as shown in the engraving. Remove the rab¬ 
bits from the trap as fast as they are caught. 
Brood-Sow Pens. 
BY A. X). FIELD, WARREN CO., IOWA. 
The accompanying figures represent a con¬ 
venient arrangement for brood sows. The 
Fig. 1.— PLAN OF CHEAP PIG-PEN. 
pens are not equal to the costly piggeries of 
wealthy breeders, but they answer a good 
purpose here, in a new country, where we 
are obliged to get along cheaply. Many of 
my neighbors who have built expensive 
houses say my pens answer a better purpose 
than theirs. First, there is a tightly-boarded 
pen (except in front), 16 by 12 feet. This is 
divided into four 
nests, 12 by 4 feet. 
A shed roof extends 
8 feet from the rear. 
The tops of the 
nests are covered 
with boards, and 
the space between 
this room and the 
roof is filled with 
straw, making it wind-tight, except in front. 
“When young pigs are expected during the 
cold weather of winter, I hang a gunny sack 
in front of the nest. The doors, figure 2, 
are the most convenient of any I have tried. 
•The board door is slipped in from the top, 
between pairs of cross-boards in the pig-pen. 
Seeding Down With and Upon Root- 
Crops. 
Farmers so habitually follow in the time- 
honored ruts of their fathers, that they do not 
take kindly to innovations of any sort. Seed¬ 
ing to grass with root-crops, however new to 
our old-fashioned round-about practice, is 
nevertheless a very good plan. Sowing grass- 
seed with grain of any kind is unphilosophical, 
inasmuch as grass and grain, being plants of 
the same natural family, make similar drafts 
upon the soil. Root-crops draw different ele¬ 
ments from the soil—at least in widely differ¬ 
ent proportions — so that clover and the 
grasses follow naturally in the rotation. 
Land ought not to be laid down under any 
circumstances unless it is in condition to 
carry a grass crop several years. For this, as 
is well known, the soil should abound in 
residuary manure—that is, in manure which 
other crops have failed to take, and which is 
therefore left as an accumulation of fertility 
in the soil. We can not ordinarily plan so 
as not to have considerable residuary manure 
left after every manured crop; so we put 
grass at the end of the rotation, to occupy 
the soil so long as it makes good returns. 
To seed down with turnips sowed broad¬ 
cast, the turnip-seed may be mixed with 
timothy and clover, and thus sowed very 
evenly—at all events, much more evenly 
than if sowed by itself. When seeding with 
red-top, orchard grass, or any of the light- 
seeded grasses, it will not do to mix the 
seed, for, in casting, the heavy turnip-seed 
would go much further. To seed down upon 
root-crops in drills, the grass-seed is not 
sowed until the roots are well established, 
and have been once or twice hoed. This 
will have levelled down the ridges to nearly 
a flat surface. The grass-seed is sowed 
broadcast just after the last hoeing and raked 
in, or just before the last hoeing, which will 
sufficiently disturb the surface to secure the 
covering of the seed. In the spring it will 
do very well to trust to rains beating grass- 
seed into the soil, but in mid-summer this is 
an unsafe reliance. After pulling the roots, 
the field should be well rolled, so as to give 
it an even surface for future convenience. 
The Corn Worm. 
About the time the field-corn reaches the 
“ roasting-ear ” state, and earlier with sweet- 
corn, there arrive by mail and by other 
means, numerous ears of com with sad com¬ 
plaints of the worm, which we shall find 
within the ear. This caterpillar (Heliothis 
armigera,) to many known as the “Coi-n- 
worm,” is the same insect that troubles the 
cotton grower by attacking the forming seed 
vessel, and is known to him as the “Boll- 
worm.” Not only does it feed to a destruc¬ 
tive extent upon these widely unlike plants, 
but in some of the Western States, it is the 
worst enemy with which the tomato-grower 
has to contend ; it is also destructive to green 
peas, and has been known to attack young 
pumpkins. String-beans, lucerne, hemp and 
I tobacco, are other plants it has been known 
to eat. It also visits the flower garden for a 
feast upon the buds of the gladiolus. Its 
geographical range is in keeping with its 
great variety of food, it being reported 
as occurring in the Isle of Wight, in Australia, 
and in Japan. Though it is most generally 
noticed when it attacks the corn in the ear, 
it is now known that in some places, at least, 
an earlier brood feeds upon the staminate 
flowers, or “ tassel,” eating through the 
leaves that surround it, in order to get at the 
the cohn worm (Heliothis armigera).. 
tassel before it is developed. The engraving 
represents the caterpillar of different ages. 
It is so variable in color, one might suppose 
there were several species, as the individu¬ 
als are all the way from light-green to dark- 
brown, In all, however, the body is marked 
with alternate light and dark lines, with nu¬ 
merous black spots from which soft hairs are 
produced. When full-grown, the caterpillar 
enters the earth, and there forms a cocoon of 
silk, intermingled with earth, and assumes 
the pupa state. In three or four weeks, the 
perfect insect appears as a moth of variable 
color, but generally of a pale clay-yellow, with 
a faint greenish tint, with pale olive and 
brownish markings. The different stages of 
the insect are shown in the engraving ; below, 
at the right hand is the cocoon, the pupa next 
above, and then the moth, all of the real size. 
The moth deposits her eggs upon the “ silk ” 
of the corn, and the young caterpillars make 
their way beneath the husks to the growing 
kernels where they riot and make sad work ; 
