6o6 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
AUG. 22 
the immediately available fertility out of the soil, and he 
declares that he will not plant a bush, vine or tree, open a 
ditch, turn a furrow, haul a load of manure or do any¬ 
thing that will even remotely benefit the rwner. He is 
one of those ehort-witted, clodhopping “ honest farmers” 
so often described by novel writers, and wept over by 
demagogic politicians who are after votes—a man who has 
worked hard all his life, who never advances or improves 
in the least, who is chronically hard up. and who is ready 
to chase after any financial will o’-the-wisp that blatant 
demagogues lead him to believe will make “times” bet¬ 
ter, money plentiful and everything lovely. 
The picture makes one feel weary. It doesn’t require 
much of an Imagination to see written on every square 
foot of the premises “ Hard Times ; ” and to hear the dolor¬ 
ous wail of the parrot, “ Farmin’ don’t pay ! ” and the oc¬ 
cupant emphatically declares that it does not Of course 
It doesn’t. Such farming, or rather, clodhopper bungling 
never did pay in any section of the country. Farming 
pays, but lubberly bungling doesn’t. It is almost needless 
to say that Mr. C. does not take any first class agricultural 
journal. He doesn’t believe in them ! fred. grundy. 
Christian Co., Ill. 
those receiving the largest quantity of seed. We have 
hoped to find a variety of wheat that would resist the 
lodging impetus; but while there is a marked difference 
between different varieties in this respect, the best of them 
are still far short of what is desirable. The old idea that 
lodging 1° to a lack of silica in the soil is pretty well 
BRACING UP THE “DOWN WHEAT.” 
Stiffening the Straw. 
Too high living; salt won’t always save It; insects do 
much damage; some varieties naturally sturdy; 
silica not all important. 
Week before last, on page 577. an Ohio correspondent 
reported a case of wheat that for some unknown reason is 
“ weak in the back.” During the past two years there has 
been an unusual amount of complaint about “ down 
wheat.” We have submitted our friend’s note to a num¬ 
ber of persons who have made a special study of this sub¬ 
ject, in the hope of obtaining all available facts to guide 
our friends in preparing for the next crop. The notes here 
presented are written in answer to the 
questions asked by E. C. H., on page 577. 
A Result of Over-Eating. 
It is most likely that high living has 
brought the wheat low. A weak stem is 
the common result of rapid growth. This 
excessive growth of the stems of the wheat 
may be partly due to the weather being 
moist, but more likely the chief cause is a 
large supply of available plant food. If 
this latter be the cause, it seems clear that 
the land needs to be relieved of a good 
share of this before, in the rotation, the 
time for wheat comes around again. Any 
kind of grain will fall when grown upon 
an area recently covered with a manure 
heap. The soil was too rich. If the soil Is 
poor, and the wheat does not stand, it may 
be due to some insect working in the stem, 
or possibly to a fungus, or the fault may 
be constitutional. If neither insect nor 
fungus is at the bottom of the trouble, it 
would be best to look for another sort of 
wheat with a reputation for uprightness. 
N. J. Exp. Station. BYRON D. HALSTED. 
Wanted ! Wheat That Will Pay for its 
Lodging. 
In 1890 a piece of land on which wheat 
was in the habit of lodging was treated 
with salt, Thomas slag, bone meal, muriate 
of potash and lime, each of these substances 
being sown on a separate plot. We were 
not able to discover that either of them had 
the slightest effect. In our experiments in 
the use of commercial fertilizer we have 
plots that receive nitrate of soda at the 
rate of 160, 820 and 480 pounds respectively, 
each year. Last year the wheat went down 
on the two plots receiving the nitrate at 
the rate of 320 and 480 pounds. This year 
we made a double experiment on these 
plots. On a section of each the nitrate was 
divided into two lots for the plot receiving 
320 pounds and three lots for the one receiv¬ 
ing 480 pounds, and was sown at intervals 
of two or three weeks. On another section, 
salt was added to the nitrate at each dress¬ 
ing, while the third section received the 
nitrate in one application on the 16th of 
April, without any salt. The result was 
that no difference whatever could be dis¬ 
covered in the result of the different 
methods of treatment. In the Rothamsted 
experiments nitrate of soda has been used 
annually on one plot since 1852 at the rate 
of 550 pounds per acre. This plot has given 
an average yield of 36 bushels per acre. 
The nitrate is applied in the spring, and in 
a single dressing. Other English experi¬ 
menters have advised the use of salt and 
the division of the dressing of nitrate. 
Neither practice is approved by Sir John B. Lawes, and 
our single experiment would indicate that the remedy is 
not to be found in this direction. 
Lodging is ascribed to the presence of an excessive sup¬ 
ply of nitrogen in the soil, and phosphoric acid in excess 
has been prescribed as a preventive; but the wheat on plot 
No. 2 that has received superphosphate alone at the rate 
of 820 pounds per acre for three successive seasons showed 
this year as great a tendency to lodge as the one that has 
received 160 pounds of nitrate of soda for the same time, 
with no other fertilizer. Lodging is supposed to be due to 
deficiency of light; but it is not uncommon for the plots 
which have been very thinly sown in our experiments in 
thick and thin seeding to lodge as badly or worse than 
Fig. 2 1 7. Fig. 2 1 8. 
Base of an Infected straw a, section of straw showing form 
a, cocoon ; b. dug of of slits made by the ovipositor; 
borings t c. circular cut; b, egg, greatly enlarged. 
d, scattered borings. 
exploded. The fact seems to be that it is due to conditions 
of soil and atmosphere which favor the most rapid growth. 
How to control these conditions and yetsecure the greatest 
possible development when the conditions are not so 
favorable Is apparently the problem before us. 
Ohio Experiment Station. CHA8. e. thorne. 
An Insect; Too Wet; Too Much Nitrogen. 
More complaint than usual has been heard this year 
about lodged wheat; in this and adjoining counties there 
land the affected stalks crinkle down and do not carry the 
others with them. These insects are often in the field in 
great abundance and the unobservant iarmer does not 
notice them. 
This season has been noted for cold nights and lack of 
sunshine; these would largely if not fully account for the 
weakened straw. These unusual climatic conditions may 
occur again and the question is what can be done to avoid 
loss in the future. First, a test of varieties should be 
made as to hardiness, yield and stiffness of straw. 
Our Rural Diehl Mediterranean stands up very much 
better and yields more than the Lancaster which we tried 
this year for the first time. If the trouble continues the 
farm manures should all be put on the corn ground and 
fertilizers containing no nitrogen should be used on the 
wheat. This is written on the supposition that the 
ground was early and most thoroughly fitted, as thor¬ 
oughly as E. C. H., Troy, O , fitted out his oat stubble. 
And, last of all, we must use less seed than formerly; this 
will be likely to reduce the yield slightly and increase the 
size of the heads and the strength of the straw as the thin 
seeding will let in the sunlight. In our experiments some 
years ago it was found that a bushel and three-fourths of 
seed gave the largest yield in an average of a large num¬ 
ber of trials; although sometimes the plots seeded with 
two bushels and two bushels and a peck gave larger 
yields than the thinner seeded ones; it was noticed in 
these experiments that where the most seed was used the 
most lodged grain was found. If we sow a peck less seed 
per acre than usual and get two or three bushels less wheat 
with standing straw, there may be more profit than can 
be realized from the larger yield and down grain. 
Cornell Experiment Station. I. P Roberts. 
Employ New Varieties or Salt. 
It is but frank to confess that I also have been annoyed by 
lodged grain this year. It is a great nuisance, and 
easier talked about than remedied. It does not arise 
from deficiency of silica, for stiffness of 
straw has been proved to be quite inde¬ 
pendent of the proportion of that constit¬ 
uent. The well-known tendency of the 
nitrates when abundant to produce excess 
of stem and leaf rather than grain un¬ 
doubtedly lies at the bottom of the dif¬ 
ficulty. It is clearly a case of too much of 
a good thing. Salt has been employed to 
check the tendency, and either this or the 
choosing of a short-strawed, erect-growing 
variety will help to avoid the difficulty 
when it can with reasonable certainty be 
foretold. The trouble is, that the same 
sorts and soils will one year do well, and 
in another give a down crop ; which often 
cannot be told till late in the history of 
the crop—too late to employ preventive 
measures. It seems to me that if there is 
great reason to suspect this difficulty, the 
remedy is to select strong growing varie¬ 
ties or else employ salt, but in most cases I 
prefer the urchin’s advice to Henry Clay: 
“Run your best and take your chances 1” 
because generally the most productive sorts 
and soils are, for the same reasons that 
make them productive, peculiarly liable to 
this danger. [prof ] E. davenport. 
Michigan Agricultural College. 
A SAW-FLY BORER IN WHEAT. Cephus pygmseus. Fig. 2 19. 
a, female beginning to oviposit; b, female with ovipositor Inserted in straw : c, insect with wings 
expanded ; d, straws cut by the larva ; e, larva in cell at base of straw. 
is perhaps many times as much wheat lodged as in an or¬ 
dinary year and more even than there was last year with 
the excessive rains of May and June. 
I learn also that the Ohio farmers have been greatly 
troubled with lodged wheat in many localities. A part of 
the trouble in New York is due, I think, to the saw-fly 
borer (Cephus pygmasus) [described elsewhere in this 
issue] which attacks the wheat when nearly ripe, reduces 
the yield but slightly but weakens the stalk materially ; 
in many fields in this locality one-fourth of the stalks 
were affected. 
It will be seen that the unaffected stalks had to bear the 
burden of holding the weakened stalks erect or all had to 
go down together; where the wheat is thin and.on poor 
A SAW-FLY BORER IN WHEAT. 
The Insect mentioned by Prof. Roberts in 
his note on “Down Wheat” was fully de¬ 
scribed in Bulletin 11 of the Cornell Ex¬ 
periment Station. The illustrations and 
description given here are taken from that 
pamphlet, written by Prof. J. H. Comstock: 
An insect destructive to wheat, but 
previously unknown in this country, has 
appeared in considerable numbers on the 
Cornell University Farm. I do not know 
of its occurrence anywhere else in this 
State; but as it is extremely abundant 
here, it is doubtless spread over a consider¬ 
able area. 
On examining the stalks of wheat at 
harvest time by splitting them throughout 
their length, it was found that some of 
them had been tunneled by an insect larva. 
This larva had eaten a passage through 
each of the joints so that it could pass 
freely from one end of the cavity of the 
straw to the other. In addition to tunnel¬ 
ing the joints, the pests had also fed more 
or less on the inner surface of the straw 
between the joints ; and, scattered through¬ 
out the entire length of the cavity of the 
straw, except the smaller part near the 
head, were to be seen yellowish particles, 
the excrement of the insect. 
If infested straws be examined a week or 
10 days before the ripening of the wheat, the cause of this 
injury can be found at work within them. It is at that 
time a yellowish, milky-white worm, varying in size from 
one-fifth of an inch to one-half an inch in length. The 
smaller ones may not have bored through a single joint; 
while the larger ones will have tunneled all of them, ex¬ 
cept, perhaps, the one next to the ground. 
As the grain becomes ripe, the larva works its way 
toward the ground; and at the time of the harvest the 
greater number of them have penetrated to the root. Here 
in the lowest part of the cavity of the straw they make 
preparations for the winter, and even for their escape from 
the straw the following year. This last provision is made 
by cutting.the straw circularly on the inside nearly sever-- 
