1913. 
WITCH HAZEL CROP IN CONNECTICUT. 
Winter Work in the Swamps. 
At this time of year many of the young men in 
the towns along the Connecticut River south of 
Middletown and back on the farms of Middlesex 
and New London counties, are preparing for their 
Winter’s work in the swamps cutting witch hazel 
brush—as “brush” they always refer to it—just as 
in the timber country the thoughts of the able-bodied 
are on the lumber camps. In many cases in Con¬ 
necticut the fathers and uncles of these young fel¬ 
lows will join them after the harvest has been dis¬ 
posed of. Where they don’t cut brush themselves 
they haul it out to town with ox teams. Connecti¬ 
cut is the home of witch hazel distillation, and get¬ 
ting out brush is the Winter work of thousands of 
men in the aggregate. Nor is the 
cutting confined to this district en¬ 
tirely, but it was in Essex that witch 
hazel extract was'first distilled, and 
the principal distilleries are located 
there and in Chester and Clinton now. 
The distillers, however, have receiving 
depots in other parts of the State, 
where the brush is taken in and hashed 
into small pieces for shipment to the 
distillery. Formerly they established 
small stills elsewhere, but that was 
found to be unprofitable. Many farm¬ 
ers about this section have their own 
stills, though, and a good-deal of witch 
hazel extract is distilled in this small 
way. 
The witch hazel, Hamamelis Vir- 
giniana, grows in rocky swamps and 
blooms in the late Fall. In October 
and November its yellow blossoms are 
often at their best, but all through the 
Winter, even in zero weather, its blos¬ 
soms are fresh. Its natural habitat is from Louisi¬ 
ana to Canada., but it seems to flourish especially in 
Connecticut. The farmer boy requires no complicated 
equipment to go cutting brush; rough, warm cloth¬ 
ing and a small ax well sharpened cover his necessi¬ 
ties. Frequently three or four young fellows club 
together and build a simple camp in the woods near 
the witch hazel swamp, and stay in for weeks at a 
time cutting brush. The cut brush is not left to 
accumulate long, though, and always the cutting 
gang has arrangements made to have it carted out 
to the mill or the railroad. The chopper cuts its 
with his light ax and hauls it through the swamp 
to a tote road. Occasionally the lay of the land is 
such that the ox team can be driven directly into 
the swamp and the brush loaded where it 
falls, and when the weather is cold 
enough for things to be frozen up this 
is the usual practice. If there is snow 
on the ground, a sled is used. Oxen 
haul the brush because they work 
much better in the swamps than horses 
would. The cart or sled has wooden 
riggings, sometimes simply poles set 
along the edges, and sometimes with 
strips laced between the poles to form 
a sort of cradle, and a lot of the brush 
can be piled on it. The average load 
for a team of oxen is about 3,000 
pounds, a ton and a half of witch hazel 
brush. 
Delivered, the brush brings $3.50 a 
ton usually, which means $5.85 a load, 
and the amount of it the cutter cuts 
depends on him. An acre of swamp 
where the witch hazel grows thickly 
will yield about a half ton to the 
acre or a little better. It is customarily 
figured that l(i acx*es yields from eight 
to 10 tons, which sells for from $28 to 
$35. There are all sorts of records for 
cutting, and through the Fall the town 
talk is of how this man or that cut a 
tremendous amount of brush. It is hard to say what 
would be a fair average. One man, working briskly, 
however, ought to cut a 10-acre piece of brush in a 
couple of weeks. 
Where the brush is purchased by the distiller stand¬ 
ing and cut by day labor under his direction, or 
that of a foreman acting for him, or perhaps by 
contract (for there are contractors who will fur¬ 
nish a gang to cut witch hazel brush at short notice), 
ihe usual price paid is from 50 cents to a dollar a 
l"n. and the distiller pays all the expenses of cut¬ 
ting. 'The prices are fairly stable, for there is little 
livalry among the distillers. Occasionally one may 
drive a hard bargain, but it doesn’t pay in the long 
■nn; he is going to remain in business where he is 
!l) i’ a long time, or means to, and is to an extent 
dependent on the brush cutters. 
THE! RURAL NEW-YORKER 
It takes from three to five years for a new crop 
of witch hazel to grow on land that has been cut 
over. The plant is, of course, very hardy and it 
grows fast. In some swamps the land is richer than 
in others, and that has most to do with the rate of 
growth. The brushr grows quite wild; no attempt 
is made to hasten its growth. Thousands of acres 
of land in these counties—wet. swampy and of no 
other value—is made to yield a fair revenue by 
growing witch hazel brush. 
Nor is witch hazel the only brush which these 
choppers cut. There is a growing demand for the 
oil of Black birch, which is commercially known as 
oil of wintergreen. and large quantities of this are 
distilled now in Essex and the other witch-hazel 
towns. Smaller quantities of other essential oils 
are produced also, and a small amount of the real 
HAULING OUT TIIE WITCH HAZEL. Fig. 414. 
oil of wintergreen. If the brush gangs happen on a 
thick patch of wintergreen. they pick it if they aren’t 
too busy, for it meets with ready sale to the distiller. 
Yet the distillation of the real wintergreen oil is 
hardly more than a pastime for him: he can get a 
good price for it, but there is not enough of it to be 
made for the market to expect it, and only an expert 
can tell the difference between oil of Black birch and 
oil of wintergreen. 
The distillation of witch hazel began in Essex 
about the middle of the last century, when the Rev. 
Thomas Dickinson distilled it and also Black birch, 
and sold the former to his neighbors for an embro¬ 
cation and the latter as a candy flavoring. One of 
the earliest witch hazel distillers was a Mr. Redfield, 
of Killingworth, in the interior of Middlesex Countv. 
CUTTING THE WITCH HAZEL BRUSH. Fig. 415. 
This is the town which until recently had neither 
railroad, trolley line, telegraph nor telephone within 
its borders, and got one mail a day via Clinton by 
stage. It now has the telephone, which includes 
the telegraph. Redfield made about 10 barrels of 
witch hazel extract a year. Witch hazel extract was 
first put on the market by Dr. Whittemore. the Essex 
druggist, who called it variously “Hawes’ Extract.” 
"Extract of Hamamelis” and “Golden Treasure,” and 
on the label of the latter’s bottles he used a cut 
showing a miner digging gold. A descendant of the 
Rev. Mr. Dickinson, however, has the largest distillery 
in the world devoted to this purpose in Essex. Of 
course the facilities of the present day are- very 
different from the crude appliances with which the 
extract was first distilled, but the product Is no 
different. That is, it is no different when pure. 
1079 
There are very many different grades of witch hazel, 
though, and while the pure food and drug law has 
stopped the sale of much of the inferior extract, 
wood alcohol is still used to adulterate it, and there 
is danger in buying from irresponsible concerns or 
at very low prices. 
The largest witch hazel storehouse in the world is 
at Essex. In it 6,000 barrels of the fluid may be 
stored at one time. From Connecticut it is shipped 
all over the world. A great deal of it goes to Paris, 
where it is used in the manufacture of toilet articles, 
and in the aggregate a great deal more goes into the 
barber shops of this country. The stranger who 
leaves the train at the Essex station asks what the 
pleasant pungent odor is which he notes so plainly 
before he asks about the storehouse across the way. 
He may also see another sign that witch hazel is 
distilled in the vicinity, for it will have 
to be admitted that sometimes the na¬ 
tives drink the extract. 
Connecticut. ,j. olin howe. 
FIGHTING THE WHITE GRUBS, 
The picture at Fig. 413, taken from 
a government bulletin on common 
white grubs, shows the familiar insect 
up to his mischief on a potato. During 
the year we have many calls for infor¬ 
mation about this insect. They are 
frequently very bad in strawberries, 
and this year they have caused more 
damage with our potatoes than ever 
before. It is almost impossible to get 
rid of them in a strawberry bed while 
they are attacking the crop, since they 
give little indication of their presence 
until the plant wilts or dies. The life 
history of this insect covers at least 
three years, and as it is most abundant 
in old meadows or pastures, a farmer 
should remember that it is not safe to set such 
plants as strawberries close after plowing such an 
old sod. From time to time we have reports from 
people who claim to have killed out the white- grubs 
b,\ heavy applications of wood ashes or chemical 
fertilizers. Such cases are very rare, and in general 
no one can expect to get rid of the white grub in 
this way. In a small way.and in strawberry patches, 
many grubs can be killed by injecting bisulphide of 
carbon into the soil around the plant, but this would 
hardly be practical except in small patches. There 
are only two ways of thoroughly cleaning out the 
grub. One is thorough culture. The ground con¬ 
taining the grubs should be plowed in the Fall, and 
the poultry left free to follow the plow. This plow¬ 
ing should be done quite early, before the grubs 
burrow down into the soil for Winter. 
Hens and turkeys are good grub ex¬ 
terminators. and a flock of them fol¬ 
lowing a plow at this time will get 
many of them. The young ones and 
eggs will be left in the ground, and 
thorough culture for a couple of years 
will get rid of most of them; thor¬ 
oughly stirring the ground, especially 
in the latter part of Summer, will 
break up the eggs and young insects, 
and prevent their growth. 
Another way of getting rid of this 
pest is to turn a herd of lively young 
pigs into the field and feed them no 
more than enough to keep them hun¬ 
gry. The pigs are very fond of this 
insect, and they will root and tear the 
ground often to a depth of two feet 
in order to get the grubs. They will 
turn the ground upside down, and get 
every grub within reach. After they 
are done with the soil, it may be 
plowed and thoroughly fitted and plant¬ 
ed in corn ,after which with good cul¬ 
ture it may safely be put into straw¬ 
berries or similar crops. This pig 
treatment is really the most practical way of 
cleaning out the grubs. 
INOCULATING FOR VETCH. 
I noticed an article on page 094 by G. A., en¬ 
titled, “What Ailed the Vetch?” I have had a simi¬ 
lar experience with 10 acres of vetch sown in Sep¬ 
tember. 1912, and was in a quandary to know what 
was the trouble and watched your columns closely; 
but after getting Bulletin 520, “Vetch in the South 
Atlantic States,” I was convinced that it was due 
to the seed and soil not being inoculated. Since 
being convinced of this fact I have noticed others 
had a similar experience the year previous, but the 
following year had a beautiful crop. We had enough 
seed mature, we think, to reseed our ground and we 
are under the impression this is G. A.’s trouble. 
Crozet, Va. R . B . c . 
♦ 
