Rensselaer Union, Volume 9, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 June 1877 — Bust in Wheat. [ARTICLE]

Bust in Wheat.

As this is about the season of the year when rust may be discovered on wheat and other blades, it may be interesting to noty some of the differing opinions as to its cause. Dr. Dwight, of the old Maine Farmer , held that it was owing to too much sap, produced by an excess of food of animal nature, or from animal manure. Those opposing this view consider it occasioned by a fuligus plant, very small and yet very uumerous, a kind ofnioss, which attaches itself to the leaves and stalks of the gram and sucks the sap till there is no more of it. They even assert that a barberry bush in the vicinity of a grain Held will bring on the rust, because this moss or fungus is always found on the barberry, and that it spreads from the hush to the grain. This view had for its advocates a host of Sir*, anions them Sir Humphrey Daw •' > r

Joseph Banks; and after paying all due respect to such honorable worthies, we must frankly dissent aud differ with them, for in days of yore we have helped to reap, with sickle in hand, where “lots” of barberry bushes, clad in all their peculiar garb, abounded, and yet the grain was entirely free from rust. Along come others, however, and tell Us that rust is caused by a superabundance of dew settling on the leaves and stalks, and when the sun comes up so hot and scorching, in either scalds, or by some other proces bringss on the rust. It is hardly possible for the dew to become so hot a 3 to injure anything before it is dissolved by the air and taken off the blades. But it is said in Italy and other countries where dews abound, they take a long rope with a man at each end and sweep over their grain fields to shake off the heavy dews before the Sunrise. This sweeping may be beneficial in putting the stalks into action, and thus by agitating, start up up and assist circulation, relieving the already gorged vessels or tubes of the plants, to prevent their bursting and destroying the plants. Trees grow and absorb sap best when stirred by winds, and may not this shaking by the rope, each morning, assist the growth of the stalks of : grain? We strongly incline to the theory of too much sap as the primary cause of rust in grain, while secondary causes have much to do in its development and ravages. This is a fine field for discussion, and farmers should give all the information they have upon a question so vitally affecting one of our great staple productions. — Rural Sun.