Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 21, Number 92, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 August 1900 — Shall Indiana Farmers Continue to Grow Wheat! [ARTICLE]

Shall Indiana Farmers Continue to Grow Wheat!

'Throughout much cf the state the wheat crop is a disastrous failure. Thousands of farmers are asking “Is it worth while to attempt to grow wheat?” This depends on whether the cause or causes of the failure are beyond the farmers’ control. While the season had somethingto do with the po.or wheat crop, the Hessian fly was largely responsible. The ‘ fly” practically destroyed many | fields of wheat last fall,-long before 1 the beginning of winter , fylany localities exempt from the fly, proproduced a fair crop. Intelligent observing farmers quite generally agree that the “'fly” is the chief cause of failure. Cau the farmers 'control this pest or must they “give up beaten” by an insect smaller than a mosquito? INDIVIDUAL EFFORT FUTILE. | While the individual farmer may do somethingto hold the fly in check, his efforts alone are practically futile when the fly is very prevalent. In this latitude there are two broods, each year, of the Hessian fly, which propagates rapidly and migrates with ease in | the direction of the prevailing! winds. ] t follow’s, therefore, that j one farmer cannot, by good! methods, barricade his farm against i both fall and spring attacks of I these insects which are produced in countless numbers by his neg-j ligent neighbor to the windward.! But can nothing be done? Is there no hQpe? Yes, there is hope, aye Victory! If the farmers will only unite, Unite, UNITE, to combat this pest of the wheat field, the remedy. If the farmers will all employ the following measures they will outwit and largely destroy the fly, and barring a hard winter, secure a fair crop of w’heat. 1. Prepare the ground for wheat, early and thoroughly. 2. Promptly destroy all volunteer wheat in the plowed fields. 3. Sow' decoy strips of wheat, about one rod wide, around each field designed for wheat. 4. Carefully turn under these strips, using jointer and roll to bury all the larvae and “flaxseed” of the fly, just before sowing the main crop).

5. Begin seeding as soon as the fly has ceased to be active, and drill in w’ith the wheat some good complete fertilizer, unless the land is already sufficiently fertile. These measures, if adopted by all wheat growers would (1) destroy myriads of the fly; (2) avoid almost wholly the fall attack of the insect; (3) by greatly reducing the number of the pests, prevent a serious attack iu spring. The times of sowing the border and the main crop would vary with the latitude. They are approximately as follows: north third of the state, border, Sep. 1, crop Sep. 20 to 30; central third, border, Sep. 10, orop, Oct 1 to 10; south third, Ixmler, Sep. 20, crop, Oct. 20 to 30. A Word to the Skeptical, If you have no faith in the above measures', don’t sow any wheat—sow rye instead, Then you will not hinder your neighbor who is willing to “try the remedy.” The writer desires to hear from wheat growers who will undertake to enlist their neighbors in a “combined attack” pn the despised “foreigners’ the Hessian fly. W. C. Latta, Agriculturist. Purdue University.