Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1888-10-27
Tho Agricultural Year.

Tho Agricultural Year.
II cannot be overlooked that the year has
been hard ore for farmers in Maine. From
the very commencement of the season to the
present time the conditions for favorable
work. rapid growth Of crops, or growth Of the
usual degree, maturity of the same, favor
able period for harvesting, satisfactory prices
of surplus. when there 10 any surplus that is
marketable-all seem to have been wanting
So unfavorable an agricultural year has not
been known in Maine for almost = genera
ton. Like the cold year to which the older
people revert As having been without . sum-
mer, and as giving frost every month in the
year, that of 1916, the year 1888 will also be
remembered by the younger farmers of to-
day as the coolest, most unfavorable year for
farm work they have ever known. The
spring was cold, backward and unfavorable
for field work. This made farm operations
late. An early spring, one in which seed
can be got into the ground in good time and
given favorable start, will generally make
good crops even amid some untoward condi-
tons later on. But this year the favorable
spring was wanting. So also was the sum
mer wanting. Indeed there has really been
no summer. Three Or four quite hot days
have been all the summer we have had. But
to keep their courage up-for something had
to be done to prevent them from feeling blue
all the farmers we talked with on the street
and in the country would say: "Oh, we
must have some warm weather later to pay
for this think we shall have warm, ia
vorable fall" And SO they kept on. Hay
ing passed somehow, the hay being made be-
tween the dull. rainy days, and hauled in be-
fore it was fully made in some cases. With
the commencement of the harvesting period
began the elimination of disaster and I'M
favorable consequences to a season that had
good weather. On the 9Th and 9th of Sep
TENDER such a bighting frost struck the
fields of Maine corn, as has not been known
in this State since 1859, when a widespread
frost the last days of August killed this crop
throughout the State, but did not then half
begin to do the damage or create the loss which
the frost of this year has done. Following
this frost came such long period of cold,
rainy, cloudy weather right through Septem-
Der and October as farmers of this genera
ton seldom, if ever, have experienced. The
picture of unharyested fields of grain, cut
but remaining on the ground of potatoes un-
dug and in fields of water-logged soil, of corn
and beans yet in the shock and stack, not
worth bringing to barn in hundreds of cases
this picture, common over Maine this fall
is most unusual one and one which we
hope may not often be repeated in the future.
Such are some of the conditions which the
present year has brought to our farmers.
appointments, and entail much loss. The
great sweet corn crop of the state, one of our
leading cash yielding crops and one upon
which farmers have relied for ready money,
and seldom to be disappointed from natural
causes, has "gone back" sadly upon them
this year. In 1887 over 100000 in cash
was paid to our farmers for this crop alone.
This year it will not be one third of the above
sum, to say nothing of the loss of
the fodder which has been regarded
in late years, where so much
attention has been given to winter dairying,
as most important secondary crop This is
almost an entire failure in all parts of the
State. But two crops of the year have
given the fairly average yield-hay and APP
pies And as if our losses were not enough
before, and when we were counting on a
goo price for apples, collapse has occurr-
ed in the foreign demand, and the bottom
has, all of a sudden, dropped on; of prices
for apples in England. The markets there
have been flooded with American and other
apples, and it looks as though it would be
some months before anything like reasonable
prices would again be reached. This is not
Maine, little to sell, and low prices, the
price of -four has advanced two dollars on a
barrel over what it was in the summer As
Maine farmers are large buyers of flour, this
makes another setback to the year. We
must look at things as they are, therefore
mention is made of these unfavorable condi- |
lions and circumstances. But farmers have
secured good hay crop, thus enabling them
to keep their stock through the winter; there
is a large crop of corn throughout the West
which, if not cornered, will be reasonable in
price, and this can be had for supplement- |
our farmers have good homes, full barns
of hay. with well-stocked tie-ups, and hearts
full of courage. The future will be brighter
and better seasons will come in the long run. |
The ffty-tvo Dprsors from this city who |