The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1891-10-21
Destructive Weather.


The weather OF the past few weeks
has undone much of the good that was
done by the fine weather early in the
season in North Dakota, and the farm
ers in the Northwest will suffer losses
aggregating I'm the millions The dam
age can as yet only be estimated, but
that the loss will be very great there
seems no doubt. The railroads had
made special arrangements to handle a
great crop, and the farmers considered
their own plans amply sufficient But
so great was the wheat crop that, first,
II was almost impossible to hire enough
help TO secure the crop, and very large
part of it had to be left standing in the
shock. Then IL was found that the sup
ply of thrashing machines was insult
ficient, and that caused delay which
left folly half the crop still in the fields
unthrashed when the rain came.
Rain has been general and abundant,
and it is this which has caused the great
est loss
At jamestown, in the North Dakota
Jim River Valley, rain and snow fell
continually for day and a night, and
last week there was but one full days
wheat thra hing. Reports are received
of grain sprouting in the stacks. At
Eevl's Lake, in the northern part of
the State, n heavy rain fell, which will
stop thrashing for several days. No
grain has been stacked owing to the
scarcity of laborers. Lakota IN. d. }
reports snow, with thrashing stopped
entirely, and fears that TN css the
weather clears soon much of the grain
will be unfit to be thraShed. In the
northern part of North Dakota there
will, however, be more loss from lack of
laborers than from bad weather.
Northwestern Minnesota gives about
the same report as North Dakota. 1t
commenced raining again about Crooks
ton and continued all Of one day. There
have been only very few days of dry
weather in four weeks, and farmers are
getting discouraged In Traverse Coun-
ty and Central Western Minnesota the
larger portion of the wheat has not yet
been thrashed and men and machines are
greatly needed.
Colonel T. =. Wa ker, OF Minneapol S,
says of the situation:
II have Just returned from trip
through that section. 1t made my heart
ache to witness the ruin. In order to
appreciate it one must actually see It,
There are thousands of acres Of
simply wonderful wheatfe.ds almost
utterly destroyed by the rains. And
the mud-it is perfectly execrable. Day
after day we tramped in the slush across
fields-slush half knee-deep. / went
out with Government surveying party
to establish town lines, and the rain and
mud broke up our party, and we were
forced TO abandon the work entirely.
"The reports published in the papers do
not cover half the devastation. AS far
as the eye can rea in every direction
are great big shocks of wheat and it all
would have graded No. 1 hard had it
been thrashed out before the rains fell
Now nothing can be done. 1t is too late
to save even q modicum. Were the
shocks in a condition to be thrashed, it
would be a physical impossibility to do
anything with the crop, for the reason
that teams cannot haul the wheat to the
thrashers nor haul fuel to the engines.
"The difficulty in the first place arose
over getting help to do the thrashing,
but the railway companies succeeded in
getting both men and machine into the
fields. When they arrived they were
poweress. The mud was so deep that
the horses mired to their bellies, and
nothing can be done now until the sun
dries out both the sol and the shocks Of
wheat
at is painful to stand on prominence
and survey the situation. Everywhere
thrashing machines are visible-all
abandoned-and the wheat for hundreds
of miles ruined"