Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1895-04-18
RUSSIAN THISTLE.
@~s<naa ways 10 Hid n Farm of The Pest
M Takes Tkorough and Systematic work
&Aecp and Cattle winser Wen on This
4Aus IL Cured whne FENDER.


thistle may be interesting 70 some of
sour readers should you see At to pub
fish il i would say:
If we wish TO clean the land Of foul
weeds we must stop sowing them. The
e.rDers of this country alone r un-
consciously sowing hundreds of bushels
u Russian thistles every year. How
10 they do 1t? Well, a friend said to
enc last fall, II am cleaning my land Of
9histles in fine shape" When asked
Aow he was doing il he said, Il am GO
ing over !. with q four horse drag and
that takes NJ every of them; as
eoon as they are loose the wind blows
them away and leaves the land as clean
IS = house floor / "smoler and went
along thinking hat with his way he
svooid not OILY thoroughly seed his
own land, but also every spot of plow-
ed land around him. Again, standing
on the street one day last month. i saw
. farmer at work in his wheat field
sowing thistles. He had a pitch-fork
and passing from one thistle 10 another
he would loosen them from the ground,
toss them in the air, and as the wind
~zs blowing quite hard, away they
would 60 across his land knocking out
Che seed continually. and on across his
neighbcrs land, seeding, seeding every
where they went, and the men who
cican their land in this way, look oyer
1t and doubtless thank God they win
have no further trouble with the foul
weed, NOT once thinking of the mill
ss0s of seeds they have planted for
another crop. Suppose you ask then
shout the seed they have sent v to
their neighbors, they reply, Am / my
brothers keeper? let him take care of
his and 1 viii take care OF mine"
There Is an cid saying chickens win
come home to roost,T and so will the
Russian thistle. am not much of a
farmer, hnt / believe that whatever Is
worth doing, should be done well.
have often been asked 10 tel
4hrough some paper what / knew
about the Russian thistle. Well, 6rst,
aIow that the way il is now handled,
a. Is a great curse to the farmers, but,
L. attended to as il should be. il will
surely prove a blessing In disguise.
I'm 1928 / sowei fax upon so acres of
old ground; IL came up nicely and /
Thought surely ! would have a good
crop. but, soon the thistle made it's
appearance and for a while IL was quite
q question which would come out
sahead. but finally the fax seemed To
xAy just what / have many times said
m regard TO other matters, Life Is too
short for me TO quarrel with these fell
lows so IL gave up the struggle and
ses The thistle get 10 the front, and /
got nc fax. Not knowing at that time
the value of my crop of thistles and
f1zx, / let il stand until the spring of
1ee4, then in order to use the land L
! obliged TO get rid of that immense
crop of old thistles. but how could it be
dome? decided to try nv hay bucker,
y soon found they would unload them
ssives and all / had to do was 20 stand
en- the machine and drive on and on
until the thistles would extend 50 far
In front that they would begin 70 roll
xader, and soon all would be left be-
hind except what remained on the
teeth, and these would rub or drag
along on the ground cleaning up every
kind of a weed. Ny man followed with
pitchfork and matches, throwing to-
gether and burning everything / left.
When we were through we thought
aue had done q splendid job, and so
- had but. like the Others / have
spoken Of. we did not think Of the seed
-e had left all over the ground Soon
after / seeded all but 10 acres Of that
ground with black barley. i Put it in
xith a press drill and in tour days il
wzs up and looking as fine a. any
grain 1 ever saw. II grew until il was
about 4 inches high and By that time
the ground had become so dry that the
barley would not grow; il seemed to
stay right there for about two weeks
I'm the meantime the ihistles had come
mp no thick that the ground looked as
though IL was coated over with green
sposs. and dry weather only made that
grow the faster. 1t seemed TO just
laugh at the barley because It could
sast grows without rain; il shot right
pas. IL leaving il almost of sight
The latter part Of July ! had about q
acres of thistles with a little barley
=aixed with IL standing 20 inches high,
and i did not know what TO do with il.
Realizing that / must ZONE time clean
nj the land in order to get another
crop, i went az il with the moving
machine and cut the whole OF it down,
rzked il up. drew IL home and stacked
IL thinking I would see il il could be
rsaed as fodder. / made my stack Is
feet wide and o. feet long. Not stack
ing il as soon as / should after cutting,
I found IL almost impossible TO work
upon il, so we piled il up in The best
shape we could from the wagon until
" was about Is feet high. BY this time
i was Disguised With the thistle, bot
still more so at what people said about
my fine stack of hay, as they called IT.;
50 ] left several loads in the field. think
ing / would burn that when / got time.
hut my stock got the start of RE ard
zte it ali up. After having built raY
stack as before stated, / topped it out
with about q dozen loads of coarse Law,
Ted I; down and left u, thinking per
.hane ] had fooled away my time and
money.
My stock and hay yard is about rs
feet square. Ny sheds and stacks are
so arranged that they break of the
north and west winds Ny yard is di-
vided into seven different yards, with
gates SO arranged that i can throw
all into one, or keep each by itself.
My feed racks are in the yard along
aide the stacks. One of these yards
contained the stack of thistles. My
horse yard was upon the north side OF
3f and the cattle ward on the south side.