The Savannah morning news., 1902-12-08

and warm and the second and third
days of Christmas month were more
like the balmy days of April and the
warm rains speedily brought back a
tinge of green to the face of nature.
If the trees could as readily reas-
sumo their leaves as our God grass"
does its emerald shade how quickly the
earth could present the appearance of
spring The birds are singing as gayly
in the leafless trees as is their event
amid the buds of May. The soil is
warm enough to sprout any seeds that
might be consigned to it. The Indian
summer is 10th to submit to its nat
ural successor. Thus it disturbs the
equilibrium of the seasons and leaves
to gentle spring to bear the burden of
the intrusion; for winter will ask to
linger in the lap awhile and in due
time will puzzle him who goes out to
sow.
Truly it requires a very long prac-
teal experience, and a most intelli-
gent study of the record to boot, TO
enable the sower to make due allow
ance for fair Natures Inconsistency, or
inconsistency which
Soon or later winter must have her
own. If denied to her early she viii
demand it later and she has been
known to demand in March, even in
April, an equivalent for her loss in
December or November.
In abnormal winters such as the
present promises to be there may be
more spring like weather in February
than in March. This happens now
and then. The sower deceived by APP
pearance thinks spring has surely
come to stay and only sows to have
to SOW again.
In the past twenty-five years there
have, been saveral occasions where
March competed with January for the
minimum temperature of the winter.
1t is not the orange and other fruit
trees alone that suffer serious dam
age from such i'll timed conditions.
We are quite sure that far more than
half of the diseases that affect our
perennial plants, trees especially are
the direct or indirect consequences of
frozen sap"
Premature. flow of sap melted by
abnormal heat in mid-winter, which Is
of such frequent occurrence in our eli
mate in January or February, swells
the buds of the trees and these are
readily frozen by an air temperature
of so or less. The sap is the blood of
sity become impaired disordered, in
the act of freezing and thawing. The
''yellows" of peaches, the blight" of
pears, much written of but little un-
derstood, are, in all probability, the
result of diseased condition of the sap,
creating as it were a tuberculosis or
consumption within the plant.
We may not suspect the real nature
of the disease, but we do know that
yiUnr0lIC VacOrt must "a had 70 the
knife and a free use of tonic in the
shape of bordeaux mixture. In the
case of ''yellows" the axe is prescribed
as the most suitable surgical instru-
ment "Yellows" is to peach trees
pretty much what "glanders'' is to
horses, affecting old trees as it does,
1t has been regarded as incurable. In
either case only heroic remedies are
appropriate.
Speaking on the subject of the ir-
Irregularities and uncertainties of the
weather in our Southern winters it
does seem that it is becoming more
common of late the occurrence of pro-
tracted warm spells just about the
time that mid winter is written upon
the record, January to wit. Two years
out of three in the past fifteen or
twenty years. spring has seemed to
jump forward into the laps of winter
and for two weeks at a time mild
weather has prevailed, causing a pre-
mature growth of vegetation that
could only prove injurious in the end.
The trucker and the fruit grower felt
the evil results.
The question is frequently sprung
whether anything can be done to so
Tetard the budding Of trees and plants
under such conditions that they would
cot be affected seriously by them. 1t
was suggested that mulching might
be resorted to as a means, but 1t was
easily shown that only in rare in
stances would it be practical.
1t might be made of use in the case
IF certain growing plants of the
garden, including strawberries, where
the foliage could be protected from the
sun while the soil was being kept cool
oy mulch put on after the soil had
eecome frozen very early in January,
perhaps earlier If sufficient cold oc-
CURED. To be effective 1t was found
$hat very thick mulch was neces-
sSry and not to be put on until the soil
Tad become cold from repeated freezes.
~ would require a very valuable crop
10 justify the heavy expense that an
effective mulch must cost And so af-
ter all it comes to this. We must
continue to take the weather as it
comes and make the best of it, wheth-
comes in spring or whether autumn
runs into a new year to meet a win.
ter so delayed it must seize from
spring a month or two to make the
ercroachment good. We Just must
not plant out of season, however, in
wiling the weather is. The more ghost
of spring shall not lead us to our I'M
doing as it may well do if we mistake
the semblance for the reality. 1t will
be well to remember a little later on
that the soil does not warm up as
promptly as does the air that sur
rounds our bodies. There may be
springtime in the air while winter is
in the soil.
With the general scarcity of good
seeds of all kinds farmers and garden
ers can not we'll afford to plant pre-
maturely nowadays. Where winter
runs into spring we have frequently
observed farmers hurrying to get in
their cotton in the period of normal
planting and without making any al
lowance for the abnormal low tenn
perature of soil. The seeds rotted in
the soil and the crop had to be re-
planted a month later. Had the cotton
been planted just two weeks later than
It was IL would have been all right.
Despite the proverb "he that observeth
the wind shall not sow and he that
regardeth, the clouds shall not reap
II is quite worth while to be governed
by certain atmospheric conditions in
regulating the planting of the CROPS
The philosopher had in mind no doubt
the man who carries things too far
A tempered and judicious regard OF
meteorological conditions win be found
rather helpful at times. At any rate,