River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1904-11-24
FARMER AND THE WEATHER
Wondered At or Harshly
Condemned.

The farmers proneness to grumble
about the weather is proverbial; and it
must be admitted that while he has
nothing like a monopoly of this trait.
he has probably larger share of it than
is possessed by any other class.
OF course the weather is a more inn
pOrtant factor in the farmers life than
in that of other people. To the city
dweller a late frost means only higher
price for his peaches; if one section does
not furnish them, another will. To the
peach grower, it may mean the difference
between prosperity and hard times. It
is small matter to the merchant or the
lawyer whether the rain comes to-day
or next week; but when man knows
that every day of fair weather is lessen
ing his corn crop, he is likely to be anx-
ious for the rains to come. When they
do come, too, in torrents, and wash away
from his hillsides soil that it will take
him years to replace, 1T is hard for him
to be patient and to refrain from think
| ing and saying many unnecessary and
| foolish things.
This is one reason for the farmers
| grumblfng about the weather; there is
another almost equally important, says
the Country Gentleman. "a poor sea-
son. is a pretty fair excuse for poor
crop. 1t is so easy to say, ''If my corn
| had been planted week earlier, it would
have been third better; but it rained
so much then I couldn't get it done"
! If it had been properly cultivated, it
might have been much better; but there
| is no use of mentioning that when the
! failure can be laid to the weather
| Doesn't it stand to reason, too, that it
| is a very exceptional case when the
weather was just the best that might
have been for any particular crop? A
| man must have something to complain
| Of and what could be surer or safer than
the weather? Other things he might
have changed, but this was utterly be-
| yond his power. For it, surely no blame
can attach to him. So if the wheat is
thin and the grass short, the apples few
and the potatoes small, what could be
more natural than to attribute it to the
| cold, or the drouth, or the frost?
Yes; farmers do grumble about the
weather, but who has a right to grumble
about anything if they have not about
the myriad uncertainties of temperature
and precipitation? If you, Mr.. Cityman,
| in everything you did had to deal with
great uncomfortable, unknowable
force which was always uncertain and
seldom or never exactly right, wouldn't
you get out of patience sometimes?
There is, however, another side to the
question. While farmers complain
about bad weather, it is doubtful if any
one else so thoroughly appreciates good
weather. When the sun and wind are
just right for haying, when the spring
opens up warm and then continues so,
when all summer long the rains have
come often enough to keep the crops
con the jump" the farmer cannot help
approaching it. He may not be so apt at
voicing his appreciation as he is his dis
satisfaction; yet it is not uncommon to
hear farmers, with smiling faces con-
graduating each other over fine year
for fruit, or a good season for wheat
sowing. Some of them can even rejoice
over favorable season for blackberries
or pumpkins.
Surely we shall continue to have both
bad and good weather; and the poor
farmers will continue to grumble about
the one, while the good ones reioices
| in the other.