North Carolina Farm Notes From Southern Planter, 1944

“Carolina Farm Notes” by F.H. Jeter, Extension Editor, N.C. State College, Raleigh, as published in the September 1944 issue of The Southern Planter

Cotton, tobacco, and peanuts are cultivated largely by mules; a hardworking mule eats a lot of corn; and corn, therefore, is possibly the most valuable feed crop grown in North Carolina, occupying the largest acreage of any other field crop. Ordinarily, these corn fields are small with several on each individual farm. They are rotated with the other crops and oftentimes, this corn field will come right next to where small grain was grown during the winter.

J. Myron Maxwell, Extension entomologist, says it appears now that some of this procedure must be changed. Tarheel farmers have a new pest, the chinch bug, which made his presence felt in a way that hurt this past season. After destroying about $70,000 worth of small grain in the two main centers of infestation, the bug moved from the small grain to adjoining corn fields where the nymphs of the first generation killed about $308,850 worth of corn. Demonstrations in which 392 growers used 30,000 pounds of Dinitro dust, protecting 4,698 acres, saved corn worth $146,984 but this is only a start. More than 100,000 pounds of the dust will be needed next spring if the pest is fought adequately, but should the season be rainy, about twice that amount will be needed.  This does not mean that the chinch bug develops more rapidly in wet weather, because the pest seems to prefer a dry season; it means that the rains will wash away the barriers of Dinitro dust.

At present, centers of infestation are in Mecklenburg and Pitt counties. But around Mecklenburg the pest was serious in Cabarrus, Stanly and Union counties. Around Pitt the farmers of Jones, Duplin, Wayne and Sampson felt its presence. Other less slightly affected counties were Cleveland, Rutherford, Pasquotank, Perquimans, Gates, Chowan, Robeson and Columbus. All in all, the growers of 25 counties lost production this year through attacks of the bug and they are planning to take some action before the next season.

Feed From Turnips

With milk routes spreading from one end of North Carolina to the other, permitting a farmer with two or three cows to market his surplus milk conveniently, the need for some succulent winter feed for these cows becomes more pressing.

John A. Arey, dairy specialist, says Sudan grass is good for late summer but, for fall, nothing beats the plain, garden variety of turnips. Seeded on fertile or well-fertilized land at the rate of from 3 to 5 pounds of seed an acre, yields of from 6 to 8 tons of turnips have been harvested and when properly fed to the milk cows this feed promotes higher milk production.

C.N. Dobbins of Yadkinville says there is no better feed. He has used the crop successfully with his own cows and this past season, he saved $00 pounds of recleaned seed from 1 ½ acres to provide a seed supply for his neighbors.

Plant Grain Early

Those who intend to do winter farming in North Carolina should seed small grain early this fall and fertilize it well, believes Dr. Emerson R. Collins, Extension agronomist. Dr. Collins is again urging all North Carolina farmers to plant winter legumes, cereal hay mixtures, and small grains for food and feed. A concerted effort to have as large an acreage planted as possible will be made, but, in all cases, growers are advices to fertilize well and plant early.

For instance, Dennis Hopper, well-known grower of Henderson Count y, produced 90 bushels of rye on 15 acres, or an average of 34 bushels an acre, compared with the State’s average of 9 ½ bushels. The rye was seeded on October 12, using 7 pounds of seed an acre. The previous crop was snapbeans, which had received 1,000(?) pounds of fertilizer per acre, while the rye received directly 200 pounds per acre of a 4-10-6 mixture. In addition to the supply of feed grain produced, Hooper had his straw for $15 a ton.

Helpful Neighbors

The Golden Rule was put into practice throughout North Carolina during the 1944 tobacco harvest and little of the golden weed was lost for lack of labor. In some sections where the growers had been accustomed to a surplus of labor, the lesson in cooperation was hard but stern necessity prevailed and in some communities the people organized themselves under the direction of their neighborhood leaders in such a way that the available labor could be swapped around., As Edwin Peterson of the ???ress Creek Community in Bladen County put it, “”Every family in our community promised to do this, regardless of how little or how much tobacco each family had. When the tobacco was all housed, a big community barbecue was held.”

In one community of Pender County, there were 40 acres of tobacco on 8 farms with 27 people available to handle the crop.  The problem was solved by “barning” for each family in a group of days. It was in this way that the crop was saved over a large portion of the tobacco belt.

Wilt Resistant Tobacco

Demonstrations being conducted with tobacco growers throughout the eastern section of North Carolina indicate that the new wilt resistant strains of tobacco developed at the Tobacco Branch Station near Oxford in Granville County are effective. W.B. Buttry of Chocowinity, Route 1, said that wilt resistant strain 11-45 stood up almost 100 percent in a field badly infested with the Granville Wilt. The resistant tobacco was uniform in height, in size of leaf and in shape of leaf. Check rows planted with the usual variety grown on the farm showed a 70 percent infection and the stalks were very irregular in growth and size. Because this wilt disease is spreading rapidly throughout the new tobacco belt, growers are much more interested in the performance of the resistant strains.

Farm Paid Better

Frank Groves of Hyatts Creek Community in Clay County earned $600 in cash on his small farm in 1940. He sold a few eggs and chickens, marketed a small amount of surplus what, a few pounds of cured meat, two or three calves and some field seeds—but mostly he worked off of the farm whenever there was a need for his labor.

Then he began a definite crop rotation, using TVA phosphate, liming, manuring and including legumes to be turned under for soil improvement. He is now milking 8 good cows, has built a grade A barn, increased the production of his soil, and has reduced his acreage of cultivated crops. He says he has made an average of $8 a day this past year and that the farm is just beginning to prove to him what it can do.

An Active Mutual

For years now, the Beaufort-Hyde Livestock Mutual Association has aided the farmers in that hog growing territory to sell their animals for highest prevailing prices. The mutual is one of the few such organizations that has continued to exist in North Carolina and to render service despite periodic low prices and other handicaps. Each year, the group meets for an annual picnic or barbecue when the year’s work is summarized and reported, new officers are elected, and plans made for the new year. At the last meeting in Washington, W.W. Bullock of Belhaven was elected president. J. Irving Hodges, secretary and treasurer, reported that during the past year, the little mutual had shipped 5,083 hogs which had netted the farmers $14,850.09.