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Friday, February 24, 2023

Is New Poison Answer to Boll Weevil Problem? Feb. 24, 1923

Lenoir Planter to Increase Acreage Planted to Cotton. . . After Trip to Burke County, Kinston Merchant Believes New Poison Will Kill Weevils and Permit Normal Production

Henry B.W. Canady, president of the Kinston Merchants’ Association, and who manages the farming operations on several hundred acres of land in this section, stated to a representative of The Free Press Friday that following a limited infestation of his cotton fields by the boll-weevil last year, he had, prior to his trip Monday to Burke County in Georgia, where the Hill method of poisoning the bugs had produced such effective and profitable results, planned to reduce his cotton acreage to about 40 acres in 1923, and take little chance on wasting fertilizer for the weevils to come along and destroy his cotton. He stated that he had little faith in the dry method of dusting with calcium arsenate; that he had learned by investigation that the expense was prohibitive and the results meager.

Saw With His Own Eyes

Canady said that since he had been into Burke County, Georgia, and made personal investigation of the new boll-weevil mixture, he found incontrovertible evidence that the people of Burke County, after having several crops ruined by the weevil, had used the Hill mixture, and made nearly normal production per acre on land that had been practically abandoned. Farm after farm was visited in the Georgia county, Canady declared, and substantial proof was furnished that good yields of cotton were made where the new mixture was used, and that where the dusting and home-made methods were used the cotton produced did not pay for the fertilizer used. These statements were verified by bankers, merchants and private individuals, city and county officials at Waynesboro, the county seat, he declared. One farmer in Burke the Kinston merchant stated, planted 100 acres to cotton, did not use the Hill mixture, and raised only 14 bales. A short distance across the fields a farmer who used the new mixture produced 16 bales on 15 acres. And this in the fact of the statement that the 100-acre farmer (as loyal a Cracker as Simey O’Neal is a Tarheel) made the remark that it rained so much in that section he had to “Open the gates to let the water out.” In reply to a question, the Georgia farmer said that he had good “hickory land,” and expected to plat it all to cotton in 1923, and make a bale to the acre with Hill’s mixture. Canady spoke of scores of similar cases, where good crops of cotton were made with the new mixture, and failures made when the poison was not used. He said that all he learned was verified by merchants and bankers at Waynesboro, Gough and Augusta.

Business Good in Burke

He spoke of the striking contrast of Burke over other counties where the poison was not used, and said that he was informed by extensive land-owners and others that the cotton acreage there would be increased, and that the farmers were basing their hopes on the new mixture to protect the cotton and permit a normal yield. He said that there was an air of hustle and business activity at Waynesboro, that the merchants and bankers were extending credit to farmers, where for several years they felt that advances on a cotton crop was financial suicide. The surrounding country was already plowed and prepared for planting cotton, the farmers were busy, and the merchants were doing a good business.

The Kinston merchant expressed his faith in the new mixture, and stated that he expected to increase his cotton acreage here from 40 to 110 acres, use Hill’s mixture and produce a good crop, although his farms were invested with boll-weevils last year. On something like 400 acres Canady said his plantings would approximate 110 acres in cotton, 275 in corn, 75 in tobacco and the balance in hay, oats and other foodstuffs.

In the course of the interview, the president of the Kinston Merchants’ Association said that he believed that a remedy had been found that would kill the boll-weevil in number, at allow cost and permit normal production of cotton. He did not view the matter from a commercial standpoint, but rather as a matter of vital community interest, and was frank in his declaration that from results secured in Burke County he believed the new boll-weevil mixture would mean the salvation of the South, particularly in sections where cotton is the one money crop. He said that he believed the matter to “be of such vital community interest that the Merchants’ Association and the Chamber of Commerce should meet jointly to consider the matter, review the evidence in the Burke County case, and give the farmers of East Carolina the benefit of the successful experience of other farmers with the mixture, or if it does not kill the boll-weevil more effectively and at allow and reasonable cost, as claimed by those who have seen it tried out, then show it up and protect the farmers.”

From the front page of The Kinston Free Press, Feb. 24, 1923

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