Edition Bobbett1. Texts by Elizabeth F. Bobbett: 1.1.3. Correspondence, Letters to newspapers

1940 Elizabeth Bobbett: Letter to the Farmers’ Gazette, 01.06.1940

Wireworms

The recent showery weather has been a blessing to the farmers, for in many districts the havoc wrought by the wireworms has been very extensive. In my parish alone there must be some hundreds of acres of grain crops destroyed, and unfortunately only a few farmers were able to re-sow the ground. I wonder if the wireworm had been as active in other districts.

For several years past I have always dressed my seed wheat and seed oats with Agrosan Seed Dressing, and then put tar on it before sowing. Sometimes I add a little paraffin oil to the tar and heat it before spreading over the seed. Of course this necessitates extra time and labour, but I consider it well worth the trouble, as this year in sowing one field of oats I ran short of dressed seed and put in half a barrel of the same oats which had not been dressed with either Agrosan or tar. The result is that where this half barrel was sown I have practically no crop. I am wondering could any of my readers tell me if it is the tar that protected the oats from the wireworm, or would it be the seed dressing that strengthened the plants to resist the attack of the wireworm? The rest of the crop looks very healthy. My reason for using the tar is to keep the crows away.