Library See cl cr" Agriculture 107 Pr.ttco llcly. Uuiv r,33 ty Ir-rlc, Xu. IGGO2 £ l , - Voi. 20 No. 19 A group of grape growers braved howling winds to watch Dr. Carl Haesler, kneeling, give a pruning demonstration in the young vineyard of Robert Hummer, Manheim. Grape Marketing Plan Presented to Growers By Dick Wanner A marketing program to encourage the use of Penn sylvania wine grapes was outlined Thursday afternoon to about 30 grape growers attending the annual Lan caster County spring grape meeting in the Farm and Home Center. Ray Reiter, a marketing specialist with the Penn sylvania Department of Agriculture, told the group that Pennsylvania apple growers have been operating a program for the past seven years, and the state’s red cherry growers began a similar one last year. A former fruit grower himself, Reiter outline*. the steps the growers would have to take if they wanted to start a program with state assistance. He noted that the Haesler clipped and quipped his way through a dozen vines before the group moved to the Raymond Stoner farm, just outside Lancaster, for a look at some more mature vines. red cherry growers started their program after a voluntary system of collecting funds had failed. Under the voluntary setup, only 10 percent of the growers had been con tributing. Now all the growers who send any amount of cherries to processors are in the program. Reiter said if the grape growers wanted to start a marketing program, they would first have to decide who should be included, how many people they wanted on their advisory board, how much money they wanted to collect, what they wanted to use the money for, and how the funds would be collected. Under a marketing program operated by the department of agriculture, Serving The Central and Southeastern Pennsylvania Areas Lancaster Farming, Saturday, March 22, 1975 money collected from growers can be used for advertising and promotion, research, or the dissemination of marketing information. “When the red cherry people were first talking about this program,” Reiter told the group, “they were concerned that because state collects the money, the state would run the program. This does not happen. All the money goes into a special account, and only the ad visory board - which is composed entirely of producers - can get the money out of the account.” Last year the cherry producers, Reiter noted, collected some $ll,OOO. Most of the money went to the national red cherry [Continued on Pace 13] Farmers Eyeing Corn Cut Back By Dick Wanner Jon Wefald, Minnesota’s fiery Commissioner of Agriculture, is spearheading a drive by Midwestern com growers to cut back the national com crop by 10 to 20 percent. Facing the Spectre of $2 com, producers in the Midwest are listening to Wefald, and many of them have signed pledges stating that they will cut back. Wefald spoke to a group of lowa farmers at the University of lowa in Ames on Thursday. The crowd was estimated at between 4000 and 5000 people. One of the people at that meeting was Robert Lounsberry, the lowa Secretary of Agriculture. Lounsberry told Lancaster Farming on Friday morning that many lowa farmers are thinking about cutting back. “But you’ve got to remember, a lot of fellows already have their fields plowed and fertilized. They’ve got the investment in the ground, and it’s going to be awfully tough to let it sit idle. In This Issue FARM CALENDAR 10 Markets 2-6 Sales Register 63 Fanners Almanac 8 Classified Ads 29 Editorials 10 Homestead Notes 42 Home on the Range 45 Organic Living 51 Junior Cooking Edition 46 Farm Women Calendar 43 Sale Reports 71 ManheimFFA 52 Garden Spot FF A 63 Fay Stoner, 1051 Eden Rd., Lancaster, will be leaving for Germany in June as an International Farm Youth Exchange representative from Pennsylvania. “I’m in favor of cutting back on com, but I don’t think we ought to reduce our total food production,” movement leaders would still a lot of hungry people in this world. If we take land out of com, I think it ought to go into legumes or some other crop.” Wefald was expected to convene another massive meeting of farmers yesterday (Friday), at the University of Minnesota. One of the scheduled guests for that meeting was Penn sylvania Secretary of Agriculture James A McHale. Pennsylvania farmers have apparently not shown much interest so far in cutting back on com or anything else. But there are exceptions. One of those is Eugene Sellers, a Lycoming County dairyman who spent half-an-hour last Friday afternoon in McHale’s Harrisburg office. Sellers County Miss Selected IF YE to Germany Although Fay Stoner won’t be leaving for Germany until June, she is already preparing for her role as an International Farm Youth Exchange representative from the United States. The Lancaster County Miss was an active 4-H member in the area until beginning her college career at Millersville State College, $3.00 Per Year told the secretary what he’d like to see the state’s far mers doing this year. Sellers said he’d like to see a 10 percent cutback in all farm commodities, but primarily in crops. He feels 20 percent of the land should be taken out of production. These two steps would be supplemented by an austerity program in which fanners would apply only absolutely necessary amounts of lime and fer tilizer and get by with the machinery they have now. The effect of a cutback on farmers in the Keystone state would be difficult to assess. William Balderston, one of the state’s biggest corn producers, said he hasn’t heard much at all about cutting back. He said he plans to plant 900 acres of com again this year, about the same as his 1974 crop, on his rented ground near Downingtown in Chester (Continued bn Page 29] where she is presently a junior majoring in psychology. As a 4-Her, Fay was a member of the Lan caster County Wildlife Club and the Lititz-Manheim 4-H Community Club taking strawberries, rabbits, flowers and gardening as her projects. A graduate of Manheim Township High School, Fay was also active in the school band, in gymnastics and also in the ski club. When asked how she had become interested in the EFYE program. Fay com mented on her decision. “A neighbor told me that Lanca ter County was searcl-ing for an IFYE candidate and after some thought, I decided to apply.” “I wanted to loam another language and thought that the IFYE program would offer a good opportunity along with learning about other people in the wo< Id.’’ Since Fay had taken German in high school anc also in college hei preference naturally went tc that country. “I had German in Higl School and in college am thought that it would be of a help to me. I was glad to be accepted in that country.” Fay applied for the IFYE program in September and following questionaires | Continued on Pace 12J
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers