VOL. 25 York County Dairyman E. Wayne Beshore, left, welcomed U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland on his first official visit to Central Pennsylvania. Ag Secty. Bergland tours area farms BY JOYCE BUFF Staff Correspondent NEW CUMBERLAND - ■U .S. Secretary of Agriculture Bofa Berglaiui, on a pre-primary swing throilght the farmlands of Pennsylvania Thursday and Friday, made no pretense of why he was here. “The interest of Penn sylvania’s dairy industry and ' the .re-election of President Garter are the reasons I’irihere,’’ Bergland told farmers and. newsmen during bis stop at York County’s E. Wayne Beshore farm on Old York Road, New Cumberland. Following the meeting at Beshore’s, Bergland met over lunch with fanners and representatives of the state’s farm organizations. He then headed to Columbia County to the father-son dairy operation of Chris and Dennis Wolf. Prom there he went to State College to meet-with Penn State Ag College Dean dames Beattie in the evening. Western Pennsylvania was on the'Friday schedule. Packers and farmers beef about market BY SHEILA MILLER NEW HOLLAND - It was standing room only for some the nearly 500 formers, '*ef feeders, butchers, and meat packers that crowded mto the New Holland Sales “table on Wednesday Evening What created this great mterest on an evening when jjfcre was no scheduled sale? “«ef—and information on with stops at the farm of State Senator Patrick Stapleton, - Representative 'Paid Yahner’s vegetable operation,.-and: the, Weat morelaad County ‘ dairy setup of Boyd Wolf. Bergland noted the im portance of the state’s milk production industry, second largest business in Penn sylvania, and said be was especially pleased to be on the Beshore dairy farm. “Hie dairy industry needs to be assured and reassured,” he told a heavily milk-oriented audience of 125 'gathered outside the Beshore stall bam. But Bergland hedged on the industry’s most pressing threat, the Community Nutrition Institute’s proposal to hold hearings on allowing the reconstitution of powdered milk for fluid sales. Acknowleging that over 8000 letters against the proposal have poured into USDA, most from the nation’s dairy farmers, Bergland promised to try to announce a decision on the issue by the end of April. raising and marketing the four-legged Porterhouses. Abram Diffenbach, president and manager of the sales stables, sponsored the meeting. He said the purpose of the get-together was to meet the challenges of the ’Bos and to .develop an atmosphere of mutual trust between farmers and packers. (Turn to Pace A3S) Lancaster Farming, Saturday, Apr;! 19,1888 “We have no intention of wrecking or eroding the of the federal milk marketing order structure,” ; assured:- -fartners wiSh' v 'tiinß' < ~ v tbe> question was raised. But. the' issue rankling most farmers was the mushrooming cost of money for production. <)ne Beshore neighbor, grain producer Geary Huntsberger, fitters, quizzed the Secretary on assistance for some 200,000 large farmersnow in trouble due to increased interest rates. Terming them “the fair haired boys who balance this nation’s trade deficit,” (Turn to Page A 32) Fourth quarter egg upturn seen BY CURT HAULER LANCASTER - Producers of both white and brown eggs are in for another six months of lean times before there is any solidmarket upturn. In fact, a panel of experts at the North Atlantic Egg Marketing Association meeting held in Lancaster Thursday, agreed that any price strength between now and the last three months of 1980 could be bad pews for the egg industry. Among the highlights -of' the meeting was a specific monthly price prediction for the coming year by NEMA Economist Gary Bradley. NEMA President Allen Wenger, Rheema, said while the white egg market is dismal, producers in Penn sylvania, Maryland and Delaware are in good Pseudorabies spreads into Southeastern Pa, BY DICK ANGLESTEIN LANCASTER - Pseudorabies, an in creasingly serious disease problem in western hog producing states the past few years, has arrived in Pennsylvania. Three cases of the highly contagious disease have been confirmed in Southeastern Pennsylvania, according to Dr. John W. Cable, Chief, Swine Health Division, Bureau of Animal Industry, Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture. The pseudorabies-infected herds which have been quarantined include: —A feeder pig operation in the southeastern comer of Dauphin County. - A bog breeding operation in the East Earl area of Lancaster County. - Another feeder pig operation in the Myerstown area of LebaowtCounty. _ In addition to these three berds,the state.quartotine 'hacJaeen-extendedto nine' other hog operations which YYND: poultry precautions HARRISBURG - A statewide alert concerning Exotic Newcastle disease, WND, is being continued by the Pennsylvania Depart ment of Agriculture. Three cases of WND, one in Camp Hill, Pa., have been diagnosed in pet birds, yellow-naped Amazon parrots. The other two cases have been confirmed in Near term outlook bleak position to recover late in the year. Although expansions this immediate area has been blamed by poultrymen across the nation for in creased output and the depressed market, Wepger said there are good reasons why expansion took place where and when it did. He pointed out it used to cost two cents per dozen to SECTION A: Editorials, iu; lop aunmentai cow, 10; Dairy leaders meet, 18; Letters to editor, 23; Conococheague FFA, 26. SECTION B: Estate planning, 2; equipment leases, 3; Cereal Research Center, 4; Fine tune cropping, 6. SECTION C: Flying farmer queen, 2; Joyce Bupp, 5; Home on range, 6; Lehigh FFA, 13; Pork King, 15; Shattercane, 28; The Milk Check, 35; York DHIA, 37; Trout breeder, 38; Apple referendum, 46. SECTION D: FFA speaking contest, 2; Cumberland DHIA, 6; Franklin DHIA, 8; Dauphin DHIA, ll;,Fann Talk, 15; Birth 'of the broiler-industry, 24; Ask the VMD.27. received animals in recent months from the Lancaster County breeder. Among areas involved in these additional quarantines are the Manheim and Ephrata areas of Lancaster County, Fleetwood, Berks County; Phoenixville, Chester County; and Montgomery County. The disease is very con tagious and can be tran smitted quickly to other animals, such as Cattle, sheep, dogs, cats, rodents and even some wild animals. In th° Lebanon County infection, five heifers which were running with the pigs were lost very quickly within a 12 to 72-hour period, Dr. Cable said. A number of young pigs, reportedly about 200, died in the Lancaster County breeding operation. Also, some cats, which had eaten tissue of the dead animals, died within a 21 to 48-hour period, Dr. Cable added: ' ' ' -Mere thnn JOO feeders and Alexandria, Va., and Norco, Calif. Thus far, ten pet shops in six different Pennsylvania locations are under quarantine in efforts by a joint state-federal task force to prevent additional ex posure. Poultrymen are advised to take the following ship eggs up from the South where today the price is seven to eight cents. But, Wenger said, there needs to be a transition period when displaced eggs find homes and the less efficient producers are shaken out. John Ricca, the vice president of NEMA, said the brown egg market is as bad as the white. He has 500,000 Trc this issue $7.00 Per Year breeders were told of the pseudorabies outbreaks at a special meeting on swine health problems Wednesday night at the Farm and Home Center. Dr. Larry Hutchinson, Penn State veterinarian, cited the three cases and a brief discussion of pseudorabies was given by Dr. Neil Becker, veterinarian from the University of Florida. “In a county like this where you have wall-to-wall bogs, this could get going and be a real problem;” Dr. Becker said. He particularly stressed the possibility of spread of the disease through stray dogsand cats. Dr. Becker said the best measures to follow are herd testing, absolute isolation of sick pigs to control the spread and avoid outside animal exposure, such as dogsand cats. Young affected pigs can be (TuhitoP^»A3o) ' precautionary steps to protect their flocks. Don’t keep caged pet birds on poultry farms and make certain employees don’t have such birds as pets. A strict program is needed to keep stray poultry or birds, dogs, cats, rats, mice and other vermin off poultry premises. Cura to Page A 33) layers at home in Massachusetts. Ricca said many Maine poultry buildings today are empty and never will come back to production. He pointed out the upswing in fowl sales but added that Campbell’s Soup, purchaser of over half of toe country’s spent fowl, is said to have frozen storages with four tones as many pounds of chicken as last year. He noted that prices in New England for toe first quarter last year averaged about 71 cents per dozen. This year toe average is 62 to 63 c«ts. And, be added, costs are up about six cents per dozen. So, the overall spread farmers need to make up is 14 cents in