when returned to the earth while full of juices, is valuable. In our
latitude this can usually be done by the middle of June, and if on
this sod buckwheat is sown at once, it will hasten the decay, loosen
and lighten the soil in its growth, and in a few weeks be ready itself
to increase the fertility of the field by being plowed under. In
regions where farmyard manure and other fertilizers are scarce and
high, this plowing under of green crops is one of the most effective
ways both of enriching and preparing the land; and if the reader has
no severer labors to perform than this, he may well congratulate
himself.

But let him not be premature in his self-felicitation, for he may find
in his sod ground, especially if it be old meadow land, an obstacle
worse than stumps and stones--the Lachnosterna fusca.

This portentous name may well inspire dread, for the thing itself can
realize one's worst fears. The deep, moist loam which we are
considering is the favorite haunt of this hateful little monster, and
he who does not find it lying in wait when turning up land that has
been long in sod, may deem himself lucky. The reader need not draw a
sigh of relief when I tell him that I mean merely the "white grub,"
the larva of the May-beetle or June-bug, that so disturbs our slumbers
in early summer by its sonorous hum and aimless bumping against the
wall. This white grub, which the farmers often call the "potato worm,"
is, in this region, the strawberry's most formidable foe, and, by
devouring the roots, will often destroy acres of plants. If the plow
turns up these ugly customers in large numbers, the only recourse is
to cultivate the land with some other crop until they turn into
beetles and fly away. This enemy will receive fuller attention in a
later chapter.