Montpelier Examiner

HOW SNAKES HELP FARMER
Man Who Knows Points Out How Valuable to the Tiller of the Soil Are Their Services.

Snakes are a valuable asset and there should be a campaign against killing them, writes Gayne T. K. Norton, in the American Forestry Magazine. The article goes on to show what the snake does for food conservation by ways of killing rodents and insects, the greatest enemies to grain that man knows. The public has become acquainted with snakes as never before, writes Mr. Norton, because of the thousands who have been engaged in the campaign for war gardens that has been conducted by the national emergency food garden commission.

"With this summer the millions of war gardens have given the snake popular interest. Tremendously increased tillage has brought people and snakes together.

"Unless much education work is done the number of snakes that will be killed next year by the well-meaning but misinformed gardeners will be very large. Our snakes are a national asset worth many millions of dollars and should be conserved. The relation they bear to successful crops is important—more important than even the average farmer realizes."