12 



THE FARM AND GARDEN. 



"Vol. I'V., JSTo. I- 



CONTENTS OF THIS NUMBiSl. 



Page 1.— September Rambles over the Farm and Gar- 

 den, by Josepb. 



Pa^e '' —Seeding wheat, by JoZin M. Stahl. Gardening 

 " ' in Florida, by \V. C. «. 



Page 3.-N0 Excellence without Labor. Preserving 

 Melons auil Squashes. Coal Tar in the 

 Garden. 



Page 4.— Fruits for Farmers, by Samuel C. Moon. Or- 

 chard Insecis, by Eli Minch. 



Paee 5.— The Be.st Location i'or an Apple Orchard, by 

 L H. Bailey, Jr. 



Page 6.— Our Flower Garden. 



Page 7.— Our Flower Garden (continued). 



Page 8.— Live Stock. 



Page 9.— HatchinE Chicks every month, by P. H. Jacobs, 



Hammonton, N. J. Moulting in Fall. 

 Page m— Working Dress for Women. The Farm and 



Garden Recipes. 

 Page II.— Odds and Ends. 

 Page 12.— Editorial Comment. 

 Page 13.— Clippings. 

 Page 14.— Correspondence. 

 Page l.'i.— Autumn Leaves. 

 Page 16.— Publisher's Department. 



eDITOI^IALi (sOMMENT. 



By a special arrangement with the puhlishers 

 of the Home and Farm we are enabled to ofler it 

 with The Farm and Garden for the low price 

 of 75 cents. It is a semi-monthly paper, and 

 very ably edited. Try it for the year. 



September. The growing season is now nearly 

 over, but our work is not. Hours of study, of 

 intelligent thinking over the problems of agri- 

 culture, and pearls of sweat were the price which 

 we had to pay for success in the producing part 

 of our business, and it were folly to expect that 

 the preservation and safe keeping of the crops, 

 once grown, could be obtained as a free gift, and 

 without effort, care, and perseverance on our 

 part. As long as the crops are in the farmer's 

 hands they are like water in a sieve. 



Woodeliueks (Ground Hogs) eat up the still 

 standing or shocked corn in the field, rats, mice, 

 and other vermin make havoc in your grain 

 mows and granaries, rain water leaks through 

 your stacks, early frost threatens to damage your 

 corn and garden vegetables, all these and many 

 other things claim a large percentage of your crops, 

 and should receive your careful consideration. 



Hay is not so very plenty, and the farmer will 

 do well to save all his fodder in the best possible 

 shape. Cut your corn as soon as the stalks com- 

 mence to turn yellow, when the grain is just 

 ready to glaze, rather than wait until the crop is 

 dead' ripe. Get ready for "Jack Frost" as 

 quickly as possible, "iou know he hardly ever 

 defers his visits, ut least in the Northern States, 

 until October. Be ready so you can receive him 

 smilingly. 



Recognizing that your crops generally lose in 

 value every day that they are unsold on your 

 hands, let it be' your first aim to convert them 

 into nice crisp greenbacks at your earliest opiior. 

 tunity ; sell when a fair price is offering. Pay 

 your'debts at once, so make everybody around 

 you happy, and do not forget to spend a part of 

 your surplus in improving your farm and home. 

 Remember your hard-working wife, and the 

 necessity of making home attractive for your 

 children. 



In order to know how profitable the farm is, it 

 is necessary to know what it costs to raise every 

 bushel of wheat, corn, oats, or other produce 

 raised on the farm. He should know how many 

 pounds of feed it takes to fatten the stock for 

 market. It he knows what it costs him to raise 

 every bushel of feed, and then knows how much 

 he has fed, and knowing what the stock cost 

 him before he commenced to feed or fatten, and 

 he knows what he has received; he can then tell 

 how much he has made. You say it is some 

 trouble. So it is; but it is some trouble to do 

 business in a business-like way, the best we can 

 do. 



Tlie manufacturer knows how much iron and 

 what it costs, how much wood and what it costs, 

 how much paint and what it costs, and how much 

 labor and what it costs for every wagon or farm 

 implement that he makes. If he did not he 

 would be uncertain as to what price he should 

 ask and how muclt profit he is making. 



The successful merchant knows what every 

 article he keeps to sell costs him ; he knows the 

 am iiiiit of freight it costs him to bring it to the 

 store ; he knows what his exijenses for clerk 

 hire, for insurance, and how much to allow for 

 shrinkage, and when he sells he knows just how 

 mucli profit he has made. At the present time a 



manufacturing or mercantile business carried on 

 after any other plan would break up the richest 

 business men. 



Can farmers who are wide awake and who 

 farm not only for pleasure but for profit, afford 

 to follow any other plan? A careless farmer 

 who farms on a small scale, and who raises all he 

 wants to eat and wear and who is not obliged to 

 know whether he is making anything more than 

 a living or not, as that is all he expects to make, 

 is generally satisfied, whether his living is 

 good or bad. But the farmer who wants to make 

 all he can ; who must know what pays him best, 

 must know what things cost before he can ex- 

 pect to know anything about the profits. 



The different branches of farming, as now car. 

 ried on successfully, require as much energy and 

 business tact as any other line of business, and 

 in order to make a success, as should be done, a 

 knowledge of what it costs to raise different crops 

 is very essential. To each farmer this must, to a 

 considerable extent, be a separate matter. One 

 farmer can with his soil and implements at one 

 price, while another with different soil and treat- 

 ment the cost would be greater or less as the case 

 mav be, so that each farmer must keep a correct 

 account, and know for himself just what it costs 

 him to raise the different products of the farm, 

 and the best and most profitable manner of dis- 

 posing of them. 



A good rotation. Southern farmers grow the 

 greater part of their wheat on corn stubbs. As 

 soon as the corn is fit to cut, strips six or eight 

 rows wide are cut through the field at a distance 

 of about sixty feet from' each other. These are 

 entirely cleared from the stalks, thoroughly har- 

 rowed, and drilled in wheat. The whole crop is 

 then sliocked upon these strips, and the rest of 

 the field prepared and sown in a like manner; 

 200 or .SOO pounds of phosphate are usually 

 applied per acre. 



We recommend this practice to farmers in all 

 sections where corn ripens before wheat sowing 

 time. The removal of the corn crops upon these 

 strips involves a little additional labor in bar- 

 v»Rting, but think of the easy preparation of 

 your field for the wheat crop, and of tlie land 

 rendered clean in consequence of the destruction 

 of the weeds in autumn. Where corn does not 

 mature much before October, good results will 

 follow the practice of harrowing and sowing to 

 rye, which should be done just as soon as the 

 crop can be removed from the field. Treat potato 

 fields the same way. Rye may be utilized in 

 various ways, and grown for the hay and straw, 

 for early pasture, or for green manuring, and is 

 a most profitable cropping way. 



they can feed, it is better to sell them at some 

 price ratlier tlian have them spoil on their 

 hands. 



Our common farm land is worth $100 per acre, 

 and with the application of .$12 wortli of special 

 potato fertilizer, a good farmer should not raise 

 less than 200 busliels per acre. •■?40, that is 20 

 cents a bushel, will pay for all the labor and 

 expense, including seed, nianurc, interest on 

 land, and marketing, and when sold for 40 cents, 

 leave a net profit of 5^40 an acre. What other 

 crop could do that, one year with another? 



Digging (Kitatoes by hand we consider to be 

 about as liard and tedious labor as there is con- 

 nected with the farm. We should rejoice in 

 finding a digger that will do the work well on all 

 sorts of soils. For well cultivated, mellow soils, 

 free from stones and weeds, where hand-digging 

 is comparatively easy, we might get along 

 without the implements, and where wanted most 

 for stiff, stonv, and weedy, or rough land, tlie 

 digger is a failure. 



If you can get a fair price for your potato crop 

 at digging time, sell them direetly from the field. 

 The potatoes then are sound and heavy, and 

 the advised method avoids all loss ami much 

 handling over. At this writing we expect and 

 hope for a fair crop and paying prices. 



Men who are looked upon as authorities in 

 such matters are sometimes guilty of thoughtless 

 remarks, which, being taken as genuine truth, 

 often work mischief. In early spring, when 

 potatoes could hardly find a market at any price, 

 Dr. Hoskins inflicted upon the readers of the 

 Rural New Yorker the statement that " the far- 

 mer could not afford to sell them off the farm for 

 less than forty cents, and at little profit at that, 

 all things considered." The doctor probably 

 knows that the tuber contains from 2 to 2.'-^ per 

 centum of albumen, and from 16 to 23 of starch, 

 varying according to quality, a total of 18 to 

 25.^ per centum, while corn has \S.^ per centum 

 albumen, and 7"." starch, etc., or 91.'' poumls of 

 sohd nutriments in every 100 pounds. When 

 corn is worth 60 cents a bushel, all the nutriment 

 contained in 60 pounds of potatoes varies in 

 value but from 12 to 1.5 cents. 



While we admit that the dige-stive machinery 

 of farm stock utilizes a larger percentage of the 

 nutritive solids in succulents tlian in concen- 

 trated foods, vet we cannot put the average feed- 

 ing value of'one bushel of potatoes at much, if 

 any, above 1.5 cents. We would sooner sell our 

 potatoes for 20 cents, if we could not get more, 

 than our corn for 60 cents per 60 pounds, and 

 where farmers grow potatoes largely, more than 



The Farm and Garden has very decided 

 views on politics, and is not afraid to express 

 them. It holds that the farmer should not belong 

 to political rings, nor to the wire-palling frater- 

 nity in general, nor run his legs off and neglect 

 his work for the nomination to any office. Yet, 

 farmers should organize, always be present at 

 their party caucus, break down the corrupt rings, 

 and try to nominate worthy candidates; also, 

 other things being equal, they should give a good, 

 substantial farmer the preference. The best men 

 in the community generally go to the polls to eat 

 the mess that rogues have cooked up for them. 



In presidential campaigns it has become the 

 habit of the party machinists to supply the en- 

 thusiasm there may be lacking, through picnics, 

 and pole raisings, and torch light processions, and 

 to fire up the wavering faith with sky. rockets and 

 bad whisky. Certainly it is everybody's duty, 

 which he owes to his country and to posterity, to 

 try to learn which one of the great political par- 

 ties claiming his support in the coming struggle, 

 is most deserving it. Such information cannot 

 be had by listening to stump speeches, which are 

 generallv made up of concentrated lies and soft 

 soap, ai'id are an insult to your intelligence. 

 Avoid such gatherings, as they involve a waste 

 of time, money, and energy which can be better 

 spent in securing your crops before the approach- 

 ing winter. 



The above are the political views of the Farm 

 and Garden, widely expressed. It is partisan 

 only as on organ of the great party of Amerioaii 

 husbandmen, and knoivs nothing about Republi- 

 cans or Democrats. We have our personal views, 

 but we consider them our own individual property, 

 and decline to part with them in this journal for 

 love ormoney. Study both sidesof the question, 

 read papers of all party colors, and decide 

 intelligently. 



This time it was Mr. Woodchuck who, though 

 neither invited nor made welcome, eame to visit 

 our garden. We did not find very much fault with 

 him as long as he had shown his good taste by 

 feasting on the rankest clover in the meadow, 

 but when he began to investigate our abilities as 

 a gardener, and the tenderness of young squash 

 shoots, and Ivory Pod wax beans, we thought him 

 a little out of his proper place. Seeing him run 

 to his burrow near a rail fence, where he could 

 not be dug out very handily, we dugup the main 

 entrance as far as practicable, and placed a half- 

 jxiund dynamite cartridge, properly adjusted 

 with cap and long fuse, as far in the hole as we 

 could reach, stopped up all the openings I could 

 find, and lighted the fuse. He never was seen 

 outside of that burrow again. Cost of material, 

 about fifteen cents, and sure pop every time. 



As soon as your hens stop laying, sell them. 

 Prices are better early than they will be later. 

 Your hens will not lav again tliis spring, and if 

 you keep them much longer they will require a 

 'new coat, which is expensive. Save your feed 

 and sell them. In regard to spring chickens we 

 think that ten cents a pound for three pounds 

 each is better than six or seven cents for four 

 pounds each. Sell early. 



Sell as soon as you can get a "fair price" is 

 the favorite advice of writers, and we indulge in 

 it occasionally. But what is a fair price ? Forty 

 cents a bushel for ))otatoes may be considered a 

 fair price in one season, and a low one in the 

 next. The farmer should not be a speculator, 

 that is, only in a limited sense, but he certainly 

 needs good judgment. 



Philadelphia seedsmen are the most cnterpris- 

 ini' in the world, and we are proud to note that 

 Mr. W. Atlee Burpee, of W. .\tlee Burpee & Co., 

 and Mr. Herbert W. Johnson, of Johnson & 

 Stokes, have both been successful in their Euro- 

 pean tours. The new vegetables and flowers of 

 the old countries have been investigated and ex- 

 amined, and next sea.son will show what lias 

 been brought back by these energetic young 

 men. 



