THE FARM AND GARDEN. 



i I 



©Or^I^ESPONDENGE. 



PLANTING GARDEN SEEDS. 



GosiiKN, Lane Co, Oregon. 

 Enclosed you will Xiud $i.'2J) lur subscriptions to 

 the Farm AxnliARDEN, also the five new names. 

 I will try and L;et more soon. I like the paper 

 very much, and think the patrons of the Farm 

 AND Garden ought to contribute all new ideas 

 or experiences in the garden business to the 

 . pai>er for the'benefit of its readers. I will give 

 a little expecience that I have planting small 

 garden seeds. In the spring, wheu the ground Is 

 very full of weed seeds, for instance, for onion 

 iieeds, have your ground well pulverized. Take 

 a plank six inches wide, lay it down, take a 

 sharp-pointed stick, make a drill along the 

 plank, put in your seect, then cover with fine dirt, 

 one inch deep. Then lay the plank over the row, 

 and in about si.x. or eight days, raise it. Wht-n 

 you see the seeds begin to peep through the 

 ground remove the plank; in two or tliree days 

 you can see the plants the full length of the row, 

 then go to hoeing. Radishes and lettuce will 

 come in five or si.x days. I wish some of the 

 readers would tell me how they grow celery. 

 That is something I have never raised, but want 

 to learn how. We always have a fine garden. 

 Success to the Farm and Garden and patrons. 

 Elizabeth Euy. 



reached the bottle of cayenne pepper from the 



castor, and holding the leaves carefully, I liter- 

 ally peppered them. The etfect wi\s magical. 

 There were very few lice on the plants next day, 

 and another application entirely finished them. 



Philomela. 

 Philomela has the same trouble that others 

 have. The fleas do not usually eat enough of the 

 poisons to kill them, and when there are many 

 of then^, they do not drive very easily. A mix- 

 ture of one pound of fresli Persian Insect Powder 

 well mixed with twenty pounds of flour, and 

 dusted on the plants will give temix)rary relief. 

 Paris green and wliite hellebore will kill them 

 sometimes, but so many new ones appear at the 

 funeral that the dead ones are hardly noticed. 

 The best plan is to make the piants, by heavy 

 manuring, grow faster than the fleas. 



LIGHT ON THE INCUBATOR QUESTION. 



Valuable Information and New IJc-js from a practical cxperimailor. 



I think the trouble with the incubator, 

 mentioned in the June and July numbers can be 

 explained. I am a mechanic, and made a Hydro- 

 Incubator, which I filled with eggs, and made 

 a very poor hatch at first. I have been experi- 

 menting with and changing the incubator until 

 now'I can depend upon an average hatcli of SU 

 percent. My experience has taught me that wiien 

 the weather is severe you must close one half the 

 iiir holes in the ventilator. I added twopiysoffine 

 burlap, one over the air holes, and one on the 

 bottom of the drawer. Underneath the burlap, 

 in the drawer, I put one thickness of butter 

 jnuslin, vesting the eggs on the burlap I change 

 the burlap in the drawer after each hatch. Tbave 

 two bottoms and keep one clean to change with. 

 In warm weather the frame over the ventilator 

 holes may be removed. I am operating two 

 Hydro-incubators, one of 74 and one of -120 eggs. 

 In large incubators you must put your water in 

 in three ditferent places and arrange to draw it 

 directly opposite the place it is put in. I found 

 in my large incubator wlien I put water in one 

 place that the heat in different parts of the tank 

 varied i:P. This would easily account for failure. 

 The water must circulate, and even in a small 

 incubator I use two openings to pour in water. 

 Here is another point. Plymouth Rocks, Wyan- 

 dottes, or any large breed require heat XWP first 

 week, 105° second, 104° third, while non-sitting 

 breeds, as Leghorns, Polish, and Hamburgs, will 

 hatch better two degrees lower each week. You 

 cannot mix these two classes of eggs and hatch 

 with success. I. E. Roth, Daggett Ind. 



EARLY POTATOES. 



Elmer M. Buell, Twinsburg, O., asks why some 

 Early Vermont potatoes he planted, came up 

 over the whole patch from four to ten stalks to 

 each hill, although but a single piece cut to three 

 or four eyes was planted. He usually planted 

 the same way, and only had one or two vines to ' 

 a hill. Answer: The season was favorable for the 

 growth of all the sprouts, and of course all grew. 

 Usually, one or two only will have vigor enough 

 to grow, but under favorable circumstances as to 

 warmth and moisture all will start at once to 

 root and grow, which is not usually the case. If 

 the weather had been dry, the strongest only 

 cou!d*grow, for it woidd rob all the others of 

 nourishment, and they must fail.- Cutting pota- 

 toes with long spror.ts on them, when planted 

 will tend to cause the trouble complained of to 

 appear, but only does so in the favorable seasons 

 that we mention. 



SICK CHIC KENS. 



Downey, Los Angeles Co., Cal. 



I wish to ask a question or two. What is the 

 matter with my small chicks, and what will ciire 

 them? They commenced the first week they 

 were hatched with sore eyes; one or both would 

 be lull of matter, and swell very large. Very soon 

 they are blind, and if you pick them up by the 

 feet, an offensive matter runs out of their mouth 

 and nostrils 1 have done everything for them I 

 could think of, read about, or learn in any man- 

 ner. I have lost over two hundred, and other 

 parties living near have lost over three hundred. 

 Others have lost irom a dozen up, so I am not the 

 only loser. Horace L. Swift. 



The chickens have a form of roup. The Doug- 

 lass mixture of copperas we have always recom- 

 mended is the best cure for tlie disease. As Mr. 

 Swift is a new subscriber we repeat the recipe: — 

 Take one pound of copperas (proto-sulphate of 

 iron), dissolve in twogallonsof rain water, or any 

 soft water, add an ounce of oil of vitriol (sul- 

 pnuric acid), keep well corked in a jug, and use 

 one teaspoonful in a pint of drinking water. We 

 add, ft>r our use, to the Douglass mjxture, a half 

 pound each of borax and alum, and we think it 

 is of advantage also. We give a teaspoonful to a 

 pint ot drinking water, the same as the Douglass 

 mixture. We advise our friend to renew his 

 stock, for when tiie roup gets a hold of the old 

 stock, the chickens are always subject to it also. 

 New and heallhy blood infused in the old stock, 

 will often make a flock healthy. 



FOR ANSWER IN SEPTENJBER. 



Will S. L. please tell us how often the dose for 



the Cholera should be given? I have been told 



that the eggs from the cross of a Muscovy with 



the Pekiu duck would not hatch. Is it always so ? 



G. L. S., CuUforniu. 



CABBAGE FLEAS. 



Pleasant Valley, Michigan. 

 What can we do with cabbage fleas? They 

 have eaten all our radishes, early turnips, ruta- 

 bagas, a large bed each of "MarbU-bead and Filder- 

 krawt cabbage plants, and have nearly spoiled 

 our plants in boxes. We have tried everything 

 we could think of or liear of. Soot and ashes, 

 iime, tobacco tea, I(^a of white Cedar boughs, and 

 I even put some toads in the boxes, with boards 

 for shelter, but inst(.'ad of eating the bugs, they 

 dug up the plants preparatory to making them- 

 selves summer residences. The only thing that 

 aflfects them is ginger, and enough of that to 

 insure a crop would be worth more than the cab- 

 bage. They thrive and grow fat on Paris green 

 and cayenne pepper; and now I do not know 

 whether they are the real cabbage flea. They are 

 black, with tour light spots on the back, and 

 when driven froni the plants, they hop off and 

 turn on their backs on the ground, where they 

 look like little black bits of dirt. Is there no 

 remedy ? Would like to raise some late cabbage 

 and turnips. Last autumn I found some clusters 

 of lice on a nice cabbage plant, and in a few days 

 it was entirely covered. I first'thought to burn 

 it, but on stooping to pull it up, I found all the 

 plants near it had lice on. I would like to pepper 

 you, I thought, and passing into the house I 



TROUBLE IN THE ORCHARD. 



FoKT \*alley, Georgia, 

 I am interested soniewhat in the cultivation of 

 fruits. I h^ve out an orchard of six thousand 

 apple, peaches, and plum trees, besides various 

 other varieties of fruit. I like The Faum and 

 Garden, and as long as Lake View orchards are 

 a success, I expect to be a subscriber. We need a 

 little light down here on the management of the 

 Wild Goose plum and the Cutiibert raspberry. 

 The plums, as a general thing, though sorry to 

 admit i.t, do well with us one or two years in 

 fruiting, then sadly fail. The Cuthbert riuspberry 

 puts on a most vigorous growth in spring, but 

 is nearly all dead by early winter. To cut back 

 severely first of August, do you think it would 

 save them ? We want a little information in this 

 matter, and hope you or Uncle Joseph can tell 

 us. M'ould like to hear from friends Munson and 

 Minch on the subject. 



L W. Love. 

 We insert a query from I. W. Love, and any of 

 our readers wlio may be able to answer will do 

 so. We sent the letter to a prominent Southern 

 pomologist, feeling the question was one we were 

 not fully able to answer satisfactorily. He was 

 not able to answer us, for he was not troubled as 

 Mr. Love, and thought the trouble was local. We 

 ft-ar the raspberries may be attacked by fungus 

 of some kind, and, it so, August pruning will do, 

 and if there is an after-growth, it may escape the 

 fungus. • We had an apple-tree, the leaves of 

 which were killed and dying, by a fungoid 

 growth, early in June, and we stripped all the 

 leaves ott' at once, and letX the tree bare. It is 

 now in full leaf, and has no fungus on the leaves. 

 This cannot be done in a tiQ:idi of raspberries, of 

 course, but we should try the plan of cutting 

 back and burning all the old leaves, and perhaps 

 the new growth would be vigorous and healthy. 

 We thought, as we passed through Fort Valley, 

 that perhaps the morning air might be warm and 

 damp, from the undulating character of the 

 country, and that would be apt to be very favor- 

 able for the growth of fungus. Will Mr. Love 

 send us a leaf or two of the raspberries in a letter, 

 and we will try to inform him more fully. Please 

 send the leaves that are dying, not the dead or 

 live leaf, but those that are afTected. 



WHAT IS THE BEST VARIETY? 



M. D. Stroud, Grahamville, Fla., asks for the 

 best strawberry for a damp, black, tenacious', 

 heavy soil, suitable for Florida, and asks if there 

 is anything better than the Wilson. Answer-The 

 American Poniok)gical Society's last report only 

 recommends the Wilson, giving it two stars, the 

 only variety having a special notice. The Wilson 

 is valuableon account of shipping so well. Other 

 varieties will grow well, but will not stand up 

 when they reach the Northern markets. You 

 do not say, but we presume you ask for the best 

 berry for you to grow for a Northern market, 

 and hence we advise the Wilson. It can beset 

 at'any time excepting very dry weather. Cut the 

 leaves away well for they draw so much moisture 

 from the roots that the plants will be dried up 

 before they can take root. The root should 

 always be stronger than the leaves when plants 

 are transplanted during the growing season. 



STIFF LEGS IN HENS. 



Hugh Martin, M'oodland, Tt'un., asks, " what 

 is the matter with my hens? They appear well, 

 and in an hour or two their legs are stiff and 

 bend under them, and they appear to be in great 

 pain." Answer :-The hens doubtless have the 

 rheumatism. This otten effects them in the 

 way you describe. The only advice and cure is 

 to keep dry and free from drafts in winter, when 

 the disease is contracted. In will often appear 

 in summer, altiumgh it Is caused by cold in 

 winter. No medicines are of much value. 



HOW TO GET RID Or STUMPS. 



Wm. Price, Manchester, asks, if a good way to 

 get rid of stumps, "Is the old plan so often 

 advised, to bore a hole in a stump and flll with 

 saltpetre and plug. \v neu reaoy till up agaiir 

 with coal oil and burn?" Answer :-Like many 

 of the remedies ve often see, it is not practical, 

 although beautiful in theory. To burn out a 

 stump, carefully remove all dirt aw!>y from it, at 

 least, 18 inches deep, and clean away the dirt 

 from the roots. When very dry take some dry 

 wood and set fire to the stump, adding wood 

 until Wfll on fire, and the stump will burn otit. 

 Have all the materials dry 



ABOUT FRAUDS. 



In answer to an inquiry sent to a friend in 

 Chicago, we find the Chicago School Agency, 185 

 So. Clark street, is considered a fraud. No such 

 party caia be found at the number given. 



Yes, "The Reliable IManufacturing Company 

 of Philadelphia is a fraud. No doubt whatever 

 about it. We have said so before, and lately we 

 have recieved several inquiries concerning them,' 



gg°g!^ggg POWELL'S PREPARED CHEMICALS 



and they WIM^ SENI» VOU, FREF, an attractive bri..k, whiih tflls you HOW TO MAKE 

 FIKST-CI.ASS FERTIXIZERS AT HUItlE, for LESS THAN HAI,F their usual cost. 



