1891 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



859 



High-pressure Gardening. 



BY A. I. ROOT. 



I'.AISING WHEAT. 



Some of you may wonder what wheat-gi-ow- 

 Ing can liave to do witli high-prc-sure garden- 

 ing. Well, yon listen to what I have to say. 

 and see if yon do not tliink it has a great deal 

 to do with it. In I'iding on the cars a lew days 

 ago I was talking with an old farmer who oc- 

 cupied half of the seat, about the crops we saw 

 out of the window. He told me a story that has 

 been much in my mind ever since. The story 

 was something like this : 



He lost enough wheat last year by the use of 

 a worn-out drill to hny a brdnd-ncir machine 

 nut find out. The drill was not exactly worn 

 out either: but the drill -k'tt/i were worn until 

 they were so dull they would not stay in the 

 ground. The consequence was. a great part of 

 the wheat was left uncovered. He did not no- 

 tice it particularly until the field was all sown, 

 then he went on it with a harrow, and tried to 

 harrow it in just as he would if it were broad- 

 cast. This might have made matters some 

 better: but a neighbor of his was in the busi- 

 ness of raising turkeys cousiderablv; and the 

 turkeys took in the condition of affairs about 

 as soon as he did. The consequence was, the 

 stand was so poor he very likely lost enough to 

 buy a new drill. The only remedy was to have 

 plowed it all under and seeded it again: but he 

 did not know how bad it was until the wheat 

 came up. 



" Well, my friend, I suppose, after such a les- 

 son as the above, you now own a brand-new 

 drill of your own. of the most approved and lat- 

 est pattern?" 



'■ Why. no." replied he; •" I lost so much on 

 that crop last year that I hadn't any money to 

 buy a new drill with.'" 



" Well, what did you do ?" 



" Why. several of us went and told the man 

 who owned the drill we used last year that we 

 could not afford to pay him 2.5 cents an acre 

 unless he took off the old drill -teeth, and 

 got a set of new ones. He accordingly did it. 

 and this year my stand of wheat is all even and 

 regular, and not a grain of it was left uncover- 

 ed." 



Think of it. friends, and consider such a state 

 of affairs. A set of driil-teeth costs only a little: 

 and yet the owner of the drill, and the farmers 

 who employed him. were such a stupid lot that 

 the thing went on until losses resulted such as 

 I have told you. They paid 25 cents an acre for 

 the use of a drill that, on one single field, dam- 

 aged them to the extent of fifty or sixty dollars. 

 Just the day before this talk occurred I had 

 been sowing that field of rye around the wind- 

 mill. The ground was in beautiful condition, 

 as I told you. after the potatoes were dug and 

 the harrowing we gave it. A little rain fell 

 during the night, just before we were ready to 

 roll the field the last time. I told the men I 

 was afraid the roller would compact the soil a 

 little too much. But the rain had made the 

 lumps so soft that they mashed up so beauti- 

 fully we concluded to go on and roll it. This 

 made the ground so hard in some places that 

 our dull drill-teeth slid over the top instead of 

 going down into the ground: and the first I 

 knew a flock of chickens belonging to a neigh- 

 bor were following the drill, picking up the rye 

 that was uncovered. Now, I do not like that 

 kind of work. We use 'this same drill for sow- 

 ing corn, beans, beets, spinach, peas, and the 

 greater part of our garden seeds. But of late, 

 when they sow peas and white beans, I have 



noticed quite a few of the peas and beans in 

 sight, especially after we have a light rain to 

 wash the light s(-eds clean, so the eye can see 

 them. This has happened so many times that 

 I have had a man go over the peas and beans 

 \\ ith a rake, coveiiug those that were left in 

 sight. Please remember, we sow very small 

 patches at a time, so as not to flood the market 

 and breakdown prices: therefore it was not a 

 very big job to go over the strip with a rake. 

 Well. I noticed the matter was getting some- 

 what worse: but it did not occur to me that it 

 was because the drill was becoming dull. I 

 think the drill cost about ^75. perhaps five 

 years ago: and we have let it out at 25 cents an 

 acre until we have got. perhaps, Mo back on it. 

 No farmer who uses it has complained that the 

 teeth were dull, and so it has been allowed to 

 go. In relating the circumstance to another 

 farmer, he said that, if the ground were just as 

 it ought to be, he preferred the drill with rath- 

 er dull teeth. New teeth, he said, would often 

 go too deep, and thus defeat us in another di- 

 rection. I then suggested that there should be 

 some gauges on the teeth that would let them 

 go just so deep and no deeper: and at the Sum- 

 mit County fair I saw just this arrangement 

 attached to just such a drill as we are at pres- 

 ent using. It seems to me it will certainly pay 

 for market-gardening, if not for raising wheat. 

 Then we can have the teeth sharp. 



Three or four days after. I visited T. B. Ter- 

 ry's farm, and looked over his wheat. It is the 

 rnost perfect stand I ever saw. In fact, his en- 

 tire fields look almost like rows of little onions 

 set just so far apart. The space left where the 

 drill turns and makes another " bout."' was so 

 exactly like the distance between the drill-teeth 

 that one could hardly tell where the drill had 

 gone the other way. Another thing, there are 

 no lumps in friend Terry"s wheat-fields. As I 

 could not find a lump on the surface of the 

 ground I dug down between the row'S of wheat 

 to see if I could dig up any lumps. Although 

 the ground was so fine and mellow I could put 

 my hand in it all over, it was just as fine as far 

 down as I could reach. Friend Terry was ab- 

 sent, and so I interviewed his son. He said his 

 father always drove the drill: and the ground 

 and every thing else must be just according to 

 his notion before he would go ahead with it. 

 Now, friend Terry not only has the finest and 

 best tilled fields I ever saw. but he has the 

 most perfect stand: in fact, there is nothing to 

 compare with it in either Summit or Medina 

 Counties. Friend Chamberlain's 36-acre wheat- 

 field, thoroughly underdrained. comes the 

 nearest to it of any I have seen. But there 

 were some lumps in sight, and the stand was 

 not as perfect as Terry's. Friend Chamberlain 

 has been on his fariin only a yeai\ remember, 

 and this, possibly, makes a vast difference. 



After I had looked at the beautiful stand of 

 wheat, and enjoyed it as it showed to excellent 

 advantage in the rays of the declining sun. I 

 turned to the clover-fields that covered every 

 part of the farm the wheat does not cover. I 

 certainly never saw any thing in the way of 

 clover in October that would compare with it. 

 The stand of clover was even, the leaves large, 

 thrifty, and of such a bright green that it was 

 a sight to look at. I spoke to the sou: 



■• Why! wouldn't that clover just make a 

 regular 'picnh- ' for any kind of stock '? Now 

 there is such a tremendous amount of feed 

 there, I suppose a great many fai'mers wotild 

 turn their stock right into it."' 



" Well, they might in some places. Mr. Root, 

 but they would not in this neighboriiood, I tell 

 you. They have learned better."" 



Doesn't this account largely for the beautiful 

 mellow soil with no lumps, and with such won- 



