Oct. 1, 1911 



bean meal, I know, is advertised now by 

 dealers in pouRry-supplies almost all over 

 the world. 



CHUFAS, OR EARTH-ALMONDS. 



Now for a word or two about the row of 

 chufas. I have said so much about this nut 

 that grows under ground, like the peanut, 

 in back numbers, that I need not go over 

 the matter again here. After we had filled 

 all orders for a free sample of the chufas, 

 there was, perhaps, a quart or more left. 

 Well, the only place to plant them was in a 

 dead-furrow right beside the soy beans. I 

 hastily scraped out that dead-furrow with a 

 hoe, and sprinkled in the chufas. They 

 were so much dried up I did not suppose 

 that many of them would grow; but they 

 are now knee-high, and growing like weeds. 

 As they were in the dead-furrow I threw the 

 dirt up against them and made a little ditch 

 on each side to keep the water away from 

 them. I think it would be better to hill 

 them up like potatoes, so the nuts will not 

 get out of the ground and be sunburned. 

 At the present writing, Sept. 15, 75 days 

 after planting, there were quite a few good- 

 sized nuts in the hills, and lots of little ones 

 starting. These also are splendid food for 

 poultry, and very rich in protein and carbo- 

 hydrates, like all other nuts. 



By the way, I forgot to mention in the 

 right place that soy beans picked green are 

 very good food. There is so much oil in 

 them that it swims on the surface, looking 

 like globules of butter. Well, these chufas 

 are also very oily; but it is a lot of trouble 

 to get them out of the dirt, either in the 

 sandy soil of Florida or the Medina clay 

 ground. But if you are growing them for 

 the chickens, you need not have any thing 

 to do with the harvesting. I have not had 

 any experience with pigs; but chickens will 

 "work for nothing and board themselves," 

 and get every chufa out of the ground. My 

 good friend Daniel Hall, of Oneca, Fla., says 

 they stopped his hens laying, or at least 

 they stopped laying when they were digging 

 over the chufa ground. But somebody who 

 is expert on poultry told me tliat letting 

 hens have a large quantity of any very rich 

 food all at once would be very likely to cause 

 them to stop egg-laying for a time; whereas 

 a little given them every day with their usu- 

 al rations would have the opposite effect. 



I suppose you can buy soy beans of almost 

 any seedsman; but you can get them a great 

 deal cheaper of somebody who grows them; 

 and they are now being grown almost all 

 over the United States, more or less, and 

 the same way with chufas. Do not send to 

 me for either, for I am not in the seed busi- 

 ness; besides, if I should offer seed for sale 

 after giving all this write-up, you might 

 with good reason think I was biased in the 

 matter. For the rest of my life, so long as 

 the great Father lets me keep up this depart- 

 ment I will try not to mention on these 

 pages any thing I have to sell. In fact, I 

 do not exi^ect to sell seeds or chickens nor 

 any thing else, except to my home grocer, 

 and at home market prices. 



609 



CHUFAS AND GROUND-NUTS. 



Mr. A. I. Root.—l noticed in the Breeder's Gazette 

 that in the South chufas become an ineradicable 

 pest. Later, however, another writer says there 

 are two kinds ot grouud-nuts, and that the c7iw/a was 

 not likely to become pestiferous. 



Mrs. J. W. Beauchamp. 



Doniphan, Mo., May 24. 



The above reminds me that our first plant- 

 ing of chufas in Florida was close to a piece of 

 woods and the ground-nuts and chufas came 

 up all together, and the two, looked at from 

 above ground, resembled each other so closely 

 that I gave up. I could not, for the life of 

 me, tell one from the other until I dug down 

 so I could see the nut. The shape of the nut 

 is entirely different, and the ground-nuts 

 are no good at all, so far as I know. After 

 I had given it up and we had lost our crop, 

 practically, because we could not weed out 

 the nuts without getting the chufas also, a 

 neighbor told how to distinguish the differ- 

 ence, because chufas always stool out, while 

 the ground-nuts make only a single stalk, 

 and I think this may be true. I do not 

 think the chufas, even if they do self-seed 

 themselves, will ever prove to be a pest — 

 that is, if pigs and chickens are allowed to 

 get on to the ground. This same tendency 

 to stool with chufas enables us to sejiarate 

 the plants of a hill, and plant them out sep- 

 arately. In this way a little seed can be 

 made to go a long way, but, of course, it 

 takes a longer season. A nurseryman who 

 visited our premises suggested that the 

 ground-nut is a "degenerate" chufa. 



GARDENING IN FLORIDA IN THE SUMMER 

 TIME. 



We are very glad indeed to give place to 

 the following: 



Mr. A. I. liool.—WiU you allow one of tlie new 

 comers to add something to what has been said on 

 gardening in Florida? We find some things can be 

 raised in early summer if you can irrigate. We had 

 corn, tomatoes, and string beans after the season 

 for them had gone by. Some other things can be 

 grown in the same way. We used only the waste 

 water from the house. The tomatoes were given 

 some shade until they outgrew it. Now there are 

 still some tomatoes, but the later blossoms all drop. 

 Our good neighbor, Mr. Gleason, tells us that now 

 is the time to sow seeds for tomatoes and egg-plants. 

 They should be shaded a little when first trans- 

 planted to open ground; also that potatoes can be 

 planted in September. He tells us that bush lima 

 beans, summer squash, sweet potatoes, and cow 

 peas will grow through the rainy season. I think 

 we may start beets early, as they seem to thrive in 

 this climate and soil. Mrs. L. W. Densmore. 



Sarasota, Fla., July 24. 



I will explain to our readers that Sarasota 

 is a neighboring town to Bradentown, and 

 so, of course, the conditions in the two 

 places are about the same. I presume like- 

 ly the old residents have so much garden 

 stuff almost all the year round that they are 

 not inclined to take as much pains as the 

 new comers from the North, who are delight- 

 ed with the possibilities that seem to open 

 up there on every hand. You will remem- 

 ber our neighbor, D. Abbott, had beautiful 

 lima beans all winter, and almost all sum- 

 mer, from the same plants. 



