1887. 



POPULAR GARDENING. 



1Z 



worked. There is, too, another important 

 thins in favor of sandy soil. It can be worked 

 right after rains, — even while wet — without 

 " baking." and, too. it is more easily worked. 



We remember one season having almost con- 

 tinual rain for weeks. Between showers we 

 kept the cultivatoi' goiug lively, and all hemds 

 at pulling out all large weeds by hand. — not 

 using hoes, anil when it did come off dry we 

 had but little trouble to get everything cleaned 

 up in good shape. Visiting a brother-in-law at 

 that time, we found his jjlants literally choked 

 down with weeds. His land was heavier, uith 

 some clay, and for weeks he could work it 

 no better than a mortar lied, hence the weeds. 



Again, a sandy loam will stand the drought 

 the best ; only keep it well worked and droughts 

 are really a benefit to the owner thereof. TVe 

 mean that we have always made more money 

 in ch-y seasons than wet, for the rea.son that we 

 kept our cultivators and hoes constantly going 

 and the soil well stirred, and when this is done 

 on sandy soil, and it is kept well pulverized, it 

 suffers but little in comparison to heavier soil 

 that becomes hard with drought. 



But we don't get the crops such seasons that 

 we do in more rainy weather and as a rule we 

 don't want them. We are speaking of sections 

 where there is competition, and where most 

 people grow in their gardens fruit sufficient for 

 their own use and in favorable seasons fruit is 

 abundant and cheap, large lots bringing in 

 little money. Picking bill, expressage, cost of 

 baskets, etc. , etc. , cut the net proceeds down to 

 a low figm-e. In dry seasons many, or in fact, 

 most, do not understand that cultivation keeps 

 moisture to the surface ; and while all such fail 

 to get crops because of negligence, and, too, 

 plantations on hea\-y soils suffering most, and 

 garden beds di'ying up, instead of having a 

 supply of their own, these become purchasers. 



We had rather have one hundred bushels of 

 small fruit from five acres of land at 15 cents 

 per quart, than four hundred bushels from the 

 same land at 6 to 8 cents per quai't. Figure up 

 cost of picking, ba.skets, marketins, etc., and 

 you will see the point. And best of all, the 

 small crop is less driving, giving one more 

 time. Understand us, reader, we are no advo- 

 cate of small crops when they aire plenty all 

 around us; neither would we, if we had the 

 power, have drougths to obtain light crops and 

 ram enough for plantations all around us. 



SMALL FRUITS ON THE FARM. 



To advise a farmer to grow small fruits for 

 market, and at the same time carry on his 

 farming operations, is something we will not 

 do. But there are hundreds and thousands of 

 farmei's who have a natural taste for fruit 

 growing, and to whom farming has become a 

 dnidgery — especially that class who are not 

 strong, to whom a change is desirable and nec- 

 cessary. To these we would say, if 5-ou are 

 living within three or four miles of a good home 

 market, and cities not far aivay by rail or steam- 

 boat, a change to fniit growing wiU be both 

 profitable and pleasant. 



The first thing to do is to rent out most of 

 your land, or let it out on shares, reserving 

 your home, and say ten to twenty acres of land 

 for your fruit growing operations, and if you 

 have a love for the business, and go at it sys- 

 tematically and energetically, you vriU make 

 more money from ten acres of land, than you 

 have ever made from your fai-m, and that too, 

 with less real heavy work. 



Plant only of leading, well tried sorts that 

 are hardy and productive ; give them good cul- 

 tivation and plenty of mulch, and you wlU reap 

 a large reward, and too, this kind of work 

 makes less hard work for the women folks, and 

 besides, supplies the table with fruit daily 

 throughout the yeai'. 



There are farmers who have no liking for 

 growing fruit; but as a rule, these have a son 

 or sons who have, and who might prefer it to 

 farming. These are very emxious to keep their 



sons on a farm, away from the city. To such 

 we say, let such a son have the use of a few 

 acres to grow small fruits; and the longer he is 

 engaged in it, the more he will like it, and con- 

 sequently his attachment for home strengthened 

 and. too, by this the table is supplied with lux- 

 uries you would not dispense with after one 

 season's experience. There are many inland 

 towns not well supplied with fruit and vege- 

 tables and here there would be good openings. 



COST OF GROWING STRAWBERRIES. 



A paragraph is going the rounds of the press 

 in which the cost of growing Strawberries in 

 the East is put down at $1.50 per acre, and item- 

 ized as follows: Land rent .SC: plowing and 

 harrowing, •*4; manure, S50; plants, $20; sum- 

 mer cultivation, $50; mulching material for 

 winter, $20. In amount for fertilizers, $35 

 is allowed for one ton of pure ground bone and 

 $15 for muriate of potash. Will some of our 

 Minnesota and Dakota growers give us the cost 

 from their experience? 



We clip the above from the North Dakota 

 Farmer. It's laughable how such absurd items 

 will find their way into Western papers. All 

 we have to say is, that as a rule one acre of 

 Strawberries does not co.st the grower at the 

 most more than one-third to one-half the amount 

 given above. In fact, we can take an acre of 

 poor Eastern land and plow and subsoil prop- 

 erly, where Strawberries have never been 

 grown, and at the right time (say in August or 

 September) apply ten dollars' worth of super- 

 phosphate and get a.s fine a crop as the average 

 of gi'owers in the West. 



So then we save the $50 item above on ma- 

 nure and the $40 item on commercial fertil- 

 izers. As to the expense of $20 on plants, that 

 need not be but for the first or starting year, 

 for after that one has all the plants he needs 

 from his own increase. We would not advise 

 ground bone for Strawberries, as it is not 

 quick enough in its efl'ects for a crop that is 

 dependent on the first year after planting, like 

 Strawberries, but is better adapted to Currants, 

 Grapes and Raspberries, because more lasting. 



We can cultivate one acre and do it well for 

 $25 to $30, while $.50 is set down in above fig- 

 urings. We wonder where in the East that acre 

 could have been gi-own. 



THE CULTURE OP CRANBERRIES. 



We have often had inquiries as to the growing 

 of Cranberries, and among all the directionswe 

 have yet received none equal the following 

 short, practical, directions taken from the 

 Fai-ni, Field and Stockman: 



The best soil is muck with a coating of sand 

 on top. Clay and loam soils will not answer. 

 Hence never plant Cranberries on a di'ift for- 

 mation, and the sand should be sharp (asiUc- 

 ious sand). 



When a situation has been selected for a 

 Cranberry bog, the first thing to be done is to 

 level it. It requires much less water to flow a 

 bog that has a level surface than one that is 

 uneven. If the bog is extensive, and cannot, 

 without too much expense, be reduced to one 

 common level, there is no objection to having 

 different grades with low dykes between them. 

 In many bogs it would be economical to em- 

 ploy an experienced engineer, and have marked 

 stakes put up and profiles and working plans 

 drawn. With such marked stakes and draw- 

 ings the workman knows when he has filled 

 his barrow where he is to tip the contents. 

 There will be no mistakes, no alterations to be 

 made, and in the end money will be saved. 



The depth of sand required to be spread on 

 the surface depends upon the depth of the peat. 

 If the latter is only a foot or two in thickness, 

 five inches of sand is considered sufficient ; it it 

 is several feet, at least a foot of sand is required 

 to make a good bog. The more sand there is 

 used, the longer it requires to bring the vines 

 into a bearing state ; but when brought into 

 that state they will bear for many years. 



The planting is generally done in the spring, 

 by covering pieces of the vine, say three inches 

 long, in the soil, about two inches deep, eigh- 

 teen inches apart, three pieces in a place. A 

 better way, on prepared soil, would be to open 

 naiTow furrows, two feet apart, and strew the 

 vines, cut into sections in the cutting-box, 

 rather thickly therein and covering lightly. If 

 in planting in this manner care is taken to 

 leave out one end of the vine, the best means 

 will have been emplojed. 



MEAT FROM THE SHELL. 



Stephen Powers, in the Ohio Fanner, tells of a 

 man in Athens County, Ohio, who bought 40 acres 

 of not particularly good soil, which he set to Apple 

 trees, plantine Peach trees alternatety with them. 

 This was 1 8 years ago. He had but three crops from 

 his Peach trees in that time, but his orchard has 

 paid for 2;i0 acres additional land, and the returns 

 for the current year aggregate $1,080 for Apples, 

 cider and evaporated fruit, and the 15 swine that 

 were fattened on windfalls. The orchard is princi- 

 pally of the Rome Beauty, 



The Orange County CS.YAFarmersays; "George 

 A. fialloway, of Walden, has applied the test of 

 cold storage to Peaches. He purchased fifty bush- 

 els of Peaches of the Salway variety, of the finest 

 quality purchasable, and put them in one-half 

 bushpl baskets The result has proven perfectly 

 satisfactory to the owner of the Peaches, as well as 

 to the cold storage house property. Mr. Galloway 

 expects to rea'ize $10 a basket for his crop. In fact 

 he has now been offered $15 a bushel for the entire 

 Int. which offer he has refused. 



Dr. Lazenby, of the Ohio Experiment Station, 

 says: " I am acquainted with an orchard of fifteen 

 Apple trees, now twenty-six years old, that has 

 been regularly and systematically treated to a wash 

 of soft soap about May 20, and again .June 30, each 

 year. Less than half a dozen borers have been 

 found in this orchard and the trees are all in a 

 thrift.y. vigorous condition. In neighboring orchards, 

 where this precaution has not been taken, the trees 

 have been killed by scores, while many that remain 

 are so much injured as to he worthless. Lye is 

 sometimes used in the place of soap, but the latter 

 is a much more effective preventive. It can be 

 readily applied with an old broom. Beside making 

 the tree obnoxious to the borer, the soap keeps the 

 bark in a healthy condition. This remedy may be 

 applied to all trees or shrubs liable to be attacked. 

 The Prai'r/e i*^ar»icr says: The Dakota man who 

 sowed buckw^heat among his young forest trees was 

 sensible. During the past fifteen years the writer 

 has lost no opportunity for urging the sowing of 

 buckwheat in nurseries, tree plantations, and young 

 orchards. When trees are set on the dark colored 

 prairie soils of the West, and the ground well culti- 

 vated and bare, the surface temperature above the 

 nitrogen feeding roots will often reach 1:30, and 

 sometimes 140 degrees. This intense heat of the 

 soil and the consequent heating of the lower beds 

 of air to which the young trees are exposed, is con- 

 trary to Nature and her methods of tree growing. 

 If the exposed surfaces are covered with succulent 

 plants of buckwheat, the nitrogen feeding roots 

 can come up about as near to the surface as under 

 native forest conditions, and the lower beds of air 

 to which the plants are exposed become relatively 

 cool. During the past quarter of a century some 

 experiments with a view to testing the relative 

 effect on young trees of exposed and shaded sur- 

 faces of soil between the rows have given results 

 too striking for popular belief. 



Ben: Perley Poore says in American Cultivator: 

 Stealing fruit is a mean business. A highwayman,- 

 who meets me on the road on a dark night, and, 

 presenting a revolver, demands my pocket-book, is 

 more to be respected than the sneaking thief who 

 creeps into my garden just before day and helps 

 himself to Apples, Pears or Grapes. Thoughtless 

 boys sometimes trespass in this manner as a good 

 joke.- Their parents should teach them better; and, 

 if they will not. let a public exposure be made of 

 every criminal detected. If this does not effect a 

 reform, let the law do its work. 



The Practical Fanner says: A well-known hort- 

 iculturist says he had an Apple tree which bore 

 fruit every alternate year only, and the fruit was 

 verj' small. He made it a yearlj- bearer— and also 

 greatly increased thesizeoftheapples— by thinning 

 out the small branches after the fruit had formed, 

 so as to remove about half of it. The Apples were 

 fully doubled in size and improved in flavor. Its 

 year for non-bearing would find it full of blossoms, 

 and by removing half the embryo Apples a good 

 crop would result. This is a good thing to remem- 

 ber and try next spring. 



