1877.] 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



21 



For Thk Lancawter FAUMEn. 

 GLEANINGS. 



$56.50 

 5G.00 

 61.50 



Prices of Fertilizers. 



No. 1 Peruvian Guano 10 per cunt, am- 

 monia standarJ per ton 



No. 1 Peruvian Guano 10 per cent, (guar- 

 antee, per ton 



No. 1 Peruvian Guano, 10 per cent, rec- 



titied, per ton 



Mapee' Nitrogenizcd Supcrphoepliate, 



perton 40.00@50.00 



Mapes' Bone Superphosphate, perton .. 40.00@45.00 

 Fisli Guano (crude in barrels) per ton.. 18.00 



Bone Flour per ton 40.00@45.00 



Ka>v Bones, Ground (pure), perton .'J3.00@40.U0 



German Potash Salts (.;5@;)5per cent.) 



perton 25.00@30.no 



Gypsum, Nova Scotia, ground, per ton.. 8.00(5j!).O0 

 Nitrate of I'otash (li.'j per cent.) jier lb. Q^O'ic 



Sulphate of Potash (^0 per cent.) per lb. o'j(sii4c 



Chloride of Potass (Muriate of Potash, 



80 percent.) per lb ^%®^c 



Nitrate of Soda per lb 4J^(gl5c 



Sulphate of Ammonia (25 per cent.) 



per lb 5@5}^c 



— American Agricidturi.il. 



Rye turned under is the cheapest manure. 

 It comes in ju<t timely so as to leave the 

 ground nut an hour idle. 



Use your lime on old, rich ground ahiiost 

 sodden with its repeated manuring. It sweet- 

 ens and enlivens it, releases all unassimilated 

 fertility — cuts it as alcohol does oil. 



If clouds are noticed coming up against the 

 wind, in drought or other times, it is a pretty 

 certain indication of rain, and my observation 

 is that by such storms are our long droughts 

 usually first broken. — liooVs Gardtn IlamaiL 



Our position that cultivating and stirring 

 the soil as being the best kind of mulching, is in 

 answer to those who enquire about mulching 

 entire surface. We have always advocated 

 mulch close to and under plants and bushes, 

 and cultivate between. Some persons suppose 

 that heavy mulching over the entire surface 

 will keep down the weeds, and make abun- 

 dance of fruit. No doubt but what a suffi- 

 cient depth of such would, but it is better to 

 use the mulch usually put on close to and un- 

 der the plants and bushes, and cultivate be- 

 tween the rows. Strawberries, if not thus heavi- 

 ly mulched between the rows, may be run 

 through between the rows, with a light drag- 

 tooth harrow, just to stir up the suttace until 

 fruit begins to turn. You made a mistake in 

 spading ground between the rows, for by so 

 doing you cut off innumerable small roots.— 

 Fruit Recorder. 



[The above in reply to a correspondent 

 whose crop failed after spading in place of a 

 mulch. When cultivating the soil to act as a 

 mulch, it should not be stirred deeper than 

 about an inch, and less will do. When the 

 soil is thus stirred up in summer time, the 

 earth so loosened up will dry out and act as a 

 mulch. Should it be stirred to the depth of 

 three inches there will be three inches of dry 

 soil and be vety close to the roots of many 

 plants.] 



Do Plants Poison the Air we Breathe. 



There is a notion prevalent that the presence 

 of growing plants in the sleeping or living 

 room is detrimental to a lualtby atmosphere 

 by their giving out poisonous carl)onic acid gas 

 in the night time. The investigation of 

 chemists demonstrate that growing plants do 

 exhale an almost imperceptible ciuantity of 

 carbonic acid gas, w^hich, in very small pro- 

 portions, is necessary in the air we breathe. 

 They also show that the quanity exhaled at 

 night is but one-sixteenth part of what the 

 same plants absorb from the atmosphere during 

 the day, and convert into nearly its own 

 weight of oxygen, thus rendering a poisonous 

 gas, that derives its origin from various 

 sources, into one of the principal elements of 

 pure air. 



If carbonic acid gas is emitted from plants 

 in dangerous quantities, it certainly would 

 exist largely in the night atmosphere of a 

 close greenhouse, heated to a tropical tempera- 

 ture and crowded from tioor to rafter with 

 rank vegetation. Yet, in my experience, I 

 have never known the slightest ill effects to 

 be realized from night work iu greenhouses, 



neither in cases that have frequently occurred 

 of workmen making the warm greenhouses 

 their sleeping quarters of a night, aiul evrn 

 for an entire winter, which, to my satisfac- 

 tion, affords practi(;al proof that the notion is 

 a fallacy ; and the fact that perhaps no 

 liealthier class of men can be found than 

 greenhouse operators, who work constantly in 

 an atmosphere where plants are growing, 

 would prove, instead, that living plants exert 

 a beneficial influence upon the air we breathe. 

 — Home Florisl.~By A. B. K. 



For Thk Lanoabteu Farm Kn. 

 BY RAIL TO FREDERICK CITY, MD. 



Scenes by the Way— The Tillers of the Soil. 

 Immigration Southward and Westward. 



To get away from home lor a brief period, 

 far enough not to see your own chimney 

 smoke does one good once in a while. At 

 least it changes the monotony which fixes it- 

 self ujion us by contiimous routine. To take 

 a seat in a railroad coach at (Jolurabia, and 

 be in Frederick City in three hours and fifteen 

 minutes, with as little jolting as if you rode 

 on the main stem of the Pennsylvania rail- 

 road, is a satisfaction hardly thouglit of ten 

 years ago. Whether equal accommod;itions 

 would be afforded, if the Hanover Junction 

 and Susquehanna, or any other railroad com- 

 pany had control of said line, is not in the 

 province of this article to discuss. Suffice it 

 to say, the Pennsylvania railroad company 

 is not in the habit of doing things by halves. 

 Traveling at the rate of twenty to twenty- 

 five miles an hour does not attbrd opportunity 

 for close observation; yet sufficient to say that 

 the crop of winter wheat has emerged from 

 under its covering of snow in good coadition. 

 except on low and wet lands where there has 

 been considerable heaving up by tie recent 

 freezing and thawing, which, should it continue 

 until spring fairly opens would put a less 

 promising appearance upon the prospects of 

 the coming crop, which may be considered 

 fair, by way of the line of said railroad. The 

 soil and geological formations through said 

 section is somewhat varied, but the greater 

 part is red shale, embracing southern York 

 county, the entire width of Adams, thence 

 through Maryland to within about fifteen 

 miles of Frederick city; the latter being sur- 

 rounded by a beautiful and naturally as fer- 

 tile a section of limestone laud as can be 

 found in the Keystone State. Throughout 

 the red shale region many of the farmers are 

 no doubt land poor, i. f., they cultivate more 

 land than they can do with profit. 



Horace Greeley's advice will emphatically 

 apply to the farmers of said region, i. e., to 

 apply their labor and expenses to half the area 

 they now skim OTe^vand fertilize their soil to 

 twice its presen^^Pfitli. It has often been a 

 query with the w'riter, why in that, as also iu 

 other sections of only partially fertile soil, we 

 see so many large and complete barns, in 

 many cases superior to those of much more 

 fertile regions. Another matter is observable, 

 and which is of too general application,! e., 

 the large number of barns devoid of spouting. 

 The prevalent custom of building bank barns 

 is no doubt admitted to be equal, if not su- 

 perior, to any otiier plan, but with the man- 

 ure bed in front, declining from the barn, and 

 in addition to the rain and snow falling on 

 the manure, all the rain falling upon tlie half 

 of the roof in addition is drained through the 

 manure pile, a drain that no larmer can af- 

 ford imless his land is too rich. We may 

 safely calculate tliat 2.5 per cent of the rich- 

 est fertilizing ingredients of the manure pile 

 is in many cases annually carried into the 

 nearest stream. 



The various methods of farming in the diff- 

 erent sections of country are not always ob- 

 servable at sight. Several visits to Frederick 

 City ami its surroundings, and also throuwli 

 Shenandoah Valley, conversations on farm 

 and other topics, with a number of intelligent 

 citizens, has satisfied the writer that there is 

 much room for progress in agriculture and 

 horticulture in that section. 



It is doubtful whether there is an equal 

 area to thu Monocacy valley in Lancaster 

 county that would bear the exhaustive sys- 

 tem of farming so long, and continue to yield 

 such crops. 



The custom almost without exception is. to 

 sell all they can pos.sibly spare from the farm, 

 i. e., "rain, hay, straw, and even manure. 

 The Tatter is not a general custom, but a 

 Penn.sylvanian who moved there after the war, 

 purchased lot) loads of manure from a neigh- 

 bor farmer, an old resitUnil, which the new 

 comer liberally applied to save his own land, 

 part of which he double cropped. The re- 

 sult was the second crop paid for all the ma- 

 nurt. besides leaving the land in very fertile 

 condition. He could however buy no more 

 manure from that neighbor. In order to 

 continue cropping, large quantities of com- 

 mercial fertilizers are annually applied, gen- 

 erally from .flUO to %oW worth, according to 

 size of farm. By this method fair crops are 

 grown, but the general difficulty is, that each 

 successive crop requires heavier doses, to give 

 satisfaction. AVliere the continuation of 

 such a course of tillage will lead to. some in- 

 dividuals who have been using patent medi- 

 cines for a succession of years, might per- 

 haps solve the problem in advance. If there 

 is a single and cheap remedy for the ills to 

 which such lauds have fallen heir to, that 

 remedy is clover. 



A Pennsylvanian who moved southward 

 since the war, conceded to the writer that he 

 had to some extent adopted the practice of 

 his neighbors, but seceded a few years ago by 

 plowing down a heavy crop of clover, which 

 seemed peculiarly suicidal at the time, but in 

 pointing out the field, said, "the soil seems to 

 have changed, no failure of crops since the 

 clover was plowed down, besides, she soil has 

 lost its former tenacity and is now much more 

 friable; can plow it when the other fields will 

 clog." That similar effects would result in 

 all soils by plowing in clover, is hardly proba- 

 ble, but we may safely say, four-fifths of the 

 lands in anv section of our country, that have 

 been run down by the above exhaustive meth- 

 od, would be benefited by the same cheap rem- 

 edy, at least where clover will grow at all. 



The question is still, which way, with many 

 who wish to move on cheaper lauds. These 

 can be had either west or south. If the laws 

 and customs of caste could be wiped out of 

 existence, the south would have advantages 

 not to be found elsewhere in the Union. But 

 since the settlement of the colonies, but es- 

 pecially since the enactment of Mason and 

 Dixon's line, the affiliation between the north- 

 ern and southern people of the country has at 

 no time been of that fraternal nature, like 

 that of east and west. 



Some time after the war the tide of immi- 

 gration seemed to preponderate southward, 

 but h.as changed into its former westward 

 current as formerly, and until the south will 

 exhibit a progressive spirit similar to that of 

 the west, the latter will retain the lead in the 

 race for population. However, until a spirit 

 will be inaugurated toward less land and bet- 

 ter tillage, instead of more acres and closer 

 skimming, the process of impoverishing our 

 best lands will continue. Sometime, how- 

 ever, a change will be inevitable. — U. M. E., 

 Marietta, Pa., Feb. 24, 1877. 



^ 



For The Lancaster Fabmxb. 

 BUILD BIRD HOUSES. 



This is one of the little odd jobs that should 

 be attended to about evervbody's dwellings. 

 We all like to see plenty of nice fruit and 

 vegetables, &c., now 1 am confident that if 

 we would give them (the birds) more care and 

 protection, they would help us in a very great 

 measure to protect it from the ravages of in- 

 sects, and also be a considerable pleasure to 

 us in other ways. I wont .say what shape 

 you shall make the boxes. Any Imix about 

 from .5 to 8 inches will do for "small birds. 

 They need not be very neat, but shold be well 

 made, and put up so that they don't tumble 

 down, and so that the cats don't disturb the 

 birds. The hole for the entrance should not 



