86 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[ June, 



benefit from each otlier's experience, I wil- 

 lingly contribute my knowledge of all ques- 

 tions relating to iiractical farming. In reply 

 to the question now under consideration, I 

 can only give you my opinion, based, it is true, 

 on long years of experience, and to some ex- 

 tent corroborated by the experience of others. 



Speculative theories will not avail us any- 

 thing—farming is a practical business, aud 

 what the true, earnest, industrious and 

 economical farmer needs most is practical 

 information. The best time to harvest his 

 ■wheat is of more importance to him than the 

 best time to plant it, because the gain or loss 

 is more easily made. The question as given 

 me is indefinite, but I shall endeavor to an- 

 swer it in two respects : First, as to quantity ; 

 secondly, as to quality. If the object or desire 

 is to harvest quantity, the greatest number of 

 bushelstothe acre, the best time to harvestyour 

 wheat is to commence a few days before it ap- 

 pears to be ripe (the weather being ftivorable) 

 and finish a few days after it is fidly ripe. As 

 there is no assurance when the weather will 

 be most favorable, you should take advantage 

 of the fine weather, whether your wheat ap- 

 pears to be ripe altogether or not, lest the 

 weather should change when it appears more 

 ripe, or when you imagine you are better pre- 

 pared to begin your harvest. It will not do 

 to wait for the ripening of the last stalk, 

 neither will it do to set a time suiting your 

 own convenience. "All work should be done 

 at the proper time," is an excellent motto, 

 and in no respect is it more true, than in the 

 sowing and gathering of wheat. 



I have said it will not do to wait for the 

 last stalk to ripen ; there may be low parts in 

 your field, or some portions may have been 

 sown deeper than others, so that the earliest 

 may become too ripe by the time the last 

 ripens. The safest way is to let your wheat 

 become ripe enough to harvest it so as to 

 admit of gathering it into your barn, or to 

 stack it as soon as it is in sheaf, providing the 

 weather is favorable, or to begin a little too 

 early rather than a little too late, both for a 

 good yield and for making good bread. 



The ability to judge of the ripening of 

 wheat is of paramount importance. An error 

 in this direction spoils the whole crop. My 

 rule is to examine the straw and the kernel. 

 The straw ought to turn yellow, aud should 

 be cut before turniug brown. So much for 

 the best time to harvest wheat for quantity, 

 but I suppose the more important point is 

 when to harvest it for quality. 



To this I would reply, examine yom' wheat 

 very carefully, and take it after the kernel 

 has turned from its milky or doughy state to 

 such a solidity that it will not shrink too 

 much, so that the shells will remain more 

 tender and softer, when less gluten will re- 

 main with the bran, after it is ground. This 

 kind of wheat, my experience has taught me, 

 makes the finest and most nutritious flour and 

 the best bread. 



Harvesting wheat too green or soft not only 

 causes it to lose in weight but in flavor also. 

 The premature gathering of any vegetable 

 substance interferes with its maturity, and 

 whatever injures its growth injures its taste. 

 Take, for instance, the cherry, or peach, or 

 currant, or gooseberry, or any kind of fruit, 

 pluck it a few days "before it matures or is 

 perfectly ripe, and you spoil its natural taste 

 or flavor. So wheat, together with other 

 cereals, must have its true \vheatcn flavor, or 

 it will not make that fine and perfectly good 

 flour which always commands the highest 

 prices aud tlie readiest market. 

 ^ 



LOCAL FRUIT NOMENCLATURE.* 



Since the organization of the •' Lancaster 

 County Agricultural and Horticultural So- 

 ciety," it "has crossed my mind a hundred 

 times that there is something very defective 

 in the department of our local fruit nomen- 

 clature. There are many excellent varieties 

 of fruit in this county that are entirely desti- 

 tute of a distinctive name, or if a name ex- 



"Read before the Laucaster County Agricultural and 

 Horticulturol gpciety, June 3, 1878, bj- S. S. Rathvon. 



ists it is so very local in its character that it is 

 hardly known "beyond the limits of the family 

 that produces it. There is scarcely a meetmg 

 of the .society during the fruit season — and 

 very often out of that season — that specimens 

 of fruit are not presented /o?- a ncwHc,- and I 

 do not know of a single instance of any atten- 

 tion being given to such application, any fur- 

 ther than a mere notice in the proceedings to 

 that effect, and but for the reporters of the 

 proceedings of tlie meetings they would, in 

 most instances, receive no recognition at all. 

 Only at the last meeting Mr. L. S. Reist pre- 

 sented an extraordinary apple — extraordinary 

 at least in its prolonged keeping qualities — for 

 a name, but there is nothing in the proceed- 

 ings to indicate that it received any other 

 notice than the incidental record made by the 

 reporters of the proceedings. Now, this, it 

 appears to me, should be provided for by this 

 society, representing as it does the wealth 

 and wisdom — in agriculture and horticulture — 

 of one of the oldest, largest and most popu- 

 lous counties in the American Union. I am 

 clearly of the opinion that our local society 

 should have an active, competent and aggres- 

 sive committee on nomenclature, and the said 

 committee, "without fear, favor or affection," 

 should give practical effect to the object of its 

 appointment. I have said that the commit- 

 tee—otherwise properly qualified— should be 

 aggressive ; and by that I mean that when an 

 unnamed fruit, that is worthy a distinctive 

 name, and has long been known to the pro- 

 prietor of it as a good fruit, and one that is 

 capable of being perpetuated, is presented to 

 said committee under proper representations, 

 it should name, describe and make a record of 

 the same ; and also assume all the responsi- 

 bilities of the act, and have it published in 

 the proceedings of the society. True, it might 

 transpire that the committee would name 

 fruit that had been previously named. But 

 that should not prevent them fi'om acting in 

 any event, for the most distinguished scien- 

 tists and the most distinguished societies have 

 done the same thing. Of course, when such 

 a contingency occurs, the former name takes 

 the priority and the latter is suppressed ; but 

 the object sought is none the less attained. I 

 don't believe such an intelligent and respecta- 

 ble agricultural and liorticuUural community 

 as Lancaster county should be content to play 

 perpetually a second fiddle in matters of this 

 kind, when it possesses the ability to play a 

 leading part. I don't believe that they should 

 in all cases depend upon the decision of those 

 foreign to its soil in mattei-s of which they 

 must know most about themselves, and of 

 which they are competent to assume the initia- 

 tory. There is a maxim among the most 

 learned, that whatever name an object bears 

 among the masses of the people in the locality 

 where the object exists and is known, that of 

 right ought to be the common or popular 

 name of it. Anterior to this, however, there 

 is another maxim to the effect that when a 

 new country or a new object is discovered it 

 ought not to be arbitrarily named after some 

 county or object in a diflerent locality that 

 was previously discovered and known, but 

 after something locally relating to, incidental 

 to, or traditionally or historically connected 

 with such a new discovery. Of course, on 

 such a subject as pomology, in which a single 

 species often runs out into hundreds of varie- 

 ties, there must necessarily be a dearth of 

 common names, and therefore many of them 

 are named after the possessors, tlie producer 

 of the originator of said varieties, if not after 

 some external form or internal quality which 

 they possess. 



Who then is more competent to name a 

 new fruit, or any other subject of the kingdom 

 of nature, than those who first discovered it 

 and who are acquainted with its origin, >its 

 habits and its peculiar qualities. If we hap- 

 pen to originate or develop a new potato there 

 is no need for us to wait until some man in 

 the Russian empire condescends to give it a 

 name, and especially so when it is apparent 

 that lie knows nothing about it beyond the 

 bare fact of its existence. I here allude to 



the common or popular name — that name hy 

 which it may become best known among the 

 common people — among those who cultivate 

 it, who trattic in it, or who consume it. Its 

 scientific name may be left to the option of 

 scientific men. 



At the Centennial pomological exposition, 

 where the poverty of Pennsylvania in aggres- 

 sive pomology was by comparison very ap- 

 parent as a whole, I made the limited ac- 

 quaintance of Dr. Staman, of Leavenworth, 

 Kansas. The doctor appeared to be an earnest, 

 industrious and persevering pomologist. His 

 catalogue contained over nine hundred de- 

 scribed and figured varieties of apples and 

 pears, all of which were duly baptized with a 

 popular name, and many of these names were 

 bestowed or endorsed by himself; but he was 

 always very particular to learn as much as he 

 possibly could about the history, the habits 

 and the quality of all new or unnamed varie- 

 ties presented to him. About six months 

 after the close of tlie Centennial exposition I 

 received a letter from him, in which he stated 

 that his catalogue had been increased to sev- 

 enteen hundred varieties, a large number of 

 which he had picked np at the C^entennial. 

 Many people had sent their unnamed fruit 

 there for a name, just as if it could not have 

 been named in tlie locality where it origi- 

 nated. I had presented an excellent apple to 

 this society for two or three successive seasons 

 for a name ; and although it had lieen grown 

 in this city for forty years, and possessed 

 qualities which I thought were worthy of per- 

 petuation, it elicited" no serious attention 

 whatever. I gave Dr. Staman a specimen of 

 this fruit, and also some scions, and he has 

 described and named it the Scner Pippin, after 

 the person who had been in possession of the 

 tree for a number of years, and through whom 

 it had been brought before the public. 



Whether a fruit possesses good or only in- 

 different qualities, if it is a fixed aud well de- 

 fined variety, it still ought to have a name, 

 in order that we may be able to deal with it 

 intelligently — to at once reject it if it is 

 worthless, or adopt it if it is good. When a 

 botanist discovers a new plant, he immediate- 

 ly proceeds to describe aud name it, no matter 

 ho\v poisonous or otherwise worthless it may 

 be, because in some instances it is as impor- 

 tant tliat the inferior qualities of a thing 

 should be known as the superior qualities of 

 some other thing, in order that we may be 

 able to discriminate between them. 



But there is a rule among scientists to the 

 effect that when a new object is discovered, 

 described and named, in order to elicit public 

 recognition, the discovery, the description 

 and the name should be published to the 

 world, and not be kept within the domain of 

 a single fiimily, or be hidden in the unpub- 

 lished proceedings of a single society. Hence 

 it seems to me that the matter should be dele- 

 gated to a competent commission or com- 

 mittee, whose decision— under the qualifica- 

 tions heretofore stated — should be final. 



I offer these remarks as suggestions, and 

 preliminary to a plan for bringing into some 

 kind of order the loose fragments in fruit 

 nomenclature which are so plentifully strewn 

 all over the county of Lancaster, and for the 

 want of a knowledge of which we seem to be 

 always hankering after foreign things of far 

 less excellence. 



For The Li\NrASTEn Faumkk. 

 REVU OF MAY NUMBER. 



Attraction Extradvilinarp. — Tiie Y. M. C. 

 A. aud the Linnean hav clasped hands it 

 sems. It wud not hurt yur Ag. and Ilort. 

 Societe to giv them compane. 



Kitchen Garden. Calender.— The closing 

 paragraf is xcelent, in urging tlie cultivation 

 of garden vegetabls with hors insted of woman 

 power. 



General Suggestions.— This articl is so sound 

 that any of yur reders may understand it, but 

 as ther dades and grandades did not belev in 

 such nufangld noshuns, fu of them wil. 



The Cat-liird.— Much as we lik his songs, 

 and. even his mokery, we wud rather du with- 



