4.J 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



101 



position takes place in tlie udder, where the 

 separation is made. 



Professor J. T. Buhuill, in tlie Ameri- 

 can Naturalist, refers certain blights and dis- 

 eases of plants to the agency of bacteria. 

 Those organisms appear to be an active cause 

 of the blight in pear and apple trees. The 

 cells of blighted pear trees are destitute of 

 the starch grains with which the healthy cells 

 are filled, but traces of fermentation have 

 been discovered in them, and bacteria have 

 been uniformly observed in the juices of dis- 

 eased pear and apple" trees. The death of 

 patches of bark on the trunk and larger limbs 

 of apple trees, is ascribed by Professor Bur- 

 rill to the same cause. The yellows of the 

 peach tree have been shown, by the discovery 

 of bacteria under the microscope, to be caused 

 by a similar organism, as are also the blights 

 of the Lombardy poplar and the aspen. 



Mr. John Mitchell, a farmer near New- 

 burg, N. Y., has refused an offer of f 13,000 

 for a Ilolstein heifer and her calf. She is 

 said to have produced the largest quantity of 

 milk and butter ever before made from a sin- 

 gle animal, viz: 103i pounds, or about 51i 

 quarts of rich finely-flavored milk. 



Olemargarine, under the microscope, is 

 seen to be made up largely of feathery crys- 

 tals. These are the fatty substances from 

 which it is made, and the appearance is very 

 similar to that of lard. Pure butter presents 

 a cloudy appearance, showing no crystals, the 

 fat being in a homogenous state and not crys- 

 talized. When pure butter is adulterated by 

 mixing with oleomargarine the crystals will 

 not be so thick, but can be plain! y seen under 

 the microscope. Butterine has no crystals, 

 because they are dissolved by the oils, of 

 which it is largely composed, but it melts 

 much more easily than butter. If melted, 

 pure butter at once makes known its presence 

 by its odor. 



PiNcn off the tops of your raspberries and 

 blackberries early, and serve the side-shoots 

 the same way early and often to make a com- 

 pact bush. If you wait to head back later 

 the strength of the vine which has been 

 thrown into the top removed is all wasted 

 and you have fewer fruit spurs. 



YouNCi turkeys are most efficient insecti- 

 cides. A brood of these should be hatched 

 out under a hen, and the coop of the hen set 

 up in the garden. From this castle the young 

 birOs will make raids upon the bugs and 

 beetles. 



If you do not bank up your celery you can 

 plant in closer rows. Try some of it this 

 way, and when the time for blanching comes 

 tie up each plant closely in old newspapers. 

 It is said the stalks will bleach under this 

 treatment in from ten lo twenty days. 



A MAN with a sharp-toothed rake or a hoe 

 can go over four times as much land now in 

 an hour as he can after the weeds are grown. 

 The best time to kill weeds is before they are 

 born. 



A French authority states that carrots 

 give horses new blood, which seems to restore 

 them, and they may be justly claimed as the 

 regenerator of wornout horses. 



PuRSLAiN, young crab grass, weeds and 

 other refuse can be utilized to advantage by 

 feeding to pigs. At this season the grteu 

 food will be highly relished by them. 



Dogs do not always kill sheep for the pur- 

 pose of procuring food. The best fed dogs, 

 when once they begin the practice, will con- 

 tinue it until they are caught in the act. 



Doos do not always kill sheep for the pur- 

 po.so of procuring food. The best fed dogs, 

 when they once begin the practice, will con- 

 tinue it until they are caught in the act. 



In growing food for poultry it should be 

 borne in mind that corn, wheat and oats can 

 always be purchased, and it is best, therefore, 

 to grow sorghum, broom corn, pop corn, 

 millet and .sunflowers for seed, which afford a 

 variety. 



Feed Uttle chicks often— five times a day 

 will not be too often— with hard-boiled egg, 

 bread crumbs, boiled potatoes, little scraps of 

 meat. Supply them with fresh water twice a 

 day. All this is you want fine healthy birds. 



The ordinary marker makes too deep a 

 furrow for corn, especially when the planting 

 is early and the ground cold. If a cold rain 

 comes on after planting, this corn ijut so far 

 below the surface, will rot, or at least make 

 only a sickly growth. 



The Massachusetts Legislature has appro- 

 priated $2,000, to be expended, through the 

 State Cattle Commissioner, in investigating 

 the matter of abortion in cows, its causes, its 

 prevention, and its effect upon the healthful- 

 ness of the milk as an article of food, 



A RICH corner of your garden which would 

 grow five or six bushels of corn will produce 

 nearly twice as much sunflower seed. The 

 hens relish it and fatten and grow strong on 

 it. Who knows that the broad leaves do not 

 purify the iiir of malaria ? This is a wide 

 spread belief and the 'plant may do for us 

 what the eucalyptus does for the ague-striken 

 in lower latitudes. 



Cut your flowers before they fade and the 

 season of bloom will be prolonged. This ad- 

 vice must be followed strictly if you want 

 any autumn bloom on your hybrid perpetual 

 roses. This cutting encourages a new growth 

 back of the old flower stems, and on this 

 growth the fall roses appear. 



The roots of peas love a cool soil, therefore, 

 make the late planting deep. With this pre- 

 caution peas planted now will escajje mildew. 



Don't neglect to pinch off the sprouts which 

 appear on the stock where you set grafts this 

 spring or budded last season. Throw all the 

 vital force of the stock into the new growth. 



A hoe wears on the under side at the edge. 

 The best way to keep it sharp— and to do good 

 work it must be sharp — is to place it flat on an 

 anvil and, with a hammer of three or four 

 pounds weight, draw it as thin as you please, 

 and at the same time set the edge down to its 

 place. It won't break it, but if it should 

 chance to be too soft it will tend to harden it, 

 after which a little grinding on the under side 

 will give it a perfect edge without loss of 

 steel or expense of files. There is nothing 

 better than such a hoe with which to top tur- 

 nips that are grown in drills ; then pull with 

 a hook. The Germans hammer their scythes 

 instead of grinding them. So says a Connec- 

 ticut man in the Farm Journal. 



Don't give the young chickens one or two 

 big feeds for all day. Scatter some pickings 



for them every three or four hours. This is 

 nature's way. Follow nature, too, in not 

 giving them sloppy and soggy food. Oat meal 

 scalded with milk and worked pretty dry will 

 help them till they can take wheat, soaked, 

 softened and swelled. 



The cabbage worm is the larva ol the com- 

 mon white butterfly. A little pyrethrum 

 powdered, mixed with five times its bulk of 

 plaster, and dusted in with a bellows will kill 

 every one. Liquid insecticides do not work 

 well, for the surface of the leaves shed water 

 like a duck's back. 



Pyrethrum dust will kill the currant 

 worms, too, and it ia not poisonous, as is the 

 equally effective hellobore. 



The safest way to treat the striped squash 

 bug is to fence him out. Bottomless boxes, 

 twelve inches square and six or eight inches 

 deep — or old milk pans with the bottoms ont — 

 should be set about each hill and covered with 

 a bit of mosquito 'netting until the leaves of 

 the vines get too fuzzy and lough for the 

 bugs. 



A bushel of apples will make from four to 

 four and a half pounds of evaporated fruit. 



One of the best mulching materials is salt 

 hay, as it contains no seeds of weeds and can 

 be stored away for use another year. 



The Ititral New Yorker says that if you 

 want to exhaust poor land, or waste your ma- 

 nure and fertilizer, manure in the hill. 



Do NOT be too hasty in getting seeds into 

 the ground, especially of string beans, lima 

 beans, squashes, etc. , as the ground should be 

 warm for them. 



Millions of strawberry plants have been 

 set ont in West Tennessee this spring. Straw- 

 berry growing for Northen markets is Jprofit- 

 able in many Southern States. 



Farmers should enjoy, above all others, 

 the luxuries of the garden, and yet strange of 

 say, but few farms have complete gardens and 

 many farmers buy vegetables. 



SoJiE of the English dairymen speak of 

 ensilage as "pickled grass," which shows that 

 they have some things yet to learn about the 

 construction and filling of silos. 



Mr. J. J. Feely, of Divide, Montana, 

 writes the Butte Miner as follows: " I have a 

 calf 14 months and 20 days old that had a fine 

 calf on June 14th. Both are doing well." 



Horses at work will be gratified if they 

 are allowed a little green grass at least once a 

 day. If not convenient to turn them on the 

 grass cut it and feed, with a little salt in the 

 rack. 



Large numbers of cattle in Western Texas 

 are dying for want of water or grass. The 

 drought is very severe. Myriads of caterpil- 

 lars have appeared and are destroying all 

 vegetation. 



In planting late potatoes discard all that 

 are afl'ected with traces of rot. They should 

 be as sound and perfect as possible, as many 

 di-seases of the crop come from the germs 

 planted with the seed. 



In raising sheep, besides the profit from 

 wool, lambs and mutton, a considerable value 

 must be .allowed the droppings, as it ia an ad- 

 vantage in favor of sheep that they benefit the 

 soil upon which they are pastured. 



