PROCEEDINGS OF THE FARMERS' CLUB. 211 



tcntli of the weight of timber is required, and almost any sort will answer 

 for these short poles, while for long ones the very nicest sort of long, 

 straiglit, slim young trees, of some durable wood, is required, and of such, 

 the hop growing counties have become exhausted, and poles are imported 

 from Canada at great expense. The cost of twine is not onerous, as it 

 can he saved and used from year to year, and the poles do not need to be 

 taken up and reset, •oiil}'- when thej' decay, and they do not need to be set 

 near as firmly in the ground as long poles, because the wind has but little 

 effect, as the twines run at right angles, from side to side of the yard, con- 

 necting all so firmh' together that not one can fall, even when rotted off at 

 the surface of the ground. There is another advantage in this system of 

 poling; that is, if these short poles are set for the first season the vines 

 will climb them and produce nearly half an average crop of hops without 

 injuring the corn. The next year the twines are put on, and the vines 

 trained along them in each direction so that the hops which always grow 

 upon branches manj'^ of them being within easy reach of the picker. In 

 this system, instead of taking up and carrying the poles to one spot to be 

 picked, the pickers pass through the field, loosening the twines from the 

 top of the pole as they proceed and leaving them to fully mature before 

 being cut. The picking is usually mostly done by girls who receive upon 

 the old plan twenty-five cents a box which holds about ten bushels. I pay 

 a little higher per bushel for picking, say four to four and a half cents, but 

 r save the expense of taking up and carrying the poles to the boxes. 

 Another advantage, there is less carrying and shaking of the hops. A 

 bushel of hops will make about two pounds when dried. That would make 

 the cost of picking an acre at two to two and a half cents a pound, $20 to 

 $25 per acre. If a man has five acres, and a kiln sufficient to dry the crop 

 as fast as picked, he should employ twenty-five or thirty girls. 



Picking and curing is the most important operation connected with the 

 hop crop. The season commences the last week in August, and the work 

 should be continued as rapidly as the hops can be cured. The old fash- 

 ioned curing house is made with a room twelve to sixteen feet high, the 

 lower part occupied by a stove or some kind of heating furnace, and the floor 

 overhead made of wooden slats, upon which a thin cloth is placed, and on 

 this the hops 'twelve to twenty inches thick. They require from eight to 

 twelve hours' heat, and must be stirred once or twice during that time, 

 because the portion lying over the slats is not as much affected by the ac- 

 tion of the fire as that in the space between. When sufficiently cured they 

 are carried to a drying room. This process requires a good deal of handling 

 and hiss of the lupulin; as the kiln must be kept going night and day the 

 owner cannot always be present, A great improvement in kilns has been 

 made; wires are substituted for the wooden slats, so that the hops do not 

 need stirring while drying, and when dry enough they are removed without 

 touching them by hand. One edge of the cloth is attached to a roller, 

 which, being turned, draws the load upon the cloth along and empties it 

 Qver into the store room. 



The telegraph plan of training hops has not proved successful. This plan 

 consisted in stretching wires from side to side of the field, to support twines 

 or smaller wires up which the vines were trained. In one case a yard of 



