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THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



December, .1907 



Garden and Farm News 



THE meeting of the National Council 

 of Horticulture, which was held during 

 the first week of October in connection with 

 meetings of several other horticultural organ- 

 izations at Jamestown Exhibition, was re- 

 markable in that those in attendance were 

 so thoroughly representative of all the diverse 

 ramifications of horticulture. There was 

 the experimentalist, the college professor, 

 the seedsman, the florist, the vegetable 

 grower, the landscape architect, the nursery- 

 man, the journalist, and others, each of whom 

 presented to the meeting his view of the 

 horticultural situation of to-day. With the 

 very marked tendencies of specialization 

 in the various societies of to-day, the great 

 necessity of some common meeting ground 

 for the leading representatives of the special 

 branches has been severely felt, and it would 

 seem that some step toward a solution of 

 the problem has been made in this National 

 Council. The open and free discussion, 

 without any trace of acrimony, that was 

 carried on between the commercial and 

 practical plant grower and the college pro- 

 fessor, may lead to a better cooperation 

 between these two elements in the training' 

 of the future generations of professional 

 horticulturists. 



The possibilities of research work in horti- 

 culture are now much greater than they ever 

 have been, thanks largely to what is known 

 as the Adams Act, which has given large 

 funds to each of the state experiment stations 

 for this specific purpose, and which cannot be 

 used for any other. The grant has been so 

 arranged that the available funds increase 

 regularly for several years, and place the 

 work of the stations much more directly than 

 before under the centre of control of the De- 

 partment of Agriculture through the Office 

 of Experiment Stations. The more the work 

 of the stations can be co-ordinated under one 

 central control, the better will be the final 

 results to the country. 

 .» 



"An act to preserve trees abutting public 

 highways and other places" is the title of a 

 law recently enacted in Maine. It gives 

 authority to all cities and towns of any size 

 to procure, for park purposes, strips of land 

 not exceeding five rods in width which are 

 situated beside highways and public water- 

 ways. Of course, land thus taken must be 

 secured through regular condemnation pro- 

 ceedings, but the importance rests in the 

 fact that each community has absolute power 

 merely and has to exercise it. Other states 

 have, from time to time, secured possession 

 of narrow strips of land along waterways 

 by the cumbersome and expensive machinery 

 of a special commission appointed by the 

 Legislature. We should like to see some 

 such statute as the Maine one reproduced 

 in the laws of other states in the Union, and 

 further, see the people take advantage of 

 the powers in their hands. Scenery is not 

 private property; each individual should 

 feel that he has, and should exert, his rights 

 of ownership. 



The latest use for cement is in a new 

 way of making beehives! Long tubes three- 

 quarters of an inch in diameter are made of 

 cotton cloth and filled with cement mortar; 

 then this long, sausage-like affair is coiled 

 around four light rods which are placed as 

 guides where the corners of the hive are to be. 

 Enough cement filters out through the cotton 

 cloth to cement the joints together. The hives 

 are said to be somewhat cheaper than wood, 

 and they are certainly more easily made, es- 

 pecially if one happens to be living in a tree- 

 less country like our great Mississippi Valley. 



We know very little indeed about soil fer- 

 tility after all. Slowly it is dawning upon us 

 all that there is a very big subject in soil bi- 

 ology. The work of the minute organisms 

 known as bacteria in causing decomposition 

 and other complicated chemical reactions is 

 something that has not as yet been brought 

 home to the cultivator, who by the very nature 

 of things, however, must work empirically. 

 He knows that a dressing of nitrate of soda 

 gives him certain desired results with a given 

 crop, and so, in the stress of business he uses 

 nitrate of soda again. But there is a great deal 

 more to be considered, and it makes the recent 

 bulletin of the Vermont Agricultural Experi- 

 ment Station (Bulletin No. 130), a particularly 

 timely publication. This bulletin should be 

 read by anyone who is deeply concerned in 

 the vital facts of soil fertility, as it tells in an 

 untechnical manner, the essential facts of soil 

 biology in relation to fertility. 



At the International Congress on Plant 

 Hardiness, which was held in New York 

 in October by The Horticultural Society of 

 New York, the greatest question that was 

 debated, and still left unanswered, was " Is 

 acclimatization really possible?" Professor 

 Hansen of South Dakota took a strong stand 

 on the negative, and asserted the truth 

 of the De Candolle's law, which is that 

 no cultivated plant has been or can be 

 extended one hundred miles North or South 

 of the natural limits of the species. He 

 based his opinion very largely on his observa- 

 tions made in lengthy travels in remote 

 Northern regions of Europe and Asia, as well 

 as in this country. By "acclimatization" is 

 meant the inurement of a plant to a climatic 

 condition totally different from that in which 

 it grows naturally. The introduction of a 

 plant from an exotic or foreign region into 

 another of similar characteristics is not to be 

 considered as acclimatization — it is merely 

 translation. Mr. Henry Hicks, a nursery- 

 man, strengthened Professor Hansen's stand 

 by showing that foreign plants that are best 

 adapted to the Eastern United States, for 

 example, are those which come from regions 

 having a similar maximum and minimum 

 range of temperature, combined with a 

 similar minimum temperature in January. 

 This was the most practical result of the con- 

 ference, and it would seem to show most 

 clearly that horticulturists must look to 

 certain regions of the Caucasus, Eastern 

 Asia and Colorado for plants that are to be 

 introduced into the climate of the north- 

 eastern United States. 



A suggested new use for bamboo is the 

 production of paper pulp. The Japanese 

 Government is reported as having success- 

 fully experimented with the young shoots 

 of one of the bamboos, which, it is said, dries 

 readily and is easily handled in the manu- 

 facture. We believe that there are several 

 species of bamboo which could be grown 

 very profitably as farm crops in some of 

 the Southern States. 



A railroad corporation sending an agri- 

 cultural explorer to foreign lands ! A strange 

 development made necessary by the demand 

 for telegraph poles and ties. And what a 

 reflection on our forestry methods! One of 

 the large western railroads has sent the 

 manager of its timber department on a 

 journey to Hawaii, Japan and Australia to 

 study the eucalyptus, and possibly import 

 trees for planting on its tie plantations. 

 Eucalyptus ties have already been used in 

 this country, but it is the hope that some- 

 thing better than we already have may be 

 secured. The supply of suitable timber for 

 railroad ties is so limited that the railroads 

 have been using inferior woods and treating 

 them with creosote to increase their lasting 

 qualities. 



A milk test for forty-eight hours was con- 

 ducted at the Ogdensburg, N. Y., Fair with 

 Holsteins, Guernseys and Jerseys, with the 

 following results: first prize, Holstein, Lady 

 Irene of Woodlawn, 119.90 pounds milk, 

 3.90 pounds butter fat, estimated 4.87 pounds 

 butter; average per cent, of butter fat, 3.25 

 per cent. Second prize, Guernsey, Torch of 

 Lisbon, 77.07 pounds milk, 3.80 pounds 

 butter fat, estimated 4.76 pounds butter, 

 butter fat. 4.95 per cent. This cow gave 

 6 per cent, butter fat the first milking, which 

 fell to 4.4 per cent at the end of the test, 

 the only noticeable difference in any animal 

 tested, the first and last milking being just 

 the same in pounds. If she had kept up the 

 percentage of butter fat she would easily 

 have taken first prize. The next three tests 

 were taken by Holsteins, the three following 

 by Jerseys. The skim milk was estimated at 

 twenty cents a hundred which gave the Hol- 

 stein an advantage in the final result, as she 

 gave 119 pounds while the Guernsey gave but 

 77 ; the periods of lactation are not known. 



The Holsteins were milked eight times, the 

 Guernseys six times and the Jerseys four 

 times during the test. In justice to all, we 

 would say that the Holsteins belong to a 

 large herd while the Guernseys and Jerseys 

 represented small herds and the Jersey cows 

 were not strictly in show shape. The prize 

 cow was milked with a power milking ma- 

 chine operated upon the Fair grounds. One 

 Jersey cow averaged 6.125 per cent, butter 

 fat, the milk of this cow, 56.30 pounds, made 

 4.506 pounds butter worth $1.17, against 

 $1.43 of the prize cow, and when the value 

 of skim milk and the difference in cost of 

 keeping is considered, there is much to be 

 said for the little Jersey by those who do not 

 need skim milk. No Ayrshires were tested 

 and no casein records were made. Small 

 decimals have been omitted. 



