1884 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICTJLTUBIST. 
359 
Orclmi'd. Fruit 4i<ai*)ileii. 
Gathering and marketing will be an important 
work. Good fruit, neatly and honestly packed, 
will always bring good prices in seasons when 
poor fruit will not pay its freight.Pick all pears 
before they become mellow.The longer the 
peaches will be in reaching the consumer, the harder 
should they be when picked.Small local mar¬ 
kets often pay better prices than those of large 
cities.Recollect what has been said about dry¬ 
ing or evapoiating fruit.Budding of peaches 
and pears on quince stocks, should be completed. 
See that the ties are cut in season.Stones of 
peaches and plums, if in small lots, may be kept in 
boxes of sand in a cool cellar.Where fall plant¬ 
ing is desirable, prepare the land and order trees at 
once.Cut away blackberry canes as soon as the 
fruit is picked; do not allow new canes to grow 
higher than six feet.... .Strawberry plants layered 
in pots may still be planted. Keep the runners 
from new beds, unless more plants are wanted. 
Grapes should be packed according to the customs 
of the market to which they are sent. Small faney 
paper boxes, and baskets holding ten or twenty 
pounds, are now popular_Attend to late insects. 
iVlnrket and Kitclien garden. 
This should be a month of abundance on the ta¬ 
ble and in the markets.In preparing vegetables 
for market observe the preferences of the place 
where they are to be sold. Wash all roots; better 
feed thetn out at home, than send to a city market 
unwashed.Warm days and cool nights favor 
the growth of cabbages, celery, etc.; also the 
growth of chick and other weeds, and the hoe and 
cultivator will be frequently required.Sow 
early cabbages, cauliflowers and lettuce, for plants 
to winter in cold-frames. In most places lettuce 
plants will keep without glass if covered with 
leaves.... Sow spinach, kale, usually called sprouts, 
winter radishes, corn salad, and flat turnips. 
Cut cue.umbei's for pickles when of the desired 
size, every other day, alw’ays with a stem.When 
melons are ripe, they part readily from the stem ; 
the ripeness of watermelons is usually told by the 
hardness of the rind.Late tomato blossoms can 
not now produce fruit that will ripen; cut them 
aw'ay.Only the celery needed for immediate use 
or sale, should be earthed up for blanching ; it is 
too early for the main crop.As soon as a crop 
is off, gather the refuse for pig or cow, and prepare 
the land at once for some winter crop. 
Xl»e Flower CJardeit aii<l l.awn. 
The lawn should be mown according to the con¬ 
dition of the grass, rather than at stated periods. 
See article page 362 on “ Lawn Making.”_Stake 
tall-growing plants, dahlias, tuberoses, lilies, etc., 
against strong winds....Pot chrysanthemums for 
house blooming; those to remain out will require 
stakes.Plant hyacinths, narcissuses and other 
“ Dutch bulbs,” as early as they can be purchased. 
_Sow seeds of perennials as soon as ripe... . 
Make cuttings of bedding plants; the old plants are 
seldom worth taking up.Violets should be 
planted in frames to be covered with leaves in cold 
weather.Gather seeds as they ripen, label at 
once, and as soon as dry and cleansed, store in 
paper bags in a dry place away from mice. 
Oreeitlioui^c and 'IViiidow 
The houses and heaters should be ready for im¬ 
mediate occupation.Potting soil, sand, pots 
and all things needed for winter use are to be 
stored under cover, or in the cellar.. ..Plants to 
be taken up from the borders for winter blooming, 
should now be potted, cutting back both top and 
roots.Re-pot those plants that have been in pots 
all summer.See that pots and plants are clean 
when taken in ... .Sow annuals for winter bloom, 
pot bulbs, and make cuttings of geraniums, etc. 
Where are the Bees the Busiest ?—Our yearly 
honey crop is about twenty-six million pounds, of 
which Tennessee produces over two millions, fol- i 
lowed closely by New York. Ohio comes next, | 
and then North Carolina, Kentucky and Pennsyl¬ 
vania. The other States producing over a million 
pounds are Illinois, Iowa, Virginia, Georgia, Alich- 
igan and Arkansas. The honey interest is widely 
scattered, and there is room for it to become still 
more so, to the benefit of plants as well as man. 
Thatching Roofs with Straw. 
Several of our readers ask us for directions 
for roof-thatching with straw. A well-made 
thatched roof is water-tight, durable, warm, 
easily repaired and especially adapted to prairie 
regions, where shingles are expensive. The straw 
employed in making the roof should be hand- 
threshed, and dampened before it is used. The 
roof-laths may be saplings, two inches thick, and 
flattened where they cross the rafters, to which 
they are nailed. The straw is prepared in small 
bundles, with the butts evenly arranged, and are 
tied to the lath with tarred twine, using a wooden 
needle. The bundles are laid in tiers, beginning at 
the eaves in the same manner as with shingles. The 
peak is covered by bending the straw in the mid¬ 
dle, and sewing the ends to the thatch on each side. 
A Watering Tube. 
Mr. G. W. Jerrard, Aroostook Co., Me., sends us 
a sketch and description of an implement for wa¬ 
tering garden plants. It is a tin tube, shown at a 
in the engraving, one-half inch in diameter, eight 
inches long, perforated near the bot¬ 
tom, and with a conical end. The up¬ 
per end, 6, is in the form of a funnel. 
In using this device, insert the conical 
end of the tube in the ground as near 
the plant as convenient, without dis¬ 
turbing the roots, and turn the water 
into the funnel. The water will pass 
out into the soil through the per¬ 
forations at the bottom. The soil is 
not baked on the surface when water¬ 
ed in this manner, and the operation 
is very quickly done. Any local tin¬ 
smith can make the tube at a slight 
A small flower pot is sometimes sunk 
in the soil near the plant, and the water, when 
poured into it, will gradually soak away. 
expense. 
A Fruit Ladder. 
An orchard ladder should be both light and 
strong. Mr. H. II. Hawes, Kennebec Co., Me., 
sends us a description of such a ladder. The sides 
may be of two by three-inch spruce, shown in 
section with trimmed corners at a. The “ rungs” 
should be of hard-wood—white oak or white ash, 
a trifle more than an inch in diameter, and placed 
A fruit ladder with movable foot. 
thirteen inches apart. The bottoms of the side- 
pieces may be left square, and on one rivet an iron 
band. Fasten a similar band to a hard-wood piece 
twenty eight inches long, and nearly the size of 
the ladder-side. Small holes are bored through 
this piece and also the ladder-side, in which is 
placed an iron pin, b. By means of this device the 
ladder can be quickly adjusted to the unevenness 
of the ground. This movable foot can be removed. 
Making a Straw Stack. , 
I 
JOSKPn HARRIS. 
As soon as the threshing machine comes on to- 
the farm, one of the first questions is, how large 
shall we make the bottom of the straw stack? If 
you ask the threshers, they will say, “Be sure and 
make it big enough.” But if you want to save all 
the straw you can, a much more sensible answer 
would be, “Be sure and make it small enough.” 
It you have more straw than can be got on to the 
stack, it is an easy matter to put a wagon bj’ the 
side of the stack, and draw a few loads to the 
barn. But if you run short of straw, you eannot 
possibly top off the stack properly. 
Barley, oats, and pea straw is frequently so mueh 
broken up by the machine, that it packs closely, and 
occupies far less space than rye and wheat straw. 
Of wheat and rye straw it will require about one 
thousand cubic feet of stack room to hold a ton, 
and a yield of twenty-five bushels per acre may give; 
you a ton of straw. Occasionally a heavy crop of 
w'heat will give one hundred pounds of straw to- 
each bushel of wheat. When wheat, rye, barley, 
and oats straw are stacked together in anything 
like equal proportions, we shall not be far wrong 
in estimating, on the average, half a ton of straw to 
eaeh acre. Furthermore, in such a case eight hun¬ 
dred cubic feet of spaee will be suffieient per ton. 
In other words, a stack eleven and a half feet in 
diameter will hold about an acre to each four feet 
in hight. One thirteen feet in diameter will hold 
an acre to each three feet in hight; one sixteen 
feet in diameter will hold an acre to each two feet 
in hight; one twenty feet in diameter, will hold 
about an acre to each one and a half foot in hight, 
and one twenty-three feet in diameter will hold an 
acre (a half a ton of straw), to each foot in hight. 
A stack thirty-three feet in diameter, will hold one 
ton of stravv to each foot in hight; one forty feet 
will hold one and a half ton to each foot in hight. 
When you have decided how large a stack to 
make, place a fork in the centre. Tie a string to 
to it, and if the stack is to be forty feet in diameter, 
tie a knot in the string twenty feet from the fork, 
and hold it in your left band. Spread out the 
straw on the bottom of the stack a little farther 
than it ought to be, and then pass round the staek 
and push in the straw with the feet, until the cir¬ 
cumference is twenty feet from the centre. It is lit¬ 
tle work, and is far better than trusting to the eye. 
In building the stack, the main point is to keep 
the middle full and well trodden down. The ehaff 
and the straw that is broken up into small lengths is 
more compact than the long straw, and should be 
kept in the middle of the stack. Place the long 
straw on the outside of the staek, and also bind it 
with long straw. It is neither safe nor desirable to 
tread down the straw on the outside. The lighter 
it is the more it will settle, and the better it will 
shed the rain. This is particularly important after 
you commence to build the top. 
Until we get longer straw carriers, we must do the 
best we can with those we have. As we approach 
the top, the straw carrier leaves the straw nearer 
the outside of the staek, and the man who throws, 
it back can hardly avoid removing the long straw 
and leaving the chaff. Take special pains to remove 
the chaff, and to pack long straw under the carrier. 
When threshing, the farmer should avoid, if pos¬ 
sible, taking any steady work that will confine him 
to one spot. He will find plenty to do in strengthen¬ 
ing the weak spots, in helping where help is most 
needed. This will frequently be at the straw stack. 
The outside should be raked down, and the straw 
thrown on to the carrier. Frequent visits to the 
top of the stack are desirable, if for no other pur¬ 
pose than to see that the middle is well trodden 
down. When the stack is finished, hand the 
stacker some “ riders ” to hold down the straw, 
and prevent the wind from blowing it off. Rails 
seeurely tied together with wire or rope will answer 
the purpose. Twisted hay or straw ropes are some¬ 
times used, but it is not pleasant to have a rail 
slip down on to one’s head. Raking the top of the 
stack until the straw slants down, makes the stack 
almost as safe against rain as if it were thatched.; 
