1891 
243 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
A STEUBEN COUNTY, N. Y., FARM HOUSE. 
At Figs 86 and 87, are shown an outside view and the 
ground plan of my new house, built in the winter of 
1889-90. It was commenced in October and finished in 
March, except the painting, which was done the past sum¬ 
mer. I cannot give the exact cost, as I furnished all of 
the hemlock lumber, but did not notice how much was 
used. I boarded all of the help, besides doing considerable 
work myself. The reader will notice the low cost of the 
paint. The figure represents the cost of the paint alone 
after the priming, for two coats were put on by myself. 
In the picture, the old gentleman near the house and the 
lady with the white apron are my father and mother, 
while I stand in front with my five-year old daughter. 
The lady on the other piazza is my wife. The buildings 
in the background are the old house and barn ; the main 
barn and other structures are not seen, being directly back 
of the new home. 
COST. 
Cellar wall work.$38 00 
Material.. 01)0 
Pine and hardwood lumber.150 00 
Shingles. 55 00 
Lath. 10 75 
Prick. 9 00 
Plaster for walls. 45 00 
Lathing and plastering .33 44 
Carpenter work.150 00 
Windows, doors and blinds. 95 14 
Trimmings. 14 62 
Paint. 34 00 
Eave troughs . 26 00 
Miscellaneous. 28 00 
Total.8695 03 
C. H. EVERETT. 
A NORTH DAKOTA FARMER’S CROP STORY. 
Match It, Eastern Farmers. 
I notice that some of The Rural subscribers have given 
it a Dr. and Cr. account of their farms. Here is such an 
account of my farm, located in Cass County, N. Dakota. 
It may interest some of my Eastern farmer friends, as they 
have, as a rule, a poor opinion of this part of the world. 
FOR THE YK4R 1890. 
Value of farm, 820 per acre for 640 acres..$12,°00 00 
Eleven horses at *125 each.. 1,375 oo 
Binders, plows, harrows and drills. 4 0 oo 
Three cows, 8'25 each. 73 00 
Hugs, chickens and small tools. . loo oo 
Total invested.S,4,750 < 0 
EXPENSES FOR YK4R 1890. 
Seed wheat for 4C0aeres, at one bushel per acre . $820 00 
Seed oats for 55 acres, at two bushels per acre. 40 70 
seed barley for eight acres, at two bushels per acre. 7 00 
Farm help .. . 8'4i0 
Thrashing bill . .. . 340 10 
Wood, coal and store bills for the year. h97 00 
Repairs. 86 (X) 
Total expense, including family for year. *2,0(4 70 
FA 5 M CR. 1890 
8,400 bushels of wheat at 80 cents per bushel. 86,720 00 
Deduct expenses for year. 2,001 70 
Net gain. $4,715 30 
On an invested capital of $14,750. 
I have not mentioned in the account 2,327 bushels of 
oats, 327 bushels of barley, one beef, together with bogs, 
chickens, eggs, butter, potatoes and garden truck, nor the 
hay raised on the farm, as a good part of all will be con¬ 
sumed by the time I have raised my next crop. Yes, and 
I also raised 10 acres of good flint corn. Let me hear from 
an Eastern farmer who has done better on no larger an in¬ 
vestment of capital. My farm operations for 1890 have 
been merely an average year’s work for intelligent farm¬ 
ing in this part of Red River Valley, s. C. carpenter. 
Cass Co., N. D. 
“Farmin’ Don’t Pay” Here. Why? 
Seeing in The Rural some accounts of cash sales from 
farmers, and an editorial on the subject, I will send an ac¬ 
count from a farm that “don’t pay.” It consists of 150 
acres, of which 100 are mountain land, no good for farm¬ 
ing ; but a part of it affords good pasture. I sold from five 
cows : 
I OKU. 
1,000 pounds of butter. $203.97 
Sundry other articles. 41.37 
$245.34 
Living expenses. $314.77 
I paid for the farm, in 1887, $3 000 cash, and my stock, 
tools, etc., cost $1,000. Is it any wonder that we are crying 
that “ farmin’ don’t pay ?” I am doing as well as any of 
my neighbors. I have not made expenses from the farm 
since I bought it. F. p. bull. 
Bradford Co., Pa. _ 
ALL ABOUT AN ASPARAGUS ACRE. 
First Cousin to a Gold Mine. 
What Was Sold —Here is a correct statement of the 
crops grown and sold from my 4% acres of land. I keep 
no stock except one horse. This last year, however, I have 
one colt coming two years, and six hens. My family 
consist of wife and self. I give statements from my book 
of saie3: 
Lettuce at wholesale at the house. $65 00 
Asparagus wholesale at the stores, ai 10 c. per pound per season. 550 20 
celery to the Celery o., and some at Elmira market. 979 39 
Onions wholesale at 74 c. per bushel . 15 1 51 
Tomato and celery plants. 45 00 
Carrots at wholesale. 27 50 
Parsnips at wholesale at 1 c. per pound. 27 40 
Turnips. it) no 
Asparagus seed at Rochester and Philadelphia. 68 75 
Premiums at Cuunty Fatr. 25 38 
$1,952 13 
I had some strawberries, cabbages, potatoes and 
squashes that were so much under water that I got no 
income from them—say a quarter of an acre. I cut one 
acre of asparagus. The lettuce was grown early in the 
season to allow the growth of a second crop, 
Paid out for help. 2^1 16 
Hen manure. 30 00 
Stable manure from the city, beside what was made from one 
horse. 20 00 
Total outlay. . $33 1 16 
I think my balance will make a fair showing compared 
with the proceeds from most of the 4%-acre farms about 
here. 
Green Manuring Pays.— Some may say the manure 
account is not sufficiently large to grow so much truck. 
This might be true if I depended entirely on the stable 
manure ; but since I have adopted the green manure plan 
I use only about one-half as much stable manure as I 
formerly did. Just as soon as I take off a crop of celery, 
say from a quarter or half an acre, I sow rye and keep on 
doing so until the whole field is in rye and all is in good 
condition for plowing under in May or June, as I may 
need the land. Last fall, after sowing rye, I covered the 
land and rye with straw and from present appearances I 
think I have done a good thing for the coming crop. 
Labor on the Crop.— Last fall I put on 20 loads of 
good stable manure; cut out all seed-bearing stalks, so as 
to get rid of the seedlings in the spring, for I find these 
very troublesome as they cover rye so thick that they hurt 
the growth of the young shoots, preventing them from 
being strong and tender. I leave the rest of the tops as a 
mulch through the winter, and as soon as the ground be¬ 
comes dry I will clean off and burn them and then sow 
200 pounds of nitrate of soda and drag all mellow and fine. 
The crowns are so large and so near the top of the soil 
that I can’t use a plow or cultivator without cutting somo 
of the plants. My market is the city of Elmira, seven 
miles from my home. I select my customers from among 
the best in the city. I sell in bulk, not by the bunch. 
They don’t ask me to tie the stuff up. I sell at 10 cents 
per pound for the season round, delivering the produce in 
the evening or morning to suit myself. The merchants 
agree to take all they can sell, and I am to let each have 
as much as he wants when I have enough for all; but if 
the cut is small on some days so that I cannot fill all de¬ 
mands, I give each an equal quantity so that one can’t 
have all and the others none. I have sold to the same 
parties for years. If I can’t let them have all they want, 
then they buy of others for the day. This saves me much 
trouble as I can often deliver the goods to all in a few 
minutes after I get into the city. A. DONALD. 
Chemung Co., N. Y. 
TRELLIS FOR BLACKBERRY VINES. 
I would like to criticise Mr. E. P. Powell’s notes on 
raspberries and blackberries, particularly his method of 
trellising, which is to run a wire 4 % feet from the ground, 
supported by stakes at intervals of 20 feet, topping the 
canes at a height of six feet. In my opinion mine is a far 
better and simpler method. My plan is to take good fence 
posts five feet in length, set one at each end of a row, 3% 
feet in the ground, leaving 20 inches above ground. I use 
No. 12 galvanized wire and draw it as tightly as possible. 
However long the rows may be, a post set firmly at each 
end is sufficient. After the canes are tied to the wire they 
form a perfect support, and there are no stakes in the way 
of the hoe. I top my canes at three feet, just the right 
height to he handy for the pickers. By running the wires 
20 inches from the ground they pass below the branches, 
so that it is much more convenient to tie them, and less 
twine is required, while the tops are in better shape for 
picking. I remove the old canes as soon as the fruit is off, 
and tie the new ones to the wire to prevent their being 
twisted off by the wind. I am well aware that a large 
number of fruit growers dispense with stakes or wires ; 
but after having used both for three years, I regard them 
as indispensable, if one wants the crop to be the best. I 
would not advise any one to use sawdust as a mulch for 
anything, as its effects on the soil are not desirable, and it 
also makes an excellent breeding place for Injurious in¬ 
sects. To keep the soil moist, cool and rich each winter I 
cover a space about two feet wide along the rows with 
manure, and start the cultivator as soon in the spring as 
the soil is in fit condition, and continue its use until 
August. Blackberries require the same treatment if one 
wants to be sure of a good crop. During the drought at 
fruiting time in the past season, I noticed that the neg¬ 
lected berries on the wild, as well as the tame bushes were 
drying up, while mine were ripening nicely and in large 
quantities. Mr. Powell says, “Set this berry in your 
lowest landthat would be bad advice for growers in 
Ohio, on account of the liability of the vines to winter-kill. 
I say, set them on the highest land, and thus avoid this 
danger to a considerable extent. e. A. trout. 
Licking Co., O. 
VEAL CALVES ON SKIM-MILK. 
Some two or three years ago I read an article in The 
Rural about raising veal calves on skim-milk, but not 
until last fall had we been so fixed that we could try 
this experiment. In former years we raised all our calves 
—Jerseys—for our own use, but this fail our calves were 
of the common stock from one side, and our cows—14 in 
number—came in between September and January, just 
when butter is at the highest price. Although our butter 
is engaged for 25 cents the year round, yet to have a sur¬ 
plus of butter during the winter, when it brings from 25 
cents to 35 cents a pound, is far better than to have a 
surplus when it brings only from 8 to 12% cents. Therefore, 
with butter at this price we could not veal our calves from 
the cows, so we tried vealing them on skim-milk. 
Oar experiment, so far, has been very satisfactory, al¬ 
though some of the calves have persisted in making noth¬ 
ing but hair, bone and muscle; but these would not have 
made veals with the cows, either, because they were not 
of the easily fattened kind, and those who have raised 
calves can say that there is a great difference in calves. 
Now, some of ours on the same feed find under the same 
conditions made what the butcher said was “ pretty fair 
veal ” Veal here brought four cents a pound. We only 
asked three cents a pound for ours and made money at 
that, as the following will show : 
Having bought a new cow we this fall tried her to see 
if she was of any account. She made only nine pounds of 
butter a week, but she is young and we will keep her a 
while lqnger. < We have other cows that make in the 
neighborhood of 15 pounds a week, but we will take this 
cow to figure our profits ou, as we know to a certainty 
what she makes this time when fresh. The calf was taken 
from her when two days old, and the first week was spent 
in diminishing the quantity of new milk fed it, and in¬ 
creasing that of the skimmed. The second week it was 
taking skim-milk alone. Dropping this first week from the 
cow’s profit and from the calf’s, too, we will only figure 
on the four weeks, as the calf was sold when five weeks old. 
In four weeks the cow ma e (counting nine pounds a 
week) 36 pounds of butter which, at 25 cents a pound, 
equaled $9. The calf when sold weighed 161 pounds, and, 
at three cents, brought $4.83, making a total of $13 83 from 
one cow for four weeks. If we had vealed the calf from 
the cow it would, at the end of five weeks, have probably 
weighed 170 pounds, although a calf we had last summer 
only went to 160 pounds when five weeks old, though it 
was raised from the cow. But say that it weighed 170 
pounds, it would, at four cents a pound, have brought $6.80, 
while nothing is left to represent the $7.03 profit made by 
raising it in the other way. 
The calf consumed during the four weeks 112 gallons of 
milk; it weighed, to begin with, 60 pounds. Thus the 112 
gallons of skim milk made 101 pounds of veal, and it was 
worth a little less than 2 2-3 cents a gallon as a feed for 
calves. Has any one fed skim-milk to a pig and secured 
so much profit ? The calf had all the hay it wanted to eat, 
and occasionally a little mush. From a calf from a better 
cow our profit would have been greater, but we knew the 
exact weight of this calf when sold and exactly what the 
cow made. The calf was half Jersey, half common stock. 
It was small to begin with, as are all our calves, for a little 
Jersey cow doesn’t have very large calves. 
During our institute one man was telling how by watch¬ 
ing the market reports in his agricultural paper he had 
sold a veal calf (raised from the cow) for four cents, when 
the butcher only wanted to pay 2% cents. This man 
then showed how,'by just simply keeping himself posted 
on the price of things, he had made enough to pay for his 
paper another year. This was very good as far as it went; 
but was he making anything by selling his veal at 4 cents 
a pound ? By looking over the figures given above you 
can see that we can not vea'l a calf from the cow at 
this time of year for less than 12 cents a pound, for the 
profit from the cow was $13 83 : a calf weighing 60 pounds 
to begin with, and weighing 170 when sold, would give 
110 pounds of veal to represent the $13 83. 
The time, trouble and extra work have not been taken 
into account. But it seems to me any girl or boy could 
milk this cow, skim the milk, feed the calf and make the 
butter for the extra $7.03 profit which was thus made. 
This would give the one who undertook it 25 cents a day 
for pay, and many a boy and girl go out to work by the 
week for little more than this sum per day. 
Scioto, Ohio. farmer’s girl. 
MEAT FOR ENGLISHMEN. 
Fluctuations in British live stock; steady increase in 
American; Americaa “ governor” of prices for 
British bread and meat; imports of fat stock and 
meat yreater than of store cattle; more of the latter 
needed; annual agrirultural reports; recent increase 
of flocks and herds; increased demand for American 
meat probable owing to improved business and in¬ 
crease of population; increased American demand 
also. 
The numbers of the different kinds of meat-producing 
animals of the farm in Great Britain fluctuate a good deal 
at times, as batween one year and another, and do not 
steadily and continuously Increase as they do in America. 
Passing last March through several of your great cattle- 
raising States, including Texas, I saw sufficient to explain 
why your national wealth in live stock is constantly in¬ 
creasing, and must constantly increase for some time to 
come. The floods in Missouri and Arkansas revealed a 
recurrent source of loss, and it was “ wondrous pitiful ” to 
see cattle, noble anti handsome even in death, drifted 
against the railroad embankments. You lose them, too, by 
thousands in droughts and blizzards, and the keen storms 
of winter; but even these disastrous paroxysms of Nature, 
sad and deplorable as they are, iuterfere only incidentally 
with the rate of increase which is always at work. 
Formerly a deficient wheat harvest in this country was 
promptly followed—nay, anticipated—by the dear loaf of 
bread; but this was in times when the great wheat fields 
of Central and Western America were still in a state of 
primeval virginity, and had not begun to pour out the 
stream of golden grain which now floods and dominates 
the British market of breadstuffs. And so it is coming, or 
has come to pass with beef and mutton and bacon; for 
the beef and bacon of America, and the mutton of the 
Antipodes, are, each succeeding year, deepening their in¬ 
fluence in this country, and the varying numbers of our 
own meat-yielding animals are of less account than they 
once were in governing the scale of prices which the fin¬ 
ished products command in our home markets. The case, 
however, is different with regard to store stock, for while 
the price of beef remains almost stationary the year round, 
one year after another, and mutton does not vary very 
much, ln-calf cows for breeding and dairying purposes, 
steers and barren females for fattening, young calves, 
store and in-lamb sheap fluctuate synonymously with the 
numbers of such animals. And while American and Anti¬ 
podean competition a<?t)S OU our dead-meat market Ukfi a 
