1894 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
583 
are as yet showing injury to any extent. Shallow cul¬ 
tivation every week has done more than spraying to 
prevent blight and beetles this year. c. e. c. 
BLOOD OUT OF POTATOES. 
BREEDING PEDIGREE INTO THE CROP. 
When young men ask The R. N.-Y. what they may 
do to win a business success on the farm, the advice, 
in a general way, is about as follows : 1. Select the 
crop or product that you vrefer to grow if it is suited 
to your farm. If possible select one containing a large 
proportion of water. 2. Study that crop and master it 
so that, one year with another, you may be sure of 
obtaining more than an average yield. 3. Vat pedigree 
into that crop by raising it so skillfully that the prod¬ 
uct will be too valuable for mere eating, and will com¬ 
mand an extra price for seed purposes. 
That is the advice given hundreds of young men, 
but hardly one of them has made a more striking suc¬ 
cess at carrying it into effect than W. S. Teator, of 
Upper Red Hook, N. Y. A brief story of Mr. Teator’s 
operations may be of interest and value to other young 
men who are striving to put “blood” into their work. 
It is not my plan in this article to go into details of 
culture and farm operations. I will give those in season 
for the next crop. The point to be emphasized here is 
that it is possible for an enterprising young farmer to 
change about from old methods, and develop a new 
and profitable business. Of course that change of 
clover sod forms part of the rotation, not only will the 
crop bring a profit, but it will leave the soil richer 
than it was before the fertilizer was applied. This is 
the universal testimony of potato growers, and Mr. 
Teator has proved it to his complete satisfaction. 
Beginning with a few acres Mr. T. has added to his 
acreage year by year, buying a planter, a digger, and 
other needed machinery as he went along. Each 
year’s experience taught him more and more about 
the care of the crop. When I visited the farm in early 
August I found 20 acres of as thrifty looking vines as 
I ever saw. The drought has been something terrible 
in all the country along the Hudson River, with hardly 
a soaking rain during the entire potato season. Level 
culture and a constant stirring of the soil kept the 
plants thriving, and enough potatoes have been dug 
to insure a yield of 3,000 bushels. 
Such a yield would pay well to sell on the open mar¬ 
ket in this short-crop season, but these potatoes are 
too valuable for that. They have a pedigree that gives 
them “ blood.” In the first place they are free from 
scab and blight; these diseases have never been known 
on these breezy old hills. It has never yet been neces¬ 
sary to use the Bordeaux Mixture, or the corrosive 
sublimate solution. The seed from which these pota¬ 
toes were grown, was selected with great care. Mr. 
T. did not wait until spring and then go to a large 
bin and select seed potatoes by their size and shape. 
The seed was selected in the field from the best yield¬ 
ing and most vigorous hills—bj actual results at dig- 
THE AGRICULTURAL VALUE OF WOOD ASHES. 
In a number of articles printed during the past year. 
The R. N.-Y. has practically claimed that substitutes 
for wood ashes could be piepared by using a mixture 
of lime, muriate of potash and some form of phos¬ 
phoric acid. Dr. C. A. Goessmann, Director of the 
Amherst, Mass., State Experiment Station, says : 
“ The universally high opinion of wood ashes as a 
fertilizer, does not depend merely upon a fair percent¬ 
age of potash, but also on the presence of more or less 
of all the mineral elements essential to the growth of 
plants. Wood ashes, like barnyard manure, on account 
of their compound character, meet, to some extent at 
least, not only known, but unknown deficiencies in 
valuable soil constituents. The thorough mixture of 
the various constituents has, no doubt, a beneficial 
infiuence on their action. 
“Ouraverage Canada wood ashes contain from five 
to six per cent potassium oxide, 1.5 to 2.5 per cent 
phosphoric acid, 30 to 35 per cent calcium oxide (wood 
lime), besides small quantities of other essential min¬ 
eral elements required for the successful growth of 
plants. This circumstance imparts to them a special 
fitness for a general fertilizer. The absence of nitro¬ 
gen is somewhat compensated for by the liberal 
amount of lime, which favors a rapid decomposition 
of the vegetable matter contained in the soil. The 
nitrogen of the vegetable refuse matter becomes 
thereby in a degree available.” 
crop makes necessary a dozen other changes. If a 
man go outside his township or county for a new crop, 
he must import with it new machinery, new 
methods, or new rotation and new ways of doing 
business. 
Dutchess County, New York, is noted chiefiy for 
dairying and fine stock, fruit (particularly apples for 
export), and the sale of hay and straw. A large part 
of the farming is exhaustive—especially where hay and 
straw are sold and but little manure or fertilizer re¬ 
turned to the soil. Potatoes are a neglected crop all 
through this county, and this was the first thought 
that struck Mr. Teator when he cast about for a new 
crop. There was a big competition or surplus in 
everything else, and while in the great markets, or¬ 
dinary eating potatoes may sometimes be dull in price, 
pedigreed seed is always in demand. 
Mr. T. had always enjoyed cultivating the potato 
crop. There is more science about it than about any 
other farm crop, a better chance to use machinery 
from planting to sorting. There is no crop on the 
farm where the difference between careful and care¬ 
less culture will so quickly show in results, and where 
it is possible to win a quicker and surer premium on 
skill and care. Another important thing about modern 
potato culture is that this crop always leaves the soil 
better than it was before it was grown. Men talk of 
potatoes as an exhaustive crop—so they may be with 
some modes of culture—but, where at least half a ton 
of high-grade fertilizer is used to the acre, and a 
ging time. M. T. did not try to select great monsters 
for seed, but tubers of fair .size and good sbapj, 
such as customers would select of their own ac¬ 
cord. The seed was planted in the best possible 
manner, with at least half a ton of fertilizer to the 
acre. The crop was harrowed, cultivated and cared 
for in the best possible manner, and never stopped 
growing, even in this parching summer. 
That is what Mr. T. means by “ pedigree.” It is 
the concentrated extract of skill and care. It is easy 
to see that if he can carry out his plan carefully, 
and make the public understand that his guarantee 
is genuine, his potatoes will be worth considerably 
above the ordinary market price. “ Pure blood ” is 
always worth more than scrub, and what is “ pure 
blood ” but the concentration of years of care and 
skill ? We have dwelt at length on this one feature 
of Mr. Teator’s business, because it is a fine object les¬ 
son for young men. Here we have a living evidence 
of what may be done with a new crop in a section 
where general farming may be said to be on the down 
grade. Before young men decide to go away from the 
farm because, as conducted about them, farming is a 
losing business, let them investigate and see if there 
are not new crops and methods that may take the 
places of the old, and give at least a fair yield of profit 
and pleasure. That is the point I wish to make in 
this article. Later we may expect Mr. Teator to tell 
how he grows his crop. What I want to do now is to 
get young men to inquire why he grows it. h. w. c. 
The difference between lime-kiln ashes and pure 
wood ashes is that pure wood ashes are the product of 
wood which is burned in stoves and furnaces through¬ 
out Canada, and gathered from house to house by 
those who make it their business We submit here an 
analysis of both pure wood ashes and lime-kiln ashes 
as taken from the Report of Agriculture of Massa¬ 
chusetts and we desire to say here that there is very 
little land that does not require lime : 
I.IME-KILN ASHES. 
Per cent. 
Moisture.15.1.5 
Potash . 0.81! 
Phosphoric aclfl. '.18 
Dime. ...44.80 
Insoluble matter .17.75 
PURE WOOD ASHES. 
Per cent. 
Moisture.10.41 
Potassium oxide. 8.05 
Calcium oxide.86.10 
Magnesium oxide. 8.17 
Ferric and alumlnic oxides. 0.59 
Phosphoric acid. 1.1)8 
Insoluble matter (before calcination). 8.89 
Insoluble matter (alter calcination). 6.49 
The quality of lime contained in pure wood ashes 
is of an altogether different nature from that which 
will be found in stone lime or any lime ashes. The 
quantity of lime in lime ashes is rather too much in 
proportion to the amount of potash found in lime 
ashes. 
The testimony of the thousands of farmers 
throughout the United States that have used ashes 
and also used other forms of potash is, that ashes are 
more satisfactory, and that they cannot use other 
combinations of potash and bone with equal results 
