52 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
“ Ilow about digging: ?” 
“ I have tried some of the cheaper diggers, but 
found that it cost me less to dig by hand. 1 can hire 
a man to dig at four cents a bushel, lie hires two 
boys to pick up for him, and makes good wages at it. 
I doubt if I can get them out cheaper than that. Hill 
culture is better for such digging.” 
“ If you are to take such pains with the crop, why 
not grow potatoes for seed and not grow simply food?” 
“ I think there is something in that. In fact, 1 have 
a barrel of Carman No. 3, and more No. 1 to start with.” 
“By the way, have you had any experience with 
irrigation ? That is the great cry now.” 
“ Yes, I have, this past season on those low lands at 
Kingston. It came on so terribly dry that the celery 
would not grow. I had 50.000 celery plants out, and 
nothing but water would make them grow. A small, 
but never-failing stream runs through the place. We 
scooped out a hole in it and put down the nose of a 
Knowles pump with a capacity of 200 gallons per 
minute. We started it with a six-horse power engine 
(which, by the way, was too small) and kept it going 
day and night. A main three-inch iron pipe ran 
along the end of the field, with two-inch laterals 
running lengthwise to the highest parts. There the 
water was emptied to find its way over the field, or 
we could attach a hose to the pipe. When a person 
starts to irrigate, he soon finds how uneven his fields 
are, and how necessary it is to have them smooth. 
We more than paid for the whole outfit the first 
season. We had a good crop of celery while some of 
those who had no water got no crop.” 
“ Any chance of duplicating that experience on the 
new place ?” 
“ Why not ? On the upper part of the farm is a 
slight depression. With a little work, that could be 
made into quite a large pond—to be filled by pumping 
from a well. I would have natural fall from it all 
along the farm. And then the springs in these wet 
places ! Instead of being permitted to soak down 
through the fields, that water can be collected in a 
reservoir and applied as needed to a crop of celery. 
In fact, one never knows the possibilities of a broken- 
down place like this, until he really goes at it to study 
them out. I look upon this place as a good business 
plant all out of repair. It is like buying an old 
factory, scraping the rust off the boilei’, putting a new 
shaft in the engine, mending the belts, and getting 
everything in shape before putting on a full head of 
steam. It takes capital, time and good judgment, to 
get ready to start.” n. w. c. 
(To be continued.) 
A LITTLE PIECE OF LAND. 
BIG RESULTS OBTAINED FROM IT. 
A man in our town, Burlington, N. J., has grown 
such a lot of vegetables and fruits on a small space, 
that I wish to tell R. N.-Y. readers about it. This 
result shows the possibilities of a small back yard, and 
ought to make those who let land about them go to 
waste, feel thoughtful. 
Chas. II. Parker is a cigar maker. He has a lot 
50x192 feet, on which he has a good house and nice 
lawn. The back yai'd, in which he grows the vege¬ 
tables, is 95x47 feet. Mr. Parker averages about three 
hours’ work per day on this patch—before and after 
his regular business—the only tillage implements 
used being spade, rake and hoe. This little garden 
does not include the lawn and fruit trees, and along 
the borders and fences he grows hundreds of flowers, 
making a wonderful sight when at its best. Having a 
desire to know what such a little garden would pro¬ 
duce, I asked Mr. Parker to keep an exact account of 
what he obtained from it. I find that he kept the 
same account with that patch that he would have 
done when buying vegetables from the store. Here 
is his report: 
“ I have supplied my family of 10 persons with vege¬ 
tables all summer. By actual count and measure, the 
little patch 47x95 feet, yielded the following: Tomatoes, 
Ponderosa, 1,133 pounds ; tomatoes, 18 baskets, earlies 
and second earlies; rhubarb, 08 bunches; onions, 4 
baskets ; cabbage, 47 heads ; egg plants, 64 ; string 
beans, 7 )4 baskets ; Lima beans, 15 baskets and one- 
half peck; Celery, between 1,000 and 1,100 roots; 
pickles, 1 bushel; strawberries, 31 quarts; peas, 16 
baskets and one-half peck; sweet corn, 480 ears ; 
beets, 654, all counts ; peppers, 2 baskets of Bull Nose 
and one bushel of the little Cayenne, and radishes, 
both spring and winter, for family use ; home-radish 
enough and to spare with plenty of nasturtiums for 
the flowers and fruits ; lettuce, both in hotbed and 
in the open, besides having a good sized lawn to mow 
twice a week, and raising thousands of flowers and a 
large quantity of grapes. There are also two rows, 
45 feet long each of parsnips and 25 feet long of 
salsify. I had spinach for family use.” 
At the prices current when we ate these vegetables, 
this produce would ha ve cost us just §105.33 ! 
“ Why did you weigh the Ponderosa tomatoes ? ” 
“ The first were measured in a half-peck measure, 
but when I came to pick Ponderosa, I found that three 
or four filled the measure more than full, so I thought 
it fairer to weigh them.” 
“ How large was the tomato patch ? ” 
“ There were 45 plants trained to climb a pole like 
a Lima bean vine. When they got to the top, they 
went on a trellis made of plastering laths, that was 
tacked from pole to pole, so it was possible to walk 
around and among them and under them without soil¬ 
ing even a white shirt. At the base of each one of the 
plants, was an old tomato or corn can, with two or 
three holes punched in the bottom, and buried in the 
ground with the lid off. I could go along in the hottest 
noonday and water my plants without any injury 
whatever.” 
“ So you believe in irrigation ? ” 
“ Yes ! yes ! I have 150 feet of garden hose, and as 
soon as a plant starts to grow, I keep it growing. 
When I attended my peas the last time this year, I 
sowed radishes, and set out head lettuce where the 
peas came up thin. The last day I picked peas, I 
turned them under, and before I went to my business, 
I had string beans planted. By wetting the ground, 
I had them up in four days, and after they came off, 
1 planted celery, and at Thanksgiving it stood 18 
inches high, thus producing peas, radishes, lettuce, 
string beans and celery on the very same spot.” 
“ What manure do you use ? ” 
“ I give to my brother the stems that come out of 
the tobacco leaves, and he in turn gives them to his 
pigeons to nest with. When he cleans out his coops, 
I get the old nests, and the scrapings of the floor, and 
the scrapings of his chicken and rabbits’ coops. There 
are at least 25 wheelbarrow loads, and I scatter it all 
over the garden.”_ j. r. s. 
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Cocoon of a Giant Silkworm. 
G. W. G., Mandan, N. D. —Will you tell me the name 
and character of the insect sent by mail ? 
Ans. —The specimen proves to be the cocoon of the 
largest of our giant silkworms (Sarnia cecropia). 
Within the cocoon was the dead body of the large, 
dusky brown moth whose wings would have expanded 
from five to six inches; on each wing, there is a 
crescent-shaped white spot, bordered with red. The 
caterpUlar which spun this cocoon, was about three 
inches in length, and of a bluish-green color. Its body 
was armed with six rows of spiny tubercles, some of 
which were of a coral-red color, and many were yellow, 
while a few were blue. It is thus a rather formidable 
looking caterpillar, but may be handled with impunity. 
The insect is quite common in the Jnited States east 
of the Rocky Mountains, but it rarely occurs in suffi¬ 
cient numbers to do noticeable damage ; for its little 
foes among its own kind—the insects—hold it in 
check. The cocoons and the moths are familiar 
objects to nearly all amateur collectors of insects. I 
recently found, in such a collection, one of these 
cocoons of enormous size. It is the largest cocoon of 
any kind that I ever saw. I made a photograph of 
this Cecropia cocoon, natural size, which is shown at 
Fig. 21. The cocoon was collected near Trumausburg, 
N. Y., and is now in a cage here in the insectary 
awaiting the emergence of its inhabitant. m. v. s. 
Killing Codling Moths in Winter. 
H. H., Clinton, III. —Where does the Codling moth 
winter ? 1 have heard that it hibernates in the cellar 
where the winter apples are kept. If that is the case, 
would it not be a good plan to have mosquito netting 
over the windows during the spring, so that the moths 
could not get out ? 
Ans. —Nearly every one who has written of the 
Codling moth, has stated that there were two, and 
sometimes three, broods of this pest annually. Usu¬ 
ally the moths from the first brood of worms are said 
to appear in June and July, and soon lay eggs for a 
second brood of worms which work in the fall and 
hibernate as worms in silken cocoons, either on the 
bark of the tree or in any crevice of an apple barrel, 
or elsewhere. Recently, Prof. J. B. Smith has recorded 
some observations which strongly indicate that, in the 
latitude of the Middle States, there is more often but 
one brood of the insect each year, two broods thus 
being the exception rather than the rule. He found 
that worms which emerged from apples in June or 
July, soon spun their cocoons, but did not even change 
to pupae that fall. This fact is an illustration that 
there is yet much to be learned of the habits of some 
of our seemingly best known insect enemies. And it 
also has an important bearing on the question at issue. 
For, if there is but one brood in this latitude, and the 
worms leave the apples in June or July, evidently but 
few of them will be carried into the cellar with the 
barreled fruit. But the recorded facts show that often 
hundreds of the moths do emerge from barreled and 
stored fruit. Mr. L. O. Howard, now United States 
Entomologist, enumerates several striking instances 
of this in his excellent account of this pest published 
in the report of the United States Commissioner of 
Agriculture for 1887, pages 88-115. Thus in any case, 
it would be a good plan to have fine netting over cellar 
or store-room windows from March to July 1. m. v. s. 
Beans “ Stung” by an Unknown Insect. 
J. McD., Battle Creek, Mich. —My last crop of beans 
was cut off about two or three inches from the ground, 
after the beans were in blossom. Now a great many 
of my beans that matured, seem to be stung. Is there 
any way I can treat them so that they will be all 
right for seed ? 
Ans. —At my request, the correspondent sent me 
several of the “ stung” beans. I cannot diagnose the 
case with any degree of certainty. The beans look 
as though they had been bitten into by some insect 
when they were green and soft. I should guess that 
they had then been punctured by the beak of some 
large sucking insect. But, so far as I can find by a 
careful microscopical examination, there are now no 
insects in any stage in the beans, so that no further 
damage will result from whatever insect “ pecked” 
the beans while they were in the pods on the vines. 
The injury was certainly not due to any of the bean 
weevils, or any other insect that would be a further 
menace to the stored seed. 
As to whether these “ stung” beans will do for seed, 
I would say that some will and some will not. Those 
that have two or three or more of the irregular open¬ 
ings through the skin and into the seed, will not pro¬ 
duce good, productive plants. And, in fact, I do not 
believe that any of the “ stung” seeds will produce as 
strong productive plants as will uninjured seed. This 
is a curious and interesting case, and the correspond¬ 
ent should watch his vines carefully another year, 
and see whether he cannot detect this new enemy. 
There is a bare possibility that it may be a fungus 
disease, but I saw nothing to indicate such. 
M. V. SLING ERL AND. 
Why Ice Does Not Keep. 
G. S., Factoryville, Pa. —Why does ice keep so poorly 
in my ice-house ? I store it in the basement under 
the barn, by partitioning off in one corner a room 10x18 
feet, so that one side and one end are the underpinning 
walls of the barn. In the bottom, I laid a board floor, 
covered it with six inches of sawdust, and put in 10 
large loads of ice ; but it melts at the bottom very 
rapidly. Would it be better to raise the floor from the 
ground to allow an air space underneath ? 
Ans. —There could not well be a worse condition 
for keeping ice than this. It \s just the way to melt 
it If one wanted to keep potatoes or fruit from 
freezing, such a place as this would be chosen. The 
reason is that the surrounding earth being warm, the 
warmth is communicated to the ice, with the result 
complained of. An ice-house should be above ground, 
or only a little below the surface, and before the ice 
is put in, the house should be opened so as to get the 
ground as much frozen as possible. The sawdust at 
the bottom is not deep enough, 12 inches is thin 
enough, and 18 inches would be better. The want of 
an air space, of course, enables the warmth of the 
ground to communicate with the floor and the ice. 
and thus make the sawdust under the ice warm, with 
the inevitable result. An ice-house should be exposed 
to the air as much as possible, for the winds, although 
warm, blowing on the walls, produce evaporation, 
and this cools whatever is exposed to it. This effect 
may be studied in a simple and effective manner by a 
person taking a warm bath, and standing in a draft, 
or by one in a perspiration in the greatest heat of 
summer taking off his outer clothing, when he will 
quickly feel such a chilling as to be in danger of a 
fatal attack of fever from this effect on the blood. 
Thus the top of the ice should be covered with a thick 
layer of sawdust, and the gable ends of the house 
should be open to afford an ample draft of air, by 
which, whatever moisture may be gathered by the 
sawdust is evaporated, and cold is thus produced 
which helps much to preserve the ice. But this 
should not be permitted to reach the ice itself in any 
part, especially the bottom, where the floor must be 
air tight. And, moreover, there must be sufficient 
drainage at the bottom to carry off the water of what¬ 
ever ice may be melted, and the drain should have a 
trap made like an S on its side, to prevent air getting 
in, while the water may run out. The principle of 
construction of an ice-house then, is to have an air¬ 
tight floor with ample drainage; impervious walls 
with at least 10 inches of sawdust between them or 
between the wall and the ice, and plenty of covering 
on the top, with abundant ventilation over it, but no 
sunshine is to be admitted. Then if the ice is packed 
