1895 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
375 
mond, of Brockport, the oldest produce buyer in the 
bean section, told me last winter that Brockport 
formerly shipped more beans than any other place, 
but that Albion, Orleans County, took the lead now, 
and that Medina ships nearly as many. As for thrash¬ 
ing - with horses, it might be all right for a few acres, 
but where a man has from 15 to 100 acres, it would be 
quite a long, dirty job. We have thrashed beans 
with a machine for 12 or 15 years, and 1 have never 
used or have seen any at work, except the Bidwell 
thrasher. There are 12 thrashers within a radius of 12 
miles of this place, and the machine that thrashed my 
beans, it was claimed, had thrashed 30,000 bushels 
last season. Monroe and adjoining counties prefer 
Marrows and White Kidneys ; but the Marrow has a 
small acreage, and White Kidney much smaller here. 
The different kinds of pea beans take the lead by a 
long way. I did not hoe my beans last year, but did 
all of the hoeing and killing weeds with a Z. Breed 
weeder and cultivator, and only used a small cultiva 
tor after haying co kill thistles. The weeder is eight 
feet wide, and I go across the rows the first and second 
times, cultivating 25 acres per day of 10 hours. My 
beans came to $700 last year, besides a large amount 
of fodder for my hothouse lamb ranch. If beans are 
hilled or ridged, and a long rain comes, many of the 
pods will stick in the mud and be ruined. The Crim¬ 
son clover on the piece sowed September 1, is all 
killed on about one-half the ground ; on the rest it is 
thick enough, but the weather has been so dry since 
it was sowed, that it is small. The piece sowed Sep¬ 
tember 8 is nearly all dead. I shall sow earlier this 
year and try again. Clark allis. 
Orleans County, N. Y. 
A NEW METHOD OF IRRIGATION. 
It is not too late to start some simple experiments 
in irrigation ; I, therefore, offer a few suggestions 
which, if tested, will prove of valuable assistance in 
raising crops, especially garden vegetables. Much 
has been written of late, but nothing so simple and 
practical as regards time, expense and water, as the 
method mentioned in Garden and Forest of December 
5, abstracted from a paper written on our experiments 
at the West Virginia Experiment Station last year, 
and in substance presented before the Horticultui’al 
Division of the Association of Agricultural Colleges 
and Experiment Stations, at their last meeting in 
Washington, D. C. 
The whole plan is this : Try irrigation by simply 
placing the tiles slightly in the surface of the ground, 
or at any convenient depth ; give them a slight incline, 
this varying according as you have pressure or not. 
In most cases, the water is scarce, and the object is to 
get it to the roots of the plants with as little waste as 
possible. 
The plan followed by us last year was to place com¬ 
mon porous 2^-inch drain tiles in a continuous row, 
end to end, on the surface of the soil, and vegetables 
were planted on either or both sides of the line. The 
tiles were one foot long, and by pouring in the water 
at one end of the line it was distributed at the joints 
throughout the length desired, when the opposite end 
was stopped up. Take celery as an example crop for 
irrigation on uplands. We plant the celery as above 
stated, Fig. 118, and while it is young we have simple 
surface irrigation ; but as the crop grows, we bank it 
up, and finally have the tile covered, and thus have 
sub-irrigation—Fig. 119. The tiles are cheap and last 
indefinitely. When the celery is harvested, the tiles 
are dug out also, and piled up or used for sub-irriga¬ 
tion in the greenhouse beds. Potatoes and various 
other crops can be grown in the same way. The 
celery watered this year grew well, and did not rust. 
Besides this, we were able to water 20 times as much 
space in the same time as in the ordinary way with 
ditches. Besides saving time, this plan delivers water 
where it is most needed, and we have reason to believe, 
is fully as economical with water as with time. 
ltows of celery watered in this manner were planted 
in a potato field, leaving every other space between 
the potato rows vacant, so that two rows of potatoes 
could be dug together when ripe. Besides watering 
the celery, the moisture reached the tops of the potato 
hills, as was plainly seen every morning by the damp¬ 
ness of the surface throughout the intervening space, 
thus showing that the watering was sufficient for at 
least three feet and three inches on each side, or six 
feet six inches in all, the rows being three feet three 
inches apart. Where the rows were on a slight in¬ 
cline, we slipped a piece of tin between the joints, 
and held the water where it was needed ; then, by 
pulling it out and inserting it further down, another 
section could be treated. The sections can be made 
longer or shorter, according to the angle at which the 
ground inclines. This subject is receiving our atten¬ 
tion this year, and we hope to be able to present it 
more fully at a future time, simply offering these 
suggestions now. f. w. rare. 
We Virginia Experiment Station. 
HOW TO GROW "FANCY VINELAND SWEETS." 
FROM TIIE SEED TO THE STOREHOUSE. 
Part VI. 
How the Crop is Stored and Sold. 
The best form of storehouse is a one-story building 
with a basement, with the heater in the basement. 
An ordinary heating stove is used ; the size needed 
will depend on the size of the house. The tighter 
and better built it is, the less heat it will require to 
heat it. The floor should be on a level with an ordi¬ 
nary wagon body; this will allo^ unloading and 
SURFACE TILE IRRIGATION FOR CELERY. Fig. 118. 
loading without any heavy lifting. The marketable 
potatoes may be stored on the first floor, and the seed 
and feeding potatoes in the basement. Provision 
should also be made in the basement for a coal bin. 
The potato bins should all have false bottoms raised 
two or three inches from the floor, and slatted sides 
set the same distance from the walls, to give free 
ventilation all around the potatoes. It is hotter to 
have the bins divided by partitions every three or 
four feet; this will allow the taking out a small quan¬ 
tity without disturbing the rest, and will also allow 
filling the bins clear to the ceiling. It will do no 
harm to have the potatoes piled seven or eight feet 
TILE IRRIGATION OF “BANKED-UP” CELERY. Fig. 119. 
deep, if the filling is done carefully. They should 
never be moved or disturbed in any way, unless they 
are to be disposed of at once, as a great many will 
rot in a few days after being moved. The tempera¬ 
ture should be kept at 90 or 100 degrees while the 
house is being filled, and for a week or so afterwards, 
giving free ventilation all the time. This dries them 
out quickly, and carries them through “the sweat” 
in a short time, making what is called a kiln-dried 
sweet. After they are through sweating, and the 
sprouts are just beginning to show on the tops of the 
bins, the temperature should be lowered to 55 or 00 
degrees, an^l kept there. The more even the tem¬ 
perature, the better they will keep. It is not abso¬ 
lutely necessary to have a house like the above, in 
order to keep sweets successfully, however. Any 
room or cellar in which a dry, even temperature can 
be maintained, will keep them just as well as a house 
built especially for the purpose. There are thou¬ 
sands of barrels in and about Vineland, stored in 
house and barn eellars. I would advise having the 
bins built higher from the floor and farther from the 
walls in cellars, to avoid possible injury from damp¬ 
ness. 
Sweets sell best put up in ordinary flour barrels, 
holding three bushels each. If shipped to a distant 
market, they should be double headed. If the dis¬ 
tance is not over 150 or 200 miles, burlap covers will 
do just as well. Before placing the potatoes in the 
barrels, the dirt and sprouts should be carefully re¬ 
moved, as the appearance does more to govern the 
price received, than anything else. In cold weather, 
the barrels should be lined with two or three thick¬ 
nesses of old newspaper. A small bunch of hay or 
straw placed on top will prevent the potatoes from 
being bruised in transit. Always make the contents 
of the barrel of as good quality in the bottom as on 
top ; this is essential to satisfactory prices. You may 
fool a buyer once, but you won’t do it a second time. 
In selling the crop after it is stored, do not ship a 
large quantity as soon as the price goes up. Always 
remember that there are others watching the mar¬ 
ket as well as yourself, and the chances are that your 
shipment will reach an overstocked market. It is 
much better to start a few at a time at regular inter¬ 
vals, say every other day, until your mark is known. 
Then in a week or so, you may send a shipment every 
day, and if your stock is good, and honestly packed, 
you may snap your fingers at the fluctuations in the 
market. If shippers would pay more attention to 
the observation of this rule, there would be fewer 
slumps in the market, prices would be better, and 
shippers and commission merchants would both be 
greatly benefited. 
Before closing these articles, perhaps I should say 
a word about diseases. There are three diseases 
which affect the sweet potato to a greater or lesser 
degree in most localities. They are known as the 
black rot, the soil rot and the stem rot. There are 
others, but as yet they have not proved destructive 
to any great extent. In fact, the black rot is the 
only one that has occasioned any very heavy loss in 
this locality. In some other places, the soil rot is the 
most destructive. No remedies have as yet been dis¬ 
covered, but the New Jersey Experiment Station has 
taken the matter up, and is experimenting with a 
view to finding remedies for these diseases, which 
are all of a fungous nature. A description of them 
may be found in Bulletin 76 of the New Jersey Ex¬ 
periment Station. Careful selection of seed and rotav 
tion of crops, have proved effective in stamping out 
disease in many cases. s. T. D. 
Vineland, N. J.__ 
THAT “BLACK PEPSIN " BUTTER FRAUD. 
A friend in Owego, N. Y., recently sent us a copy 
of the Owego Daily Record which contained an article 
headed, “ Milk Butter.” After telling how he bought 
an exact half pound of creamery butter, and one-half 
pound of pure milk, the reporter says that he went to 
a room in the hotel where “ the process was carried 
on to success.” 
This was to place the milk, warmed to about the temperature at 
which it comes from the cow, and the butter together in an egg 
beater, and with them about as much as would lie on a dime, of 
a powder, which was tasted by all and which resembled salt and 
Indian meal. The beater was revolved, and In eight minutes the 
compound was a pound of butter. That the weight was a pound 
is known to all, as the dish was weighed empty, and when the 
work was done, weighed Just one pound more. There was nothing 
but butter in the dish—no buttermilk or sweet milk, just good, 
sweet butter. As is well known, butter as commonly made in the 
best creameries, is obtained in the maximum ratio of four pounds 
to every 100 pounds of milk, this proportion decreasing according 
to the quality of the milk and manner of churning. Milk contains 
casein, sugar, butter fat, salt, and other solids. By the common 
process of churning, only the butter fat is saved, the casein and 
sugar being lost. In making cream cheese, the butter fat and 
casein are saved, and the sugag - is lost. Bv this new process, all 
of the above ingredients (casein, sugar, butter fat, salt, etc.) are 
saved and converted into good butter. By this process, skimmed 
milk is used, the yield of butter being about 50 per cent less than 
that obtained from whole milk. Thus it is seen that after all the 
butter properties are taken from the milk that are available by 
the old process, there are still remaining in the skimmed milk 
double the amount of butter properties, which are taken up and 
converted into butter by this new process. 
He then says that “a prominent member of the New 
York Stock Exchange” has taken an option on the 
right to work this “new process” in New York and 
Brooklyn, while agents are ready to sell county 
rights to use this wonderful powder which will double 
the output of butter ! 
It is a little discouraging to The R. N.-Y. that people 
can be found in the heart of a great dairy district, to 
pay any attention to such nonsense. This fraud has 
been exposed time and again. It was first advertised 
as “ Black Pepsin” and that name still clings to it. 
Some of the original “Black Pepsin” was analyzed. 
It contained 82 parts salt,15 parts annatto, and two 
