4io 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
.Tune 15 
Treatment of Frosted Vines. 
W., Blair County, Pa. —Professional 
grape growers know how best to treat 
the vines that have lost all their young 
shoots with foliage and fruit, by disas¬ 
trous frosts. To those with less experi¬ 
ence with grape vines, the following 
notes may be useful : In the first place, 
most sorts of American grapes yield 
much the finest bunches and berries on 
stout canes which grew the year before 
from the collar (base of the stem) or as 
near it as may be, because such canes are 
in position to receive a free and copious 
supply of sap, and if duly supported by 
wires, and protected from injury, they 
will have large, thick leaves and buds. 
The art of the pruner, trainer and weeder 
consists chiefly in stopping all other 
growth, but the one, or two, or more 
such canes as the roots may be judged 
able to fill out and mature for next 
year’s fruiting. When a vine has all 
its new shoots killed, and no fruit can 
be hoped for this year that can ripen 
into eatableness, the only way to secure 
a full crop of good fruit next year, is to 
keep rubbing off all but a very few of 
the lowest down of the newly issuing 
shoots, choosing those most forward, and 
by and by pruning the old canes close 
off after these new shoots are well 
leaved and able to use up the root supply 
of sap, thus preventing waste of it by 
bleeding. If the old shoots are left alone 
to make growth as they may, they will 
soon be covered with crowds of young 
shoots, all too slender and too weak and 
ill developed to bear fruit, either large 
or good, and the whole will look and be 
the reverse of luxuriant. 
A Dose for the Borers. 
T. H. K., Trumansburg, N. Y.—We 
begin working at the borers in our peach 
and apple trees about as follows : Two 
men work together ; one goes ahead and 
removes the soil with a hoe down nearly 
to the roots (our trees were banked up 
last fall) ; the second man examines the 
trees carefully, and takes out all the 
borers he can find. Then the first man 
returns and washes the trees from the 
limbs down ; he can take away the soil 
and do the washing as fast as the other 
man can take out the borers. Our wash 
consists of one quart of crude carbolic 
acid, three gallons of soft soap, and 
about a barrel of water. We thicken 
this to about the consistency of white¬ 
wash, with about one-half bushel of 
lime, and the same amount of clay. We 
dry the clay thoroughly, and pour boiling 
water on it and slake the lime. We use 
the clay because it makes the wash ad¬ 
here to the trees very much better than 
the lime alone. We fill up around the 
trees by using a cultivator with mold- 
boards. We washed once and looked for 
the borers twice last year, on 1,600 trees, 
at an expense of about one cent per 
tree. We cannot afford to run any 
chances with the borers when the ex¬ 
pense is so slight. 
Asparagus in Georgia. 
A. W. S., Americus, Ga.—I can’t agree 
with all that The R. N.-Y. says about 
asparagus. I eat daily in its season 
what would suffice for a family when 
they have to buy it. I never eat it on 
toast, unless away from home, as I pre¬ 
fer it unadulterated and Simon pure. I 
have made three asparagus beds; the 
first as my forefathers did by digging a 
trench four feet wide, and two feet deep, 
throwing away the clay subsoil and fill¬ 
ing in with stable manure and ground 
bone, in which the crowns of the plants, 
to start with, were a foot underground, 
while each year the top dressing made 
the distance greater. The second bed 
was planted in thoroughly plowed and 
prepared land, and the crowns of the 
plants were placed a foot below the sur¬ 
face. The third, the one I now have, 
was planted as I understood the large 
growers on Long Island did theirs, only 
I placed my rows three feet apart, while 
they make theirs four to five feet apart. 
In this third bed, the crowns were placed 
only about three inches below the sur¬ 
face, and I have pretty much made up 
my mind next fall to go back to old 
fogy bed No. 1 , and use the long rows I 
now have to better purpose. From beds 
Nos. 1 and 2, I had as fine shoots as any 
one could wish, and they grew more 
rapidly and as large again as I now get. 
It may be that our crops requiring more 
moisture than yours, may account for 
the deeper planting doing best as there 
is always moisture a foot down, while 
three inches is too near the surface and 
the roots become dry. 
Then as to the shoots themselves. I 
never cut or break off shoots when they 
get four to six inches above ground, ex¬ 
cept to get rid of them, and thereby in¬ 
duce other shoots to put up more quickly. 
I always cut below the ground, and wish 
to do so before the tips are more than 
two inches out, or are just through. 
When two inches high, I cut the shoots 
so as to have them about six inches, and 
when just showing, so as to have them 
about four inches long. They are all 
white except the inch or two at the tip. 
If you will dine with me during aspar¬ 
agus season, I will give you a dish of 
white and the next day one of green 
above-ground growth, and if, after that 
you eat the green unless away from 
home, and you cannot help t yourself, I 
will say you are a man of poor taste. 
Further, of the white you will eat the 
butt of each shoot with as much relish 
as you do the tip of the same shoot, and 
find it just as tender. Like all other 
good dishes, it needs preparation to have 
it at its best, and to do so, it is only 
necessary to cut as I do, take a knife 
and catching hold of the tough outer 
skin at the bottom, pull it toward the 
top, when the skin will peel off until it 
comes to the part where the whole is 
tender, when it will leave the shoot. 
Put these shoots to boil with a little salt 
in the water, and when done, dress with 
butter and you will have a flavor and 
richness combined with pure white meat, 
four to six inches long, which melts in 
the mouth, and to which the green 
growth is no more comparable than are 
“ green goods ” to greenbacks. 
“Skinning is too much trouble”; but 
consider that it gives you a dish which 
more than repays for the time and 
trouble. As for the green growth gen¬ 
erally used, I would not waste the salt, 
much less the butter to dress it. My 
experience extends through 20 years 
with the three beds, and I shall never 
make another without deep planting, 
and I will not eat it unless I can have it 
as I describe. 
R. N.-Y.—We are always pleased to 
have experienced men oppose our views. 
A Good Lesson in Northern New Jersey. 
B. Iv. J., Beaver Run, N. J.—In my 
first experience with Crimson clover, I 
sowed August 27 last, about one acre on 
oat stubble, and one acre of a young 
peach orchard in which I had sweet 
corn, about 15 pounds to the acre. I 
plowed and harrowed the oat stubble, 
and after sowing went over it with a 
one-horse weeder to brush in the seed. 
I sowed in the corn without any prepar¬ 
ation after the last cultivating five or 
six weeks previous, and without cover¬ 
ing the seed. It all came up well, grew 
until cold weather, and wintered finely. 
That on the oat stubble was just coming 
into bloom May 17, when we plowed it 
under and planted the ground to corn. 
The acre among the peach trees seems 
later. I shall turn it under as soon as it 
heads, and sow buckw 7 heaton the ground 
June 15 to 20. The ground is a gravel) y 
loam, or most of it nearer to a sandy 
loam, and good corn land. I think the 
last of August too late to sow; it doesn’t 
have time enough to grow before cold 
weather to enable it to get the height 
before heading that earlier sown would. 
Mine got only about 12 inches high, al¬ 
though it looks rank, and a rich green. 
I had bought 2 % bushels of seed, and 
owing to the dry weather, could not get 
the ground fit to sow the bulk of it 
until October 1 and 2, and was then 
foolish enough to risk wasting my seed 
on about seven acres of rye stubble on 
which the drought had killed the spring- 
sown Medium clover. At this time, I 
could carry all the Crimson clover on 
the seven acres in my hat, and I don’t 
believe that it would be very full at 
that. I am not discouraged, and shall 
try it again if I can get it sowed in July 
or about August 1. I believe that it 
will grow here on any ground that will 
grow the Medium clover, if we follow 
The R. N.-Y.’s advice and sow in July, 
and will grow a much larger crop than 
other clovers, and in less time. 
Polygonum cuspidatum is the near 
relative of Saghalin which has been 
growing in the Rural Grounds for over 
20 years. We have asked wherein it 
differs from Saghalin which is, botanic- 
ally, Polygonum SaghaJinense, and have 
received various answers. We shall soon 
be enabled to answer the question from 
our own experience. Meanwhile we 
have something further to say of Cuspi¬ 
datum. Our plant (or plants, for there 
is quite a patch of it) is growing in a 
poor soil and in nearly complete shade. 
It is crowded by a plot of shrubs and 
trees the roots of which seem to have 
taken complete possession of the soil. 
Its wonderful vigor may be inferred 
when we tell our readers that on May 24 
(the day these notes were written) many 
of the stalks were eight feet tall and 1 % 
inch in diameter at the base. The stalks 
are still green in every part. The stems 
are hollow (there is not a particle of 
pith) except at the joints, and the walls 
are but an eighth of an inch thick. The 
joints (nodes) will average six to seven 
inches apart. The structure is very in¬ 
teresting. Though the internodes are 
clean, hollow tubes, the joints are cov¬ 
ered over with a quite firm, succulent 
tissue an eighth of an inch thick, like 
the heads of a drum, as may be seen in 
the illustration, Fig. 131. Now every 
one of the internodes until the leaves are 
reached, contains an amount of water or 
sap—those near the soil about a table¬ 
spoonful, those above less, up to the first 
(Continued on next page). 
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