3  026 
Efte  RURAL.  NEW-YORKER 
July  20,  1016. 
lie  built  up  to  a  good  height,  and  the  cotton  we]] 
tramped  down,  to  hold  enough  loose  cotton  to  make 
.1  500-pound  bale  when  cleaned  of  seeds  and  dirt. 
All  kinds  of  teams  and  wagons  could  be  seen  wait¬ 
ing  around  a  gin-house.  Often  the  wagon-boxes 
were  built  higher  by  means  of  stakes  and  “gunny- 
sacks.”  Southern  teams  are  certainly  not  hampered 
with  any  unnecessary  harness,  and  the  lack  of  hold- 
hack  straps  seems  strange  in  so  hilly  a  country. 
Some  gin-houses  could  turn  out  two  or  more  bales  at 
once,  but  in  the  smaller  places  usually  only  one  load 
was  baled  at  a  time.  The  wagon  was  driven  under 
a  shed,  and  a  long  pipe  drew  the  cotton  by  suc¬ 
tion  to  the  second  floor.  Here  it  went  through  the 
gins  where  all  dirt,  seeds,  etc.,  were  removed  by 
means  of  revolving  cylinders  filled  with  long  spikes. 
The  cleaned  cotton  passed  down  a  chute  into  a 
heavy  box.  the  top  and  bottom  of  which  were  huge 
presses,  and  the  soft  mass  of  cotton  was  soon  in¬ 
duced  to  a  hale  so  hard  that  it  was  not  easily  dent¬ 
ed.  The  bagging  with  which  a  hale  was  covered 
was  arranged  in  this  box  before  the  cotton  went  into 
it.  and  before  the  pressure  was  released  the  bale- 
ties.  long,  thin  strips  of  steel,  were  put  on  and  fas¬ 
tened.  holding  rhe  bagging  firmly  in  place.  The  bale 
was  next  weighed  and  marked  with  both  weight  and 
owner’s  initials,  ready  to  he  taken  home  and  sold 
to  the  cotton  buyer  later  on. 
HANDLING  THE  SEED. — The  cotton  seeds, 
which  were  cleaned  from  the  cotton,  fell  into  a 
trough  and  went  hack  to  the  shed  under  which  the 
wagon  first  unloaded.  Here  they  dropped  into  a 
large  box,  the  sloping  bottom  of  which  emptied  them 
directly  into  the  box  of  the  wagon  drawn  up  just 
outside  the  shed.  From  a  hale  of  cotton  there  was 
about.  30  bushels  of  seed.  The  farmers  did  not  have 
this  seed  ground  up  for  their  stock,  hut  sold  if  to 
the  cottonseed  oil  companies.  They  extracted  the 
oil  and  made  a  dry  meal  from  the  kernels.  The 
hulls  as  well  as  this  meal  were  then  sold  hack  to  the 
farmer  who  used  them  for  cattle  feed.  Southern 
butter  has  a  peculiar  hard  crumbly  quality  due  to 
(he  use  of  cottonseed  meal  as  feed  for  the  cows. 
WHEAT  AFTER  COTTON.— The  ground  on 
which  cotton  had  been  ra ised  was  sometimes  sown 
to  wheat  in  the  Fall  scattered  broadcast  between  the 
standing  stalks.  About  March  the  dead  dry  stalks 
were  broken  up  with  a  cotton  stalk  cutter— a  ma¬ 
chine  with  revolving  knives  which  not  only  cut  the 
stalks  off  close  to  the  ground,  but  broke  the  entire 
plant  into  small  pieces.  l.  e.  h. 
Weakness  of  the  Farm  Bureau 
!  Following  its  usual  plan  of  giving  an  open  and  fair 
discussion.  The  R.  N.-Y.  prints  this  article  from  a 
Pennsylvania  fanner  who  signs  his  name  and  will  stand 
for  what  be  writes.  The  Farm  Bureau.  in  most  States 
and  counties,  has  become  an  established  fact,  and  will 
not  be  given  up.  Granted  tlrat  it  may  fail  in  some  par¬ 
ticulars,  the  question  is.  would  it  not  pay  our  prac¬ 
tical  farmers  to  obtain  control  of  it  and  thus  make  it 
serve  them  ?] 
ERRING  THE  FARMER.— An  article  in  a  re¬ 
cent  issue  of  Tiie  R.  N.-Y.  headed  “The 
Strength  and  Weakness  of  Farm  Bureaus”  gives  12 
lines  to  the  weaknesses  and  two  columns  to  its 
strength;  an  unbalanced  and  unfair  division,  need¬ 
ing  readjustment.  “Help  the  farmers,”  seems  to  be 
a  very  popular  theme  nowadays.  He  is  supposed  to 
he  totally  exhausted  as  to  his  brain  and  greatly  to 
need  advice  and  counsel.  I-Ie  is  incompetent  to  se¬ 
lect  an  ear  of  corn  that  will  grow,  unable  to  tell 
when  a  field  needs  lime  or  humus,  or  a  fruit  tree 
needs  spraying.  Do  help  him.  He  hesitates  ns  to 
whether  drain  tile  should  run  down  or  across  a 
slope  and  waits  a  week  for  some  one  to  tell  him 
whether  to  cut  his  silage  two  inches  or  four.  Help 
him!  All  farmers  joiu  in  the  chums  “Help  us, 
help.”  This  is  the  impression  one  farmer  gets  from 
reading  the  literature  of  the  farm  bureau  propa¬ 
ganda  :  the  fact  of  our  great  need  of  help  and  the 
self-sacrificing  willingness  to  help  us  of  those  who 
hear  the  heavy  burden  of  farming  with  a  lead  pencil 
and  paper  pad. 
SUPPORTERS  OF  THE  PLAN.— To  my  mind  one 
great  weakness  of  the  farm  bureau  plan  is  the  fact 
that  the  farmers  do  no i  ask  for  it.  do  not  feel  any 
need  of  it.  And  just  here'  let  me  say  that  my  defini¬ 
tion  of  the  word  fanner  is:  “one  who  farms";  not 
“one  who  owns  a  farm.”  There  is  a  wide  distinction 
between  the  two  classes.  In  our  cities  and  towns 
and  villages  are  many  farm  owners  engaged  in  pro¬ 
fessional  or  mercantile  or  mechanical  pursuits,  to 
whom  the  bureau  would  be  a  live  and  useful  propo¬ 
sition.  These  invariably  support  the  plan,  for  very 
obvious  reasons.  I  cannot  go  to  Monroe  or  Fay¬ 
ette  Counties  for  proof  of  this,  but  I  know  it  is  true 
of  my  own  home  county.  Find  a  lawyer  practicing 
his  profession,  or  a  merchant,  who  own  farms,  and 
you  find  farm  bureau  supporters  just  its  certainly 
as  yon  find  a  tartar  if  you  scratch  a  Russian.  Ask 
the  man  who  tills  the  soil  about  it,  and  lie  says, 
“What  for?”  Ho  asks  the  question  intelligently  too. 
PRACTICAL  WORKERS.— Four  farmers  out  of 
every  five  know  of  the  approved  modern  methods 
in  their  line  of  work,  and  practice  them  as  far  as 
special  conditions  will  allow:  the  fifth  man  would 
not  learn  if  he  had  a  special  agent  to  live  with  him 
the  year  round.  There  is  scarcely  a  neighborhood 
where  there  is  not  what,  is  practically  a  demonstra¬ 
tion  farm,  where  the  advantages  of  such  work  are 
shown  to  all,  and  the  Pennsylvania  farmer  knows 
that,  he  has  at  State  College  an  experiment  station 
that  has  made  such  farms  possible;  that  when  he 
needs  special  information  or  advice  he  can  get  it 
first  hand  and  free,  from  this  Station,  instead  of 
through  a  State-appointed,  State-paid  middleman. 
And  this  is  why  lie  says  “What  for?” 
STATE  APPOINTEES. — Another  weakness,  from 
the  farmers'  viewpoint,  is  that  it  adds  to  the  al¬ 
ready  big  list  of  State  appointees.  “Few  die.  and 
none  resign,”  was  once  written  of  these,  and  once 
unloaded  on  a  county,  the  agent  will  be  a  perman- 
ancy.  Following  the  natural  order  of  such  things, 
his  salary  will  he  increased,  never  lessened;  an  as¬ 
sistant  will  he  needed  soon,  etc.  Pennsylvania,  as 
everyone  knows,  is  a  boss-ridden  State,  and  ap¬ 
pointees  are  strictly  of  the  parry  in  power,  and  the 
possibilities  of  this  additional  political  pull  are  evi¬ 
dent. 
ANOTHER  WEAKNESS.— Again,  a  weak  point 
lies  in  the  fact  that  the  movement  is  in  great  part 
only  a  transfer  of  the  work  that  has  been  so  etli- 
eiently  done  at  State  College,  by  a  corps  of  trained 
scientists,  specialists  in  their  several  departments, 
to  the  limitations  of  individual  agents.  To  any 
thinking  mind  it  is  evident  that  the  individually 
owned  and  managed  farm,  run  for  profit,  is  no  place 
for  exact  experiment,  and  that  the  results  of  such 
work  by  agents,  would  always  be  up  against  the 
Scotch  verdict  “not  proven.”  and  must  he  referred  to 
State  College  for  its  “O.  K." 
VALUE  OF  THE  EXPERIMENT  STATION.— 
There  is  no  good  reason  why  Pennsylvania  farmers 
should  not  put  their  queries  first  hand  to  the  Sta¬ 
tion".  T  have  done  so  frequently  with  must  satisfac¬ 
tory  results.  Once  1  wanted  to  know  the  amount  of 
potash  in  a  lot  of  tannery  ashes  I  thought  of  buy¬ 
ing.  I  sent  a  sample  of  a  pound  or  so,  and  had  the 
analysis  in  a  few  days.  Again,  I  found  splotches  of 
some  fungus  or  bacterial  growth  discoloring  myr 
lawn,  and  a  letter  describing  its  appearance  brought 
a  name,  and  a  remedy.  A  farm  agent  could  have 
sent  the  sample  or  have  written  the  letter  and 
transferred  the  replies  to  me,  but  why  a  $3,000 
agent  for  what  I  could  do  myself? 
AN  ERRONEOUS  VIEW.— That  the  movement 
originated  at  State  College  is  by  no  moan*  an  ef¬ 
fective  argument  in  its  favor.  At  a  four-State  gath¬ 
ering  of  agricultural  helpers,  upliflors,  etc.,  held  in 
Philadelphia  late  last  "Winter,  President  Sparks  said 
in  an  address  that  the  old  plan  of  giving  instruc¬ 
tion  to  farmers  by  agricultural  reports,  bulletins,  re¬ 
ports  of  experiments,  etc.,  must  be  consigned  to  the 
scrap  i iile  as  useless;  that  the  farmers  of  the  State 
used  the  reports  mainly  to  prop  open  their  doors 
and  the  bulletins  for  shaving  paper.  And  yet  Dr. 
Sparks  could  not  travel  20  miles  in  Pennsylvania 
without  seeing  evidences  of  the  great  work  done  for 
farmers  by  just  these  bulletins  and  reports  of  ex¬ 
periments  sent  out  by  State  College.  Or  if  we 
admit  the  truth  of  his  statement,  that  the  Work  of 
t He  Station  for  the  past  two  or  three  decades  has 
been  wasted,  then  we  must  also  accept  as  facts  that 
these  vast  herds  of  improved  breeds  of  farm  ani¬ 
mals,  the  silos  never  out  of  sight  in  Pennsylvania, 
the  universal  presence  of  the  most  approved  farm 
tools  aial  machinery,  and  the  immense  output  of  all 
crops  in  our  State:  all  these  have  come  into  being 
through  the  efforts  of  local  agricultural  societies, 
Granges,  etc.,  and  the  ambition,  ability  and  initia¬ 
tive  of  individuals.  “'Tis  an  ill  bird  that  fouls  Its 
own  nest.”  and  one  can  only  guess  at  the  motives 
that  prompted  Dr.  Sparks  to  belitID  the  work  of 
our  agricultural  station.  The  logical  reply  is,  “If 
your  work  has  been  useless  or  largely  superfluous 
heretofore,  why  ask  us  to  trust  you  in  another  big 
and  expensive  venture?” 
SUPERFLUOUS  TEACHING.— Another  weak¬ 
ness  lies  in  some  of  the  lines  of  work  the  Bureau 
proposes  to  do  among  farmers,  with  the  object  of 
helping  or  instructing  them.  For  instance,  he  is  to 
tell  us  when  our  soils  need  lime.  Fifty  years  ago 
1  hauled  lime  to  my  father's  farm,  slaked  it,  spread 
it  and  harrowed  it  in.  He  may  not  have  known 
the  niceties  of  the  chemical  action  of  lime  on  the 
soil,  but  lie  did  know  when  his  fields  needed  it, 
and  so  did  his  neighbors,  and  so  does  any  Pennsyl¬ 
vania  farmer  worthy  the  name.  Or  the  seed  corn 
demonstrations.  Tho  fanner  who  in  this  year  of 
our  Lord  Ifilfi  cannot  select  viable  seed  corn,  should 
he  sent  to  ;i  kindergarten,  not  pestered  by  an  agent. 
Going  hack  fifty  years  again,  I  remember  my  father 
shelling  a  few  grains  from  ears  of  a  selected  strain 
of  seed  corn,  spreading  them  thinly  on  a  slate,  cov¬ 
ering  them  with  a  wet  cloth,  and  putting  them  un¬ 
der  (he  kitchen  stove  to  sprout.  To  accomplish  the 
same  results  today  we  must  have  a  farm  agent.  lie 
will  form  a  hoys’  club,  will  teaeli  the  boys  to  make 
a  “rag  baby"  or  a  sand  box.  to  test  corn  for  plant¬ 
ing,  and  the  boys  will  teach  their  fathers,  greatly 
to  the  fathers'  chagrin  and  amusement,  how  to 
double  their  yield.  These  are  hut  two  of  the  many 
ways  in  which  the  agent  will  “help  the  farmer." 
will  teach  him  what  he  already  knows  practically  if 
not  technically,  better  than  bis  would-be  instruc¬ 
tor.  The  agent  when  be  comes  will  no  doubt  find 
plenty  of  work  but  be  will  not  find  it  among  the  real 
farmers.  The  glad  band  will  be  given  him  by  the 
class  I  have- indicated  in  a  preceding  paragraph,  the 
non  resident  farm  owner,  those  who  are  able  to  and 
should  pay  their  own  bills  for  farm  management 
and  advice.  E.  j.  baird. 
Pennsylvania. 
Spinach  for  Fall  and  Winter  Use 
Part  I. 
REPARING  SOIL. — Spinach  is  one  of  the  most 
healthful  vegetables  that  can  he  eaten.  Many 
people  would  like  to  grow  it  for  home  or  market 
hut  are  frequently  unsuccessful  because  of  several 
features  which  will  cause  disaster  unless  they  are 
thoroughly  understood  and  guarded  against.  The 
right  variety  should  be  planted  at  the  right  time, 
always  on  soil  especially  prepared  for  the  crop. 
The  preparation  of  the  soil  should  of  course,  re¬ 
ceive  first  consideration.  Spinach  requires  a  very 
rich  soil,  because  it  is  a  heavy  feeder  and  must 
grow  quickly  for  its  best  development.  Heavy  ap¬ 
plications  of  manure  should  he  worked  into  the  soil 
for  two  or  three  years,  so  that  the  plant  food  and 
humus  become  thoroughly  incorporated  with  the 
soil.  While  the  soil  is  being  thus  prepared  light 
feeding  crops,  such  as  peas,  beans,  peppers,  celery, 
onions  and  tomatoes  may  he  grown.  Exhaustive 
crops  such  as  turnips,  late  cabbage,  eggplants  and 
Summer  crook  neck  squash,  will  feed  heavily  upon 
the  available  plant  fond,  and  take  out  of  the  soil 
what  the  spinach  will  need. 
TILLAGE  AND  FERTILITY.— Greatest  success 
with  any  crop  is  attained  only  when  its  require¬ 
ments  are  thoroughly  understood  and  we  plan 
ahead  so  that  we  can  arrange  our  operations  to  pro¬ 
vide  conveniently  the  ideal  conditions  for  each  crop. 
However,  if  we  wish  to  plant  spinach  this  Fall,  and 
if  our  ground  has  received  no  previous  preparation, 
then  we  will  have  to  do  the  best  we  can.  Planting 
for  the  Fall  eif>p  should  not  begin  until  August, 
therefore  the  crop  may  conveniently  follow  some  of 
the  early  Summer  crops.  If  only  coarse  stable  ma¬ 
nure  is  available  it  may  be  broadcast,  the  heavier 
the  better,  and  plowed  into  the  soil.  Frequent  liar- 
rowings  until  planting  time  will  get  (lie  soil  in  the 
best  physical  condition,  and  will  pack  down  the  ma¬ 
nure  so  that  it  can  rot.  Also,  moisture  will  be  re¬ 
tained  and  tbe  plant  food  contained  in  the  soil  will 
become  available.  Of  course,  the  soil  will  become 
hard,  but  this  just  happens  to  be  what  spinach 
likes.  Never  plow  up  a  piece  of  ground  and  plant 
spinach  until  the  soil  has  thoroughly  settled.  Well- 
rotted  manure  or  poultry  manure  is  most  excellent 
for  spinach.  Greatest  benefit  is  had  from  it  when 
it  is  harrowed  into  the  soil  a  few  days  before  plant¬ 
ing.  If  sufficient  manure  is  not  available  about  a 
half  ton  of  high-grade  fertilizer  should  be  broadcast 
instead,  using  a  4 — 9 — 0  formula.  In  any  event,  no 
matter  how  much  manure  or  fertilizer  may  be  ap¬ 
plied,  wood  ashes  are  very  beneficial  in  helping- to 
produce  a  strong,  dark  green,  vigorous  growth.  One 
pound  of  good  wood  ashes,  if  available,  may  be 
raked  into  every  ten  square  feet  of  soil  before 
seeding. 
FALL  VARIETIES.— For  the  Fall  crop  the  Savoy 
spinach  is  probably  the  most  popular  variety.  It 
lias  a  heavy  frame  and  a  thick  crinkly  linn  leaf, 
all  of  which  makes  it  well  liked  by  the  farmer  and 
the  retailer  because  il  fills  up  the  measures  quickly. 
This  variety  holds  up  well  in  transit  and  retains 
its  fresh  appearance.  The  Thick  Leaved  Viroflay 
or  Long  Standing  is  sometimes  used,  and  will  often 
do  well  where  Savoy  fails.  The  planting  of  Fall 
spinach  begins  in  North  Jersey  about  August  10, 
and  is  continued  until  about;  September  1st.  If 
plantings  are  made  later  than  that  the  crop  may 
not  he  harvested  until  tbe  following  Spring,  unless 
the  weather  is  favorable  for  rapid  growth.  As  Savoy 
bolts  to  seed  quickly  in  the  Spring  the  smooth- 
