Tne RURAL NEW-YORKER 
815 
See the people wearing shoddy and tin silks, of babies 
dying with filled milk, the war grafters sitting on 
their stealings, and the officials in partnership with 
bootleggers, making billions out ol’ forged permits, 
and nothing doing. 
Look at the coal strikes, with all the symptoms 
that they are engineered by the coal barons, with 
the railroads and all big industries stocked and the 
public robbed. How can the laborer, the producer 
and the common people prosper under such condi¬ 
tions? This is the end to look at. All efforts to hunt 
remedies in the middle are foolish. All complaining 
comparisons between food growers and consumers 
are but wasted time, and the cancer grows. The 
hidden grafters laugh as their press agencies keep 
the real cause hidden while they rake in the money 
of the people. The labor unions, producers, and 
everyone bad better realize the tine cause. Without 
a change soon we are due straight for Russia. 
But hope begins to show on the horizon. This un¬ 
rest has started organization, and if the leaders can¬ 
not he bought, the power of the members will pre¬ 
vent further trouble. Here is the farm blue, and the 
Farm Bureau, friends of the farmer, which means of 
all the people. Here is a break in Indiana and in 
Pennsylvania, and it is likely to continue until the 
“Old Guard” and the “standpatters'' get a thinning 
out. and men who have the welfare of the land, in¬ 
stead of themselves, will take their place. That is 
the end to look at and to work on. 
OlliO. W. W. REYNOLDS. 
Continuous Crops of Corn 
My land best adapted to corn is rather limited. Can 
corn be planted year after year on same ground, pro¬ 
vided a green manure crop is turned under and chemical 
fertilizer used, and still increase the yield or keep up 
production? I prefer to use my stable manure for the 
hay land, which is too moist for corn, especially in 
rainy seasons, but is excellent for liny. The use of rye 
and chemicals came to mind after reading Mrs. Lager's 
article on “Potatoes After Potatoes,” also the elimina¬ 
tion of manure so as belter to control the weed ques¬ 
tion, This sowing of rye at last cultivation is both for 
corn used for husking and the silo, this to he plowed 
under and sown to corn again. The soil is of a sandy 
loam nature. How much of a 4-8-4 or other high-grade 
fertilizer is it profitable to use? E. D. 
Burlingham, N. Y. 
T would he possible to keep up the fertility of the 
soil with green manures and chemicals for a 
good many years. It has been done for at least 15 
years to our knowledge. A small amount of manure 
every year or two would lieli), not so much for the 
plant food which the manure supplies as because it 
would bring to the soil certain bacteria which are 
useful in breaking up organic matter. In a way 
this use of manure would be much like using a com¬ 
mercial bacteria, so often used when seeding to 
Clover and other legumes. Rye alone could be used 
at the last cultivation of the corn, hut rye and Hairy 
vetch, or rye and clover, would he better. South of 
Philadelphia (Tituson clover is very good for this 
use, and is often used on suitable land where corn 
pays better than any other crop. About 500 lbs. of 
the fertilizer per acre would insure a good yield. 
While it is possible to keep up the land in this way, 
it is not always practical to do so. The trouble is 
that after continuous corn culture for several years, 
insects and disease germs multiply so that the crop 
is greatly injured. The corn ear-worm becomes quid* 
destructive after three or four years of continuous 
culture, and corn smut will usually work in and 
become quite injurious. It is of course possible 
largely to overcome the effect of the smut by going 
through the crop, cutting out the smutted ears and 
burning them, but there will he a gradual increase 
or' the disease, unless a rotation is followed: that is. 
another crop that is grown a year or two following 
the corn. The corn ear-worm has been very had in 
many States during the past few years, and it seems 
to he increasing. Where corn is grown year after 
year this insect becomes quite common and will do 
considerable damage. There is, of course, no ques¬ 
tion about the possibility of keeping up the soil by 
“Two Blue Hen Chicks” is the name given the picture 
of the children here shown. Delaware is called the Blue 
Hen State, although most of the hens seem to be reason¬ 
ably happy down there. At any rate, these healthy 
children help round out the farm stock. A farm without 
such a pail—why it wouldn't be a farm ! 
using green manures and chemicals, but the insects 
and disease will, after a few years, make the plan 
unprofitable. 
Some Notes on Strawberry Culture 
The Way I Do It 
HAVE just finished a 17-hour day in the straw¬ 
berry field, and thinking that I would look over 
The II. N.-Y. a few minutes before retiring I noticed 
that C. It. would like to know how to care for four 
acres of strawberries the coming season. First of 
all, C. It. must he a man with an endless constitu¬ 
tion to care for four acres of berries, for it is a 
regular man's job. I have been in flic business for 
six years, and find with my experience and good 
market that 1 >•_, acres to hoe and 1*4 acres to pick 
is all 1 can handle successfully. 
The first difficulty which C. It. would find would 
be the varieties to plant, as there is nothing that 
varies with soil conditions as much as strawberries. 
I have given plants of my best varieties to neigh¬ 
bors. only to find that they were almost a failure 
in their soil. I am now testing 55 varieties, and 
find that some very good varieties one season will 
be very poor the next. 
The method which I use is the matted row sys¬ 
tem. I tried the hill system once, and the runners 
ran too fast for me, so it. ended in the matted row. 
and has been that ever since. I do my plowing in 
the Fall, and as soon as it is possible in the Spring 
I prepare the soil. I plant 3x4 ft., cheeking it so I 
can cultivate both ways. About August 1 I sow from 
one-half to one ton of bouemoal in the rows where 
the plants are to catch root, and cultivate and hoe 
it in well. Don't drag the runners in hunches with 
the cultivator, but let them catch root as they will. 
Then get a couple of steel disks and put them on 
the sides of your cultivator, and cut the runners off 
as they get over the 2-ft. mark. Keep the cultivator 
going till time to cover them with straw, and I am 
sure you will meet with success. Don't use a culti¬ 
vator with corn shovels or you will have your rows 
ridged too high. A garden tractor with a spring- 
tooth cultivator is a very good implement.. 
Ohio. D. D. HOUGHTON. 
The Second Year’s Fruiting 
We make a practice of fruiting strawberries at 
least two years, and often three years. We do not 
think it pays to spend much time on the old beds. 
After they fruit they are allowed to stand for a 
little while, then a mowing machine is run over them 
to destroy tall weeds. The cutting bar is sot high, 
so as not to take off many of the leaves of the ber¬ 
ries. This may have to be repea ted in the Fall. 
Sometimes a harrow is run down the middle of the 
rows to keep a path open for picking. This, though, 
is not necessary. The following Spring 500 to 000 
lhs. of 5-8-5 fertilizer is used early as a top-dressing, 
and that is about all the patch gets in the way of 
care. This is not an ideal way. perhaps, to clean 
up old beds, but it is not expensive and, all tilings 
considered, about the most profitable. If newly set 
beds are kept perfectly clean the first year it is not 
so very much trouble to keep them two or three 
years with profit, even though cultivated with mow¬ 
ing machine. Eve rhea rers should he newly set each 
year. It seldom pays to keep them over. 
When old beds are plowed we find late white 
potatoes the best, crop to follow them. In this sec¬ 
tion Red Skin potatoes are used for this purpose. 
South Jersey. willard p. kille. 
Agriculture in England 
R EPORTS from England show that another agri¬ 
cultural depression is starting, caused by in¬ 
creased imports of meat and grain. The (treat War 
caught England unprepared to feed her working 
people. Thousands of acres of land had gone <>nt of 
cultivation into pasture or meadows. The govern¬ 
ment gave every encouragement to farmers who 
would break up sod land and work it into grain and 
potatoes. Prices were fixed, a bonus was provided, 
loans were made—everything that could induce 
farmers to increase the natural output of farm 
crops. These efforts were successful, and thousands 
of acres of pasture land went^ hack into grain and 
vegetables. For a time the English farmers pros¬ 
pered. and they have not met the depression which 
fell upon the agriculture of Ibis country. Now, how¬ 
ever, the swing seems to have started with cheaper 
wheat and meat from South America and Australia. 
The English government cannot afford to permit 
agriculture to run down. Before the Great War it 
seemed possible to make England a great machine 
shop, with little attention paid to where food was 
produced, provided .it was cheap enough. The Eng¬ 
lish have now learned the fallacy of this theory. 
The farms must he kept up and the farmers must 
be satisfied at any cost. That is the first duty of 
the nation, and we may expect to see the government 
do almost anything in reason to maintain prices 
and make the farmers feel that they are having a 
fair showing. 
Delivery wagon horse showing heavy head and poor quality, steep pasterns and soft 
bone. The type that soon wears out. 
Delivery horse showiug proper quality, size and bone. Has been used on city streets 
six years, and is perfectly sound. 
