330 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER 
FARMER GARRULOUS’ DIARY. 
My Diary—Nov. 3.—This is election day. I 
have done iny duty and voted. BPUNTER ask¬ 
ed me when 1 planted that field of corn from 
which I told him I husked 175 bushels of good 
sound ears of corn this season. I couldn’t 
tell him. “ Why, don’t you keep a diary ?” 
asked he. ! had to say no. “ I do,” was 
the reply, “audit saves a heap of trouble. 
It is no trouble to keep if and mighty con¬ 
venient to have in your pocket wherever you 
are. Now Smith would have cheated me 
out of $20 the other day if 1 hadn’t kept a 
diary. You see-” But 1 need not tell his 
story concerning Smith ; he convinced me, 
however, that u diary was a good thing to 
keep ; and when I am once convinced it is 
good to do u thing, 1 begin of once. That is 
a rule I have. Fur instance, last fall I was 
convinced if wotdd not pay to winter over 
my unprofitable cows; accordingly I pump- 
kined-aud-mealed them until they sold well, 
and there I was—with nearly $250 for four 
of them, clean, iu my pocket, and the hay 
that would have gone into their stomachs in 
the barn, and worth to me, the first of March, 
$20 per ton. There are some peopie who say 
“ Sell the best.” But I don’t find that a rule 
which should apply in all oases. It is folly 
for a dairyman to sell his best milch cows; 
but it is also folly for him to sell any but the 
best butter and cheese and to liavc any other 
for sa’e. 1 would not sell my best breeding 
animals, if i was a breeder ; but 1 would sell 
my best fruit, grain, pork, etc It’s queer, 
the way some 1 tinners have of trying to get 
off their smallest til'd poorest potatoes, tip¬ 
ples, their mustiest hay, &c., &c., on the 
market, when if they had a particle of gump¬ 
tion, they would know they were marked 
men ou that market ever after. 
“ Little. Graves.” — Nov. 4. —I read a para 
graph in a paper to-day, headed “Little 
Graves.” It reminded mo of certain “little 
graves” I have seen on some farms. I re¬ 
member several. They were not “ sacred 
places for pure thoughts and holy medita¬ 
tions.” They were shallow, stinking holes 
in which were the rotting carcases of dead 
sheep, Calves, cows and horses. I’m not 
going to have any such “little graves” on 
my farm if I can help it. If 1 should lose an 
animal 1 ill either bury him below any pos¬ 
sibility of resurrection by hungry dogs or 
other carnivorous animals, or cat up the car¬ 
cass with lime smothered in a muck dressing. 
I’m opposed to “ little graves” of the charac¬ 
ter I am now thinking of. 
“ Thinking Should go 'with Rend inn .’'— 
Nov. 5.—That’S30, just as surely as digestion 
should follow eating. These editors do, once 
in a while, get off a good ihing. I have found 
it a good practice to read a single paragraph 
of au article and then stop and think about 
it until I was sure 1 had learned something 
from it or it had suggested something I could 
add to it. Esquire Whine, the other day, 
said, “There is nothing new in the papers.” 
“Nor is there anything now under the sun,” 
I said, “but I’ll wager my old hat against 
yours that I can go onto your farm and show 
you a hundred things new to you within au 
hour—things yon look at every day, too, but 
do not see, because you do not think about 
them. Bo in the papers, if you don’t see some 
stunning head lines and experience a sensa¬ 
tion, you say there is nothing new ; while 
the thoughtful man will gather from the 
same paper material enough to occupy his 
thoughts profitably for a week. Mem .— 
Think about whatever you nee or hear or say 
or do ! 
“ Going to Seed.” — Nov. 0.—Brown said to 
me, this morning, “Don’t you think Jame¬ 
son is going to seed < See his fences, barns 
and tools !” Now it was not a neighborly 
remark of Brown’s, but 1 thought about it 
some. I can see evidences enough that neigh¬ 
bor Jameson is “ going to seed,” but I would 
not wane to say so. Why? Because I would 
not want, the same thing said of me. But 
I’ve beeu trying to fix upon the muse of his 
“going to seed.” Fve concluded that the 
chief reason is a Lick of ambition, from want 
of knowing wli.it other people are doing and 
what may be done. This comes in part from 
almost complete isolation from his fellow 
farmers and from all lack of effort to keep 
posted by reading what others are doing. He 
neither is a member of a farmer’s club, nor 
attends farmers' meetings, nor takes a paper 
in which there is any record of what the 
world is accomplishing agriculturally. Hence 
he is in no sense fed, nor stimulated either 
to observe, think or act, and Is “going to 
seed. ’ 
•'Splitting Hairs.”—Nov. 7.—I’ve heard, 
two men talk to-day two hours ou au unim¬ 
portant topic and do nothing of greater value 
to themselves, or any one else, than if they 
were splitting hairs with broad swords. Does 
it mat; r materially whether a bean winds 
around a pole in one direction or another, so 
that it winds ’< Or whether a cow should be 
yellow or black, so that, she gives the largest 
quantity of the best quality of milk ( Or 
whether chess comes of wheat or not, so that 
a man grows wheat instead of chess ?—for if 
chess is produced from wheat, or not, what 
is the farmer going to do about it, except to 
properly drain the laud on which be sows 
wheat and thus prevent its winter-killing 
and thus prevent chess ? I’m sick and tired 
of this splitting hairs. I’m very fond of piue- 
tioal facts ! 1 want to know how many bush¬ 
els of wheat, or corn, or potatoes, etc., a 
fanner produces on au acre, of what variety, 
what manures he used, soil, cost of culture 
and net profit. That’s what I like, and I 
don’t care whether the. wheat has beards or 
not, or whether the corn has 8 rows or 12, or 
whether the potatoes have large or small 
tops, so that the results are satisfactory. 
-♦♦♦- 
MEETINGS OF FARMERS AND THEIR 
FAMILIES. 
The most successful of the Farmers’ Clubs 
and local horticultural organizations with 
which we arc acquainted, arc those in which 
the social feature is not ignored—t hose Where 
the club or society meets at the house of 
some one of its members and is entertained 
with a dinner and social reunion, as well as 
instructed by the discussion of some farm, 
orchard or garden topic. This seems the 
best mode devised for securing and perpet¬ 
uating attendance, and cohesion. Besides, 
the informality of such meetings secures an 
expression of opinion and the giving of expe¬ 
rience from those who might be too timid to 
speak formally in a public meeting. 
We call attention to these facts now that 
the length of the evenings and the closing 
up Of the autumn work will enable farmers 
and their families to meet each other in such 
profitable social intercourse. Where Granges 
are organized this feature is secured to the 
neighborhood and such a suggestion is unnec¬ 
essary ; hut where there is too Grange, or 
where there may be objections to organizing 
One, a neighborhood club of the-fburucter 
above indicated, in which all the adult mem¬ 
bers of every family may participate, will 
be found to be a wholesome means of in¬ 
struction and entertainment during the win¬ 
ter months. 
•-- 
CAMEL BREEDING IN NEVADA. 
We find the following statement in one of 
our exchanges “ Upon a ranch in Nevada, 
on the Carson River, there is a herd of 26 
camels, all but two of which were bred and 
raised in Nevada. Some years ago nine or 
ten camels were imported into that State, 
but of these only two lived to become accli¬ 
mated, and from this pair have been raised 
24 animals. The men who now have them 
are Frenchman, who had formerly some ex¬ 
perience with camels in Europe. They find 
no difficulty in rearing them, and can now 
show 24 line, healthy animals, all of Washoe 
growth. The camel may now lie said to be 
thoroughly acclimated. The owners of the 
herd find it no more difficult to breed and 
rear them than would be experienced with 
the same number of goats or donkeys. The 
ranch upon which they are kept is sandy and 
sterile in the extreme, yet the animals feast 
and grow fat. on such prickly shrubs and bit¬ 
ter weeds as no other animal would touch. 
When 1 ft to themselves their great delight, 
after filling themselves with the coarse herb- 
lage of the desert, is to lie and roll in the hot 
sand. They are used iu packing salt to the 
mills on the river from the marshes lying in 
the desert, some 60 miles eastward. Some 
of the animals easily pack 1,000 pounds. 
INDUSTRIAL NOTES. 
A. Day's Work on the Farm. —R. S. M. 
is informed that we know of no “ Scat^ which 
has fixed by law the number of hours which 
shall constitute a legal day's work ou the 
farm.” But there is just as much reason 
why the farm laborer’s day's work should 
be measured as the mechanic’s. The length 
of a day’s work may always be governed by 
specific agreement between the employer 
and employed ; but. In the absence of any 
such agreement a legal standard should al¬ 
ways govern. But iu the ease of farm labor 
there is no such legal standard, hence custom 
in localities governs and is frequent cause of 
dissatisfaction and dispute. 
American Farmers .—The Artizan says: 
“ We hazard the assertion that no class of 
equal average means live so well as A meri¬ 
can fanners. One of these possessing a farm 
and buildings worth $10,000 will gather about, 
film and enjoy more real comfort than could 
be obtained from the income of $100,000 in 
New York. He may live in a more commo¬ 
dious dwelling than a metropolitan citizen 
having $10,000 annual income. He. may have 
his carriage and horses. His table may be 
supplied with every thing fresh in its season. 
His labor is less wearing than the toil of the 
counting-room and offices, and he has more 
leisure.” 
What Some Western Farmers are Doing.— 
The Farmers’ Union (Minnesota) of Oct. 10 
says : —" Grasshoppers, potato bugs, drouth, 
chinch bugB and prairie fires and two per 
cent, a month are driving many farmers 
from their farms in various sections of the 
West. Borne have thrown up their claims 
entirely, preferring to risk starvation in the 
towns rather than on the prairies.” 
Plaster and Grass .—It has beeu shown 
that at the Michigan Agricultural College a 
single bushel of plaster added a full ton of 
hay to the yield of an acre of ground in the 
five, most of it in the four mowings that fol¬ 
lowed—two crops being taken off the ground 
each of the two years succeeding the sowing 
of the plaster. 
ofjtdd (£i;opi 
ORCHARD GRASS. 
W. F. Tullant, Montgomery Co.,Va., who 
has furnished, heretofore, the Rural New- 
Yorker with his estimate of the value of 
orchard grass, thus writes the Country Gen¬ 
tleman “Orchard grass is ready to cut by 
the first of June, and can all be cured before 
wheat harvest commences, and the second 
crop will keep until harvest is over. Now 1 
know orchard grass cut at the right time 
(and there is no reason why it cannot, always 
be cut at the right time), is better than tim¬ 
othy cut at the wrong time. There, is no 
time more convenient for cutting hay than 
the first of Juuu and no time more inconven¬ 
ient than the first of July. Hay buyers w ill 
do well to remember this and look at the 
quality of the hay and not at the kind only. 
“ For my part, 1 prefer orchard grass hay 
to timothy hay, as it has more binder Tim¬ 
othy dies out in course of a few years, w hile 
au orchard grass sod (if not pastured too 
close) will not only never die out, but ’ dll 
continue to get better and better each year 
for many years. I have ascertained by ex¬ 
periments that orchard grass will root out 
all other grasses. Even our common blue- 
grass, and the small blue wire grass, have to 
give way to it. where the land is not pastured 
but mowed. When land is to be pastured, 
nothing can excel a good sod of our common 
blue grass, but it takes years for a good blue 
grass sod to form, even here, where it comes 
naturally, while orchard grass forms a sod at 
once. 1 think, therefore, that orchard grass 
should have the preference, even as a pasture 
grass. One aero of orchard grass will afford 
as much pasture as two or three of clover or 
timothy. I am confident that orchard grass 
will make two pounds ol' hay on the same 
land that timothy, clover, redtop, or any 
other that, I know, will make one. I might 
except one kind, tall meadow oat grass, 
which makes an immense amount of hay, 
but for reasons 1 have not space to mention, 
orchard grass is to be preferred to it. Blue 
grass ou bottom lands will sometimes make 
nearly as much hay, but on uplands orchard 
grass will make four times as much as blue 
grass. I believe timothy to be an impoverish- 
er of land, while orchard grass forms such 
au immense sod that 1 believe turning a sod 
of it under is equal to any clover sod. There 
is one thing all must remember, that orchard 
grass will make but little hay the first year, 
bur the second year one will have to tear 
down his barns and build greater ones, or do 
as I have had to do—fill the barns and stack 
the remainder out-of-doors.” 
-- 
WHY POTATOES RUN OUT. 
Some one asks why it is that potatoes so 
soon run out. There are two grand reasons. 
There are but few potatoes iu a hill that are 
fit for seed. Some arc. overgrown, coarse, 
rank, and will not transmit the original 
quality. Others are undergrown, and not 
fully developed seed. A potato of medium 
size, perfect in all its purls, with change of 
ground, will produce its like ad infinitum. 
One other reason—cutting potatoes between 
stem and seed end continually is wrong. It 
requires the stem and seed end to make 
perfect seed. If cut lengthwise, single 
eyes will run out any potato. There is no 
MOV, 24 
other seed that will bear mutilation like the 
potato ; t.he only wonder is, that it does not 
run out completely.— Rural Messenger. 
It is to be hoped that the author of the 
above is satisfied with his o wn wisdom. We 
advise him to enter into a partnership with 
Mr. Kerr who always selects his pumpkin 
seed from a female pumpkin ; for two such 
"wiseacres” should certainly pull together 
and then they might astonish the world, 
with practical results emanating from such 
profound theories as advanced by both. Who 
could have thought it'?—a potato tuber being 
a seed which will not bear mutilation. In 
our ignorance we had always supposed that 
a potato was merely a thickened subter¬ 
ranean stem, with buds on its surface not 
very dissimilar to the stem above ground or 
the twig of pear, apple, or grape vine, whieli 
ignorant horticulturists like ourselves have 
been mutilating for the past five thousand 
years, never dreaming of the fearful conse¬ 
quence which might follow ! 
Seriously cannot somebody invent an easy 
way of getting rid of or educating a certain 
class, w hioh we have among us who are con¬ 
tinually propounding theories that neither 
have common sense nor science for a basis ? 
Perhaps our agricultural colleges will do this 
great work. Perhaps, and then, “ we pause 
for a reply.” 
--- 
FIELD NOTES. 
Sweet Potatoes should not be kept (or no 
attempt to keep them should be made) in a 
lower temperature than 05—or 60° at the 
lowest. They may he packed in dry chaff 
or kiln-dried sand. We have seen them kept 
in thoroughly dried loam pretty well. 
Rye for Spring Pasture. —(C. T.) —It is not 
too late, though late, to sow rye for early 
spring pasture. It makes excellent forage 
either for pasture or for soiling. 
Ohiunomit. 
RELATIVE VALUE OF FERTILIZERS. 
We find the following sensible paragraphs 
in the American Agriculturist:—“You pre¬ 
tend to be able to tell what a ton of manure 
is worth ; but I notice that the chemists 
differ very much among themselves as to the 
value of the same identical manure, and 1 do 
not see how you can tell with any certainly 
how much good a ton of manure will do. 
No one pretends to do so. What we say is 
thisi:—Here are two samples of barn-yard 
manure in about, the same condition. One 
contains twice n.< much nitrogen, phosphoric 
acid and potash, ns the other, and wo say, if 
the one is worth $1 per ton, the other is 
worth $2 per ton. We do not say that il you 
put 20 tons of the former, or 10 tons of the 
latter upon an acre of land, the difference of 
the crops will be worth $20. This may or 
may not be the ease. The chemist’s estimate 
of the value of different manures is based on 
their chemical composition, and on the con¬ 
dition of the ingredients. The chemist does 
not undertake to tell a fanner, whether ho 
can afford to buy sulphate of ammonia, or 
nitrate of soda, to sow on his wheat or barley 
crop. But if you are going to sow these 
manures, the chemist can tell you to a cer¬ 
tainty which of two samples is the cheapest 
for you to buy. 
For instance, he finds one sample contains 
22 per cent, of ammonia, and the other 18 
per cent. If he tells you the Litter is worth 
$72 per ton, and the former $SS per ton, he 
merely uses these figures iu a comparative 
sense. If fie should say the cue was worth 
$30, and the Other $44, he would be equally 
correct. He has nothing to do with the 
commercial value on the one hand, or the 
fertilizing value ou the other. The latter 
must be determined by the experience of 
farmers themselves, and on repeated experi¬ 
ments. Where wheat is worth only 75 cents 
per bushel, and other crops on the same 
scale, ammonia is only worth half as much 
to a farmer as iu a section where wheat is 
worth $1.50 per bushel. 
When an agent for some artificial fertilizer 
shows me a whole string of testimonials as to 
the value of his fertilizers, I tell him that a 
good analysis would be more satisfactory 
to me than an actual trial on my own land 
and under my own eye. A man need not 
swallow a lot of Glauber salts to tell if they 
are pure. The chemist cannot tell him 
whether he needs a dose of the salts, but he 
can tell him whether the salts are genuine or 
not. Chemistry cannot tell us whether our 
laud needs this or that manure, but it can 
tell us whether the manure is genuine or 
spurious. If farmers bad clearer views on 
this subject, the sale of interior or worthless 
fertilizers would soon cease.” 
