9 
©I .3 
until Sept. 15, when the frost killed the stalks 
right down. I was very sorry. I sowed the 
Washington Oats in May, and they did splen¬ 
didly; they grew about 2)4 feet high. 1 cut 
them in July and put them into the granary. 
A trap-door was left open and the pigeons 
found the opening and destroyed them. I had 
one Cuban Queen Watermelon that weighed 
43 pounds, so 1 have beaten the Rural Farm. 
We were very much troubled with chinch and 
potato bugs, but they couldn’t stomach Paris- 
green and London-purple. Wheat averaged 
about eight bushels to the acre; it was a little 
damaged by the chinch bugs. Cora is about 
one-fourth of a crop, We are getting lots of 
rain this Fall, making plowing good. We 
have had three bad years, but hope to do 
better next. T. H. 
Wichita, Sedgwick Co., Nov. 19.—We had 
au excessively hot, dry Summer, which was a 
great drawback to success with the Rural 
seeds. Tue Beauty of Hebron, Early Ohio 
and Burbank Potatoes have proved the best 
with me out of 28 different varietias, all 
treated alike. From the White Elephant we 
got only about a quart of late tubers, as it 
was planted very late and the season was un¬ 
favorable. The Rural Branching Sorghum 
was planted in two rows, three feet by one 
foot apart; almost every seed grew. Part of 
it was cut when about four feet high and my 
stock ate it greedily. It grew again six feet 
high, and what wasn’t cut is now ateut nine 
feet tall and from 25 to 30 hills have ripened 
their seed. There were from 15 to 20 stalks 
from each seed. a. j. p. 
Louisiana. 
Monroe, Ouachita Parish, Nov. 14.—The 
drought has thoroughly succumbed to the Fall 
rains. Cotton has bem very nearly all gath¬ 
ered, and will net but little more thau half a 
crop—of a superior quality as compared with 
that for several years. We have had no killing 
frost yet, aud but three slight frosts to date. 
With the rains in October Spring vegetation 
clothed trees and plants—the heaviest hay 
crop harvested for years was the result from 
the grass seeds which had lain dormant dur¬ 
ing the unprecedented drought of the past 
Summer. The Bermuda was about the only 
grass which had not succumbed to the heat 
and dry weather. We have many fine indi¬ 
genous grasses, and the Ouachita Valley is 
specially adapted to stock-raising. I think in 
the course of time, when capitalists take hold, 
cotton culture will be abandoned here and the 
finest stock farming in the world will succeed 
the dethroned king, who, like most kings, has 
pretty effectually kept his subjects’ noses to 
the grindstone. I was pleased to read the 
good word spoken for the Iona Grape 
in the Rural of November 12, on page 
7(52. I have grown the Iona to the exclu¬ 
sion, almost, of all others for several years. 
It has been entirely free from disease of any 
kind and reasonably productive; the bunches 
large to very Large and compact. Like Mr. 
P. B. Mead, in his book on grape culture, I 
place it at the head of the list. In truth, 
with Iona as the standard, 1 have found few 
other American grapes at all fitted for table 
use. Here, it is hardy, a good tearer, trains 
well, is handsome and luscious. Nearly all 
other varieties I have tried fail in several of 
these qualities, and all, except Iona, in our 
mild climate and long season, grow too ram¬ 
pantly. In the same issue of the Rural an 
inquiry is made about a remedy for cabbage 
worms. Both the cut-worm and cabbage 
worm were unusually abundant here last 
Spring, and I fought them successfully with 
air-slaked lime profusely scattered over the 
cabbages and into the heads while the dew 
was on. The same treatment with the potato 
bug was successful. f. g. 
Micliijriuw 
Mason Co., Nov. 20.—I planted the White 
Elephant May 25, cut in 17 pieces which were 
put in nine hills; all grew and yielded 51X 
pounds. The Washington Oats yielded six 
quarts. The Rural Branching Sorghum 
grew about four feet high. I cut it once. I 
think the Rural seeds have done as well as 
could be expected on account of the dry 
weather. r. h. 
Owosso, Shiawassee Co., Nov. 16.—As a 
farming community we have no great com¬ 
plaints to make, for, taking everything to¬ 
gether, the farmers of this county have re¬ 
ceived as much money this year- for their 
wheat, oats, cattle and hogs as they did Inst 
year, aud most of us tillers of the soil are 
pretty well prepared to maintain and enjoy 
life, and sit by theme this Winter and read 
the Rural New-Yorker. My White Ele¬ 
phant Potatoes turned out splendid. There 
were 87 of them, some of them very large. 
The Washington Oats were a failure—more 
smut than grain. The sorghum failed to 
grow; but the pinks were beauties. I am well 
pleased with the investment of $2.06 for the 
paper and the seeds. Either of them has been 
worth the money to me, aud I shall promptly 
renew for 1882 and speak urgently to my | 
neighbors of the paper’s merits. n. b. a. j 
seed did not quite ripen. I harvested about 
a pint of Washington Oats. I do not think 
they are as good as the Ennobled Oats sent 
out a year ago. The flowers were one mass 
of blossoms, of nearly all colors aud combina¬ 
tions. E. w. B. 
Wisconsin. 
Eagle, Waukesha Co., Nov. 18.—The sea¬ 
son has been very changeable. Crops light 
except potatoes, of which there has been an 
extra large yield in this vicinity. The White 
Elephant fills the bill. I cut mine to single 
eyes of which there were 12. Planted one eye 
in a hill on May 16, and dug them September 
SO—yield, 45 pounds. The Rural Branching 
Sorghum 1 planted May 20, one seed in a hill 
three feet a part each way'. I had from 10 to 
20 stalks in a hill. I cut off two hills August 
20, They afterwards only' grew about one 
foot high. The rest I cut ou Nov, 8; the seed 
did not get ripe. The sorghum is a good fod¬ 
der plant. In the Rural of Nov. 5, Z. M., of 
Darien, Walworth Co,, WLs., says: "The 
Beauty of Hebron excelled all other potatoes 
with me.” With me the Mammoth Peail 
yielded twice as much as the Beauty did side 
by side, with the same cultivation, and Clark’s 
No. 1 was a great deal better than either of 
them; from three pounds I raised 193 pounds. 
They were superior in every way to any 
other sort I raised and I had 13 different 
kinds. a. m. 
Hampden, Columbia Co., Nov. 20.—Fre¬ 
quent rains hinder all farm work. Cora 
husking nearly done. Hundreds of acres of 
seed clover not stacked. Frost began Nov, 14 
and the ground is now quite ha rd. Corn is a 
good crop, but in rather bad order; some of it 
is sprouted; it was down badly. We have 
had a good season—showers nearly every 
week. It is the off year for fruit so we had 
very few apples; but a good crop of small 
fruit and fair crops generally. The sorghum 
seed matured. The asparagus grew two feet 
high and some of it blossomed. The oats pro¬ 
duced eight pounds. The pinks were lovely 
and much admired. The White Elephant 
Potato, weighing 1 ounce, yielded 40 pounds 
of not very large tu here. They were grown 
by r the side of the Dunmore, and after these 
were ripe the bugs left them and killed the 
White Elephant vines, and I thiuk that short¬ 
ened the erop one-third. Their only' fault is 
that they are late, and eternal vigilance is the 
price of late potatoes. We can manage the 
first generation of bugs but the second are 
too many for us. The Cuthbert Raspberry 
has produced a. good crop for one vine, and 
there are 20 new sets, some of which are five 
feet high. It is a fine addition to my small 
fruit patch. The White Zealand Oats did bet¬ 
ter than the Washington. From about half 
as much seed I raised eight pounds of much 
nicer oats. The Golden Grains Wheat planted 
in the Springstooled und made large bunches; 
three or four ears headed and the rest stood un¬ 
til October and then died, and I had less wheat 
than I sowed. What I got I have sowed this 
Fall. g. w. T. 
Hereby, St. Croix Co., Nov. 23.—From 
the W. E. Potato I made six hills, one piece 
in each. The soil was good and the potatoes 
Ans. —A fleece should be laid on a folding 
table with the outside down, the sides are 
turned in and the fleece is then r lied up and 
tied with as little string as possible; the twine 
used is a thin kind known as wool twine. The 
fleece is tied around each end of the roll and 
then lengthwise. A wool table for folding 
and tying fleeces commonly used in New 
York State, is made as follows: see Fig. 543. 
Three boards, one inch thick and 12 inches 
wide, are used. The center one is cut into 
three equal pieces and fastened together by 
butt binges so that the eudstura up, ns shown. 
The other two are hinged to the center-piece 
of the first board so that they turn up at each 
side, as shown. The box is used as follows:— 
The sides are all let down flat and the table is 
placed on a bench; two strips of the right 
length are laid across so as to come up when 
the sides are closed, as showu at a. a. The 
fleece is laid on the table and the ends of the 
center piece are turned up; then the sides are 
turned up and held by a wooden hook, shown 
at b. The fleece is then tied lightly with the 
strings and the sides are let down, leav¬ 
ing the fleece properly secured. A fleece may 
easily be tied in 15 seconds, with the help of 
this table. 2. Second growth of clover very 
often has some acrid weeds in it, as lobelia 
and St. John’s-wort; and very little clover 
seed is free from these, so that when clover 
seed is sown these weeds are sown with it. 
They blossom and ripen their seeds with the 
second crop of clover, from which the seed is 
always taken. If a little lobelia is put in the 
mouth its effect in causing slobbering or sali- 
ivation will be readily perceived, No doubt 
if the clover is •tamined these weeds will be 
found in it. Lobelia is easily recognized by 
its blue-bell-shaped flowers and its ovoid or 
egg-shaped seed capsules, also by its strong 
these oats were very' free from smut. I have 
about 175 asparagus plants. The flower seeds 
were a failure. D. J. c. 
Ohio. 
Bristol, Trumbull Co;, Nov. 18.—From my 
White Elephant Potato I raised 50 tubers that 
were large enough for eating, 30 smaller ouas 
and a dozen or so of the smallest to throw in 
for good measure. The whole weighed 19 
poands, the largest weighing three-fourths of 
a pound. This yield does not come up to 
many' others, but I think it is not so bad for a 
dry season. I only planted three hills of the 
Rural Branching Sorghum as I did not have 
ground suitable for planting more of it. It 
grew to about six feet in hight, but did not 
head out in time for the seed to ripen before 
the frost came. The Washington Oats did 
not do as well with me as some others have re 
ported, on account of the rust. I will prob¬ 
ably get two quarts of good, clean oats. I did 
not sow the asparagus until quite late, aud it 
was so dry afterwards that the plants did not 
make a very good growth. I gave part of the 
diauthus and pink seeds away and planted 
the rest. Some of the diauthus did not come 
up, and some, I thiuk, were destroyed after 
they came up. Part of them blossomed, and 
they were nice, I can tell you. The season 
here was pretty dry most of the time and 
very warm also. We had no rain worth 
speaking of from August 1 until September 
16; since that time it has been wet enough. 
Wheat and grass came on very well after the 
rains began—better than for many years. 
Pastures and meadows that looked as if the 
grass in them would never start, soon looked 
as though the Spring time had justcoine. 
Railroad and other fires ha ve done a great 
deal of damage to pastures, fences and wood¬ 
land, but no buildings were burned. Cora is 
notmur.h more than half a crop except once 
in a while some fiehis turned out first-rate. 
Wheat, and oats were good crops with but few 
except ions. Potatoes are a prett.v light crop 
as a general thiug, aud are selling at fl@1.25 
per bushel. We had an excellent crop of 
grass and splendid weather for making hay. 
I don’t think people around here ever made 
hay of better quality than they did this year, 
taking the hay crop all through. Hands were 
pretty scarce through haying and harvesting 
and wages were $1,50@2.00 per day. j. s. b. 
Fayette, Fultou Co., Nov, 18.—Our crops 
here have been about an average. The drought 
in May damaged the hay, corn and wheat. 
The small White Elephant had 10 eyes and 
was cut into 10 pieces and made 10 hills. We 
think the yield was g»od—nearly half a bushel. 
The Washington Oats were a failure—very 
smutty and rusty. The asparagus seed did not 
germinate, nor did the flower seeds come 
up. e. f. 
Pennsylvania 
Titusville, Crawford Co., Nov. 20.—My 
White Elephant had a dozen eyes; one was 
buried in each of a dozen mounds, and alto¬ 
gether they produced 20 pounds of large, nice 
young Elephants. The asparagus all came up: 
it is now a foot high. I have four quarts of 
Washington Oats. I think they are worth 
more than the price of the Rural. a. h. 
Tennessee, 
Humboldt, Gibson Co., Nov. 16,—The White 
Elephant Potato I cut into eight pieces and 
planted in eight hills. The yield was 38 tubers, 
averaging as large as, or larger than, the one 
planted. Of the Rural Branching Sorghum 
nearly all the seeds came up. It is all you 
claim for it. I planted it in thin, clay land. 
It had no rain to speak of for 80 days. To¬ 
wards the last it would wilt in the heat of the 
day, but always came out fresh and green the 
next, morning. I saved seed from two stalks; 
the others I cut, and it is green where I cut it 
off and growing to-day. The asparagus has 
done very well. The flower seeds did well; 
nearly all of them came up. They com¬ 
menced to bloom in J uly and are to-day f ull 
of beautiful flowers. r. h. f. 
Texas. 
Dayton, Liberty Co., Nov. 14.—Our long 
dry spell was broken the first week in this 
month by a perfect deluge. No scarcity of 
water here now. My flowers and White Ele¬ 
phant gave way to the drought, but I have 
the Rural Branching and the usparagus all 
right. One of the magnolias, that took a year 
to germinate, also succumbed. It has teen a 
delightful Fall for cotton picking. The cot¬ 
ton is about all picked now. u. G. 
Vermont. 
Factory Point, Bennington Co., Nov. 7.—On 
May 251 planted my White Elephant Potato, 19 
hills, and in ground that the hogs rooted over 
a year ago, and only 16 hills came up, from 
which I harvested 59% pounds of tubers. On 
Sept. 19 I planted my Sorghum too thick, and 
it grew only six or seven feet high, and the 
A WOOL TABLE.—FIG. 543. 
taste which is much like that of tobacco. This 
is Lobelia inflata or the common eyebright. 
The writer has proved in his own experience 
the truth of this circumstance and otherwise 
has never known second growth clover to 
cause this effect, although it commonly has 
the reputation of producing slobbering. This 
plant may also often be picked out of the 
clover hay and in this case also will produce 
the same effect. It grows only a tew inches 
in hight. St. John’s-wort (Hypericum perfor¬ 
atum) also produces the same effect; it is rec¬ 
ognized by its yellows with live petals and a 
three-horned pistil which of course becomes 
the seed pod; this has three cells which, with 
the three diverging styles connected, contain 
the seed. This plant ripens the seed at 
the same time as clover, viz., in Sep¬ 
tember and October. It is about 12 to 18 
inches in hight. 
" NEW-PROCESS" OIL MEAL. 
It. C. K., J J leinpton, Ohio, asks what is meant 
by “ new-process” oil meal. 
Ans. —Oil cake is the residue that remains 
after the oil has been extracted from certain 
seeds—usually cotton seed, flax or linseed, and 
rape or colza seed. Flax contains from 30 to 
40 per cent, of oil; rape, 35 to 4-5 percent., and 
cotton about 30 per cent. The oil is generally 
obtained by subjecting the seeds to hydraulic 
pressure, by which a large proportion of the 
oil is forced out, while mostof the albuminoids, 
or flesh forming elements, remain behind The 
greater the pressure to which it is subjected 
the less oil and the more relatively of albu¬ 
minoids will remain. A new method of ex¬ 
tracting the oil consists in treating the ground 
seeds with benzol or bisulphide of carbon 
which dissolves the oil. Sulphuric acid is also 
used for the purpose of obtaining a larger 
quantity of oil from flax seed. The acridity of 
the acid soon becomes dissipated on exposure 
to air, and does not in any way injure the 
health of the animals fed on such “ new-pro¬ 
cess” oil cake, or on the oil-meal made by 
grindingit. Such meal contains about eight per 
cent, less oil than the old style sort, aud usually 
sells for about ‘25 per cent, less, though it is 
considered equally good for feed, inasmuch as 
the larger proportion of albuminoids it con¬ 
tains fully makes up for the greater loss of oil- 
The manufacturers can afford to sell it cheap¬ 
er, however, for the extra oil they obtain is 
worth, commercially, eight cents a pound, and 
the quantity saved by tho new process will 
pay about one-third the price of the flax seed. 
NESTS IN A POULTRY-HOUSE. 
A Subscriber, address mislaid, asks the best 
way to make nests in a poultry-house, so that 
fowls cannot sit on the roof. 
Ans.—N ests of the kind desired may be 
ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS, 
[Every query must be accompanied by the name 
and address of the writer to Insure attention.] 
“DOING UP” WOOL; SECOND GROWTH OF 
CLOVER. 
J. S., Ithaca, Mich., asks, 1, what sort Oi 
machine is test for “doing up” wool; what 
part of the fleece should be exposed when it is 
“ done up ”, and what twine should be used; 
2, why does the second growth of clover make 
all animals that eat of it slobber. 
