Q6Q 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
©ST I! 
Y., the propriety of reading my remarks 
about thistles and Witch Grass before rushing 
into print, (page 591) to criticise them. If he 
will do me the favor to look again, and see 
what I did say, he will probably wish he 
hadn’t called me "cracked,” or "ft sloven ” I 
gave no advice. 1 merely reported a fact. 
Under the new rule, my critics must sign 
their names hereafter, eh, Mr. Editor? [Yes. 
—fins.] _ 
"Pay As You Go:”—Roselle’s remarks under 
this head (page 504), bow sound they are! 
8aid John Randolph: "Sir, 1 have found the 
philosopher’s stone. It is ‘pay as you go.’” 
How many have found it, and yet how vastly 
many more have never looked for it. Young 
man, young woman, you will double your 
pleasures and halve your troubles, if you will 
paij as you go! 
“Death in the Dish rag?” (page 595.) Yes, 
and death in the sink-spout, and death in the 
slop hole, and death in the dirty cellar, and 
death in a damp house site, and deuth all 
around to him or her who gives not thought 
to sanitary matters. 
Rural, Bept. 18. — ’Tis a beautiful head, 
that of Rayon d’Or, on page 001, and finely 
engraved; and the Rural is only two dollars 
a year! 
G. M. H., in "Discussion” (page 607), writes 
with much intelligence upon theuseof tobacco. 
It is unquestionable that the sedative or de¬ 
pressive action of tobacco tends to create a 
craving for stimulants, and especially for al¬ 
cohol, which (toxically speaking) is its anti¬ 
dote. 
Your information (page 90S) about the gam¬ 
bling establishment of Armour & Co., in Chi¬ 
cago, is, as Horace Greeley used to say, 
"mighty interesting reading.” How long la 
the great agricultural public going to endure 
these "deals,” in which their interests are so 
trifled with aud made the sport of the vilest 
scoundrels on the continent? Men are taken 
out and hanged with a short shrift for horse 
stealing; but horse stealing is a virtuous pro¬ 
fession compared with the gambling in food 
products. 
Your cucumber with a tendril growing out 
of it (referred to on page 5(IH) is matched by a 
Wealthy Apple which I picker! al'ewdaysago, 
with a small leaf growing on the fruit near 
the "blow end.” 
"Kim’s” plea for the country cemetery (on 
page 60S)), is a good article, where it applies. 
But the old "burying grouud”is rapidly dis 
appearing in New England, aud the danger 
now seems to be in vast and unwise expendi¬ 
ture for the adornment of cemetery lots and 
the erection of costly monuments. Alongside 
of a poor and meanly-equipped school-house 
in my ncughborhood, is a cemetery with not 
less than a dozen lots where from $500 to 
$2,000 have been expended in this way. Yet 
would not the memory of the loved and lost 
“smell sweet and flourish in the dust” far 
longer, if a lurge part of this money had been 
bestowed for the endowment of some perma¬ 
nently benificent institution? If my heirs 
want to spend $ 1,000 in a memorial. 1 hope 
they will give it to a free school, or a free li¬ 
brary, aud let the sweet grass over my grave 
grow, unvexed by costly marble or granite. 
Rural, Bept. 20.—Ahr Mr. Barry, how 
welcome your countenance is (on p. 618) to 
one whom you have served faithfully as a 
nurseryman, aud intelligently as a writer, for 
now nearly the third of a century. "Barry’s 
Fruit Garden” gave me my first lessons in 
orchard and nursery work, and is my hand¬ 
book to-day. 
No doubt, as Mr. Stahl says (p. 020), the 
small horse wears the best. The history of 
the Morgans proves that. But one horse 
farmers, like myself, often find themselves 
best served by a heavy horse, that takes the 
plow, burrow and cultivator right along by 
bis weigbL alone. 1 have pitched forward 
over plow aud horse-hoe handles aud hurt 
myself too often, when a light horse stopped 
suddenly at some little obstruction, to w T ant 
such a one for my work. Give me my -well 
trained, half blood Clydesdale, going slowly 
but steadily across the field. He costs as 
much as a pair of little fellows, but he does 
the work at much less expense, does far less 
damage in orchard, nursery and garden, and 
can draw a two-horse load on a cne-horse 
wagon to market. 
Allow me to thank Mrs. Fisher for her very 
interesting and instructive traus continental 
letters. She gives the facts on the Mormon 
question far more intolligiblj 7 than any other 
writer 1 have noted. 
Gambling in farm products, gambling at 
agricultural fairs—must we always endure 
these crimes'? How glad I am that the Rural 
has the sense and courage to be "flat-footed” 
on this matter, and say (p. 624) "you cannot 
afford to support such iniquities concealed un¬ 
der the grand mantle of Agriculture.” Surely 
we cannot, and bow long shall we endure them? 
farm Cjctmoimj. 
A NEW WAY TO STACK CORN FODDER. 
Stretch two lines of barbed wire between 
two trees, or posts well braced, and fasten the 
wire securely about five feet from the ground• 
draw it as tight as can be, with u stretcher 
or lever—1 fastened my wire to apple trees 
about 18 inches in diameter and from 50 to 100 
feet apart. Have several stakes ready, squared 
atone end, and sharpened at the other; these 
need to he about 5j^ feet long and of the size 
of common fence stakes. Drive the first stake 
three feet from the tree, and on a plumb line 
between the two wires; drive it until it is two 
inches below the wires. On the top of this 
stake nail a small stick of any shape, one foot 
long, and at a right angle with, and under the 
wire. One ten-penny nail is all that is requir¬ 
ed in each slick. Next, tie the wires with 
strong cord to this stick, about six or eight 
inches apart, and at equal distances from the 
center of the stake. 
Now we are ready for the first stack. On 
each side of the stake place three bundles of 
stalks, making six in all; tie them above and 
close to the wires with a straw band; this will 
keep the stack from sett ling. Around these 
bundles place twenty more, ton on each side, 
binding them twice near the top; this gives us 
a stack of 26 bundles, which will keep their 
place for any time. 
Two and-ono-half feet from the base of this 
stack, or about five feet from the last stake, 
and on a filurnb line between the wires, com¬ 
mence as before for a new stack. I have 21 
such stacks between two trees, which are as 
true as when first put up. Thinking the long 
lines of wire might sway, I braced them three 
times on each side with poles ten feet long, but 
I hardly think It was necessary. 1 used barb¬ 
ed wire because it is strong, the stalks arc not 
so liable to slip, and it can be used for fencing 
afterwards. My corn fodder whs from ten to 
thirteen feet high. Oue-half of it lay fiat on 
the ground, and a good share of that was 
crooked, which caused a great deal of trouble 
in stacking The space l»etwceu the wires 
keeps the stack open, mid allows the air free 
access to the center of the stack, causing it to 
cure rapidly, and without much, if uny, mold¬ 
ing. I used 56 pounds of wire for au acre of 
staiks. The bundles were made quite large 
and were drawn to the stacks by cattle aud 
sled. Thus far I am well pleased and satisfied 
with my experiment. o. n. c. 
New Britain, Conn. 
MANGELS WITHOUT HARD WORK. 
I fully appreciate Dr. Hoskins’s objection to 
knee and-finger work in growing mangels 
and beets. I object to it myself. Indeed I ob¬ 
ject to all sorts of work but harvesting a big 
crop: and that 1 can scarcely tear myscl f a way 
from. I have invented a method of growing 
roots, which is an improvement on the method 
practiced by Dr. Hoskins’s friend. In addi¬ 
tion to the use of the Planet Jim. hand wheel 
hoe along the rows, as is described. I use it 
across the rows, cutting out the surplus plants 
aud leaving the others 12 to 14 inches apurt, 
as the case may lie. This is easily done by 
making special knives, or scrapers, to use iu 
stead of the usual ones. I use a Monitor seed 
sower to drop the seed and roll the ground, 
and as this leaves a distinct mark, it is easy to 
go the next day, if I want to, aud work the 
rows to loosen the ground or to kill the weeds. 
As the cross-cultivation keeps the rows very 
clean, no hand hoeing at all is required. A 
little more seed is used, und that is all, aud if 
there is any vacant space in the row, it is easy 
to put iu a sprouted seed there. I do not find 
it necessary to thin out the hills left by this 
method. Generally, one plant takes the lead 
aud keeps it, the others never amounting to 
anything, aud sometimes two or three will 
grow harmoniously together aud seem to en¬ 
joy 7 each other’s company. This plan greatly 
lessens the work of root planting. h. s. 
-*-»-«- 
A CONVENIENT PIG TROUGH. 
Any one who keeps hogs, knows how they 
crowd to the end of the trough where the slop 
is poured; they seem to want it over their 
heads, and are apt to get it there. I send you 
a drawing of a trough arranged to avoid this 
annoyance, As shown in Fig. 391, it is only 
half inside the pen, and the first board on that 
side of the pen is from six to ton inches above 
the trough. Strips nailed from the bottom 
board of the fence to the edge of the trough 
inside the pen, ten inches apart, prevent the 
hogs from crowding each other aud getting 
their feet in the trough, and leave the outside 
part of the trough clear, and into this the feed 
A Convenient Pig Trough. Fig. 891. 
can lie put. The trough is also easily cleaned 
from the outside. o. e. Daniels. 
Franklin Co., Iowa. 
iaon Copies. 
THE TRU TH A BOUT IT. 
(The object of article* under t his heading Is not so 
much to deal with “bumbags” as with the, many 
unconscious error* that creep Into the methods of 
dally country routine life.—Kos] 
TILLAGE VS. MANURING. 
I WAS struck with the quotation of Cato’s 
well known three points of good husbandry: 
first, good plowing; second, any kind of plow¬ 
ing; and third, manuring; and the comment 
of Dr. Gilbert on this—that this shows the 
relatively low esteem in which manuring was 
held 2,000 years ago. It is an example of the 
truth of the old adage that circumstances alter 
cases; for today the very same idea is cur¬ 
rent, and the same faith is preached by promi¬ 
nent agricultural writers. Tillage is excellent 
in its way. Old Mr. Tull said, abuut a century 
ugo, that “tillage was manure.” This idea is 
about as truthful as if I were to say 7 , as a gen¬ 
eral tiling, “to have money is to put your 
hand iu your pocket.” Tillage only brings 
out of the soil what is already in it. It can do 
no more; and all the talk which used to be 
current a few years ago, during the deep- 
plowing craze, to the effect that every former 
had a second farm under his first one, ami 
only a foot below 7 it, if he would only turn it 
up, is exactly parallel with this talk about 
tillage. Two thousand years ago the soil was 
comparatively fresh. The poor implements 
barely scratched the soil, which was still rich 
iu fertility, that had not beeu extracted from 
it. A hundred years ago, when fanners said 
of iron plows, that they brought weeds into 
the soil—to us, an idea suggestive of the value 
of better plowing on a still prolific soil—there 
was still a great reserve of fertility in the 
earth. And to-day there are soils—as in the 
case of Hir .1, B. L«wes’s wheat plot 44 years in 
cultivation in wheat only, und which yet 
yields better than our average manured 
fields, — which still retain a considerable 
amount uf permanent fertility. But even these 
cannot always be kept prolific by tillage alone, 
and the better the tillage, the faster will the 
inevitable final exhaustion he accomplished. 
But there are also soils which tillage alone 
cannot make fertile. Thousands of farms, on 
every hand, are so poor that to attempt a crop 
without manure would be entirely useless. 
Aud to the owners of these farms, all the 
raphsodica) talk of the benefits of tillage by 
writers whose farms are of an entirely differ¬ 
ent class, is exceedingly tantalizing, and is 
apt to be received with incredulity by some 
who have had little experience outside of their 
owu infertile fields. Moreover, the claim 
made by these persons, that manure is uu- 
necessaiy for them, because tillage alone is 
sufficient for the production of good crops, is 
misleading, and merely a repetition of the old 
story told by farmers who now regret the 
days when they burned their straw and 
dumped their manure into the streams, in the 
belief that their soils would endure forever in 
their first productive condition. And when 
one reads of farmers boasting what great 
crops they grow by tillage alone, the thought 
of these things occurs to the mind, and the 
truth of it appears all the more plainly, viz.: 
that manure is the food of the soil, and tillage 
is the consuming, the masticatiug process, so 
to speak, by which the food is made digestible; 
and that without manure, the soil is merely 
subsisting upon its reserve, which is sure to be 
exhausted sooner or later. h, s. 
THE LOCO WEED. 
For some years past the cattle men of the 
Western Plains have been much bothered by 
a peculiar weed (Fig. 892, p. 669), which grows 
abundantly in places. This weed has been 
called "loco” weed; why or wherefore no one 
can tell, because the name has no significance 
in respect to its peculiar qualities. It is said, 
however, that this is the Indian name of the 
weed. The stockmen call it" crazy weed,” 
and the significance of this name is intelligible 
enough because the horses which eat it become 
quite as crazy as one of their riders could 
possibly be when he is filled up with "40-rod” 
or the common “chain lightning” of West¬ 
ern "hotels.” The peculiar effect of"the weed 
upon horses is so much like that of the bad 
whisky taken by the cowboys, that it is amus¬ 
ing to make the comparison. For instance, 
horses which eat it, see double or see the most 
frightful things—snakes probably, and other 
crawling things—they will eat nothing else, 
but go about in a maudlin, staggering manuer, 
seeking more loco; they will cat no food, and 
will refuse to touch the best grass, an<1, indeed, 
care for nothing but loco. They lose flesh; 
become thin and weak in the limbs; the eyes 
become red and blood-shot; they lose their 
reason and instinct, become helpless and vi¬ 
cious; leave the companionship of their kind, 
attacking them without excuse or reason; and 
finally die if they don’t recover. If they re¬ 
cover they go at it again. Other horses, how¬ 
ever, have no appetite for the weed, and 
refuse to touch it; but a horse that has once 
become "locoed” is rarely broken of the 
pernicious habit. If men and alcohol were 
substituted for the words, horses and loco, 
the application would be perfect. Why this 
weed should have this effect no one has yet 
discovered, and perhaps no ope can tell why 
alcohol should affect a man’s brains in the way 
itdocs from any chemical analysis, so that the 
one effect is wholly as inexplicable as the other, 
excepting that it does so just because it does. 
This weed belongs to the botanical family 
of the Leguminosm, or pea and bean, or pod- 
liearing class of plants: or, I might say, these 
weeds; for the crazy weed is various, there 
being at least seven kinds known or supposed 
to have this eburacter, and most of them are 
closely related to each other, three of them be¬ 
ing species of Oxytropis, and one, which is the 
most common, beiug a species of Astragalus, 
(A. mollissimus). This plant Is a low-growing 
herb, with small pinnate leaves covered with 
white down (whence its name, which means 
"very soft.”) It has beeu analyzed aud found 
to contain about eight per cent, of a bitter 
extract, but nothing has been found to ex¬ 
plain in any degree the cause of its peculiar 
effect upon horses. The other next abundant 
plant, Oxytropis Lamiiertll, is somewhat sim¬ 
ilar to the first named, having • ilky, hairy 
leaves, and being a low-growing perennial. It 
also contains an extractive substance, not bit¬ 
ter, but sweet, but nothing to uoeount for its 
action on the animals which eat it. Being 
quite sweet, however, aud tough, fibrous and 
indigestible, its sweetness may thus tempt the 
horses to eat too much of it. and produce vio¬ 
lent iudigostiou, from which u very natural 
result would lie pressure and congestion of the 
brain, commonly called blind staggers (very 
similar in effect to alcoholic drunkenness) and 
even frenzy, which at times happens to horses 
overfed with grain, and with disturbed diges- 
tiou. 
Sophora sericea (or Silky Sophora) is an¬ 
other of these loco weeds. This is also a low- 
growing herb, with silky pinnate leaves, aud 
contains 9>£ per cent, of au extractive sub¬ 
stance, from which an alkaloid eau be pro¬ 
cured. that may have poisonous properties aud 
injuriously affect the nervous system, as some 
other alkaloids do. A good reason for this 
supposition is afforded by the known poison¬ 
ous properties of an alkaloid (suphoria) con¬ 
tained in the seeds of Sophora speciosa, fouud 
in Texas aud New Mexico. 
These three plants are the only weeds that are 
known to "loco” horses, although some other 
species of Oxytropis (A multiflora and deflexa) 
are charged with the crime; and a malvaceous 
plaut (Malvastrum coceineum) and a species 
of the fumitory family, (Corwlalis aurea, v, 
occidental^—C. iuoutana of Engelmauu) are 
supposed to be guilty of it. From their natu¬ 
ral qualities, however, the latter may be held 
innocent until proved guilty. 
It is carious that no other animals but horses 
get intoxicated with loco weeds—a proof per¬ 
haps of their near approach in intelligence to 
man, the only auimttl which ever acquires 
an overpowering passion for alcoholic liquors, 
aud loves the delightful experiences of intoxi¬ 
cation, with the joysof becoming soberagaiu. 
Btockmen, however, have to consider these 
loco weeds seriously, for they are a serious 
trouble to them. How to prevent their growth 
over the vast plaius is a problem that seems 
impossible of solution How to cure the horses 
of the diseases caused by them is ea-y, when 
the euro can be applied: to relieve the stomach 
of the offending matter aud the brain from 
the excitement is quite within the power of 
medicine. A strong purgati ve.as a quart of lin¬ 
seed oil,or a ball of four dramsof aloes with lin¬ 
seed meal, would effect the one, and potassium 
bromide, iu half ounce doses, would prob¬ 
ably relieve the brain. Not knowing whether 
or not a mule is ass enough to acquire this 
reprehensible habit of loco eating, 1 will not 
venture to suggest the use of mules in badly 
infected localities. It is said that a doctor in 
Kansas has discovered a cure for this ‘ ‘loco” 
