Warder remarked to one member, “I have 
uever eaten a a decent Wilson yet.” Mr. O. 
B. Galusha, President of the Illinois State 
Horticultural Society, in an essay upon the 
Wilson, says that the only point upon which 
the great reputation of the Wilson has teen 
built is its marketing quality. A valuable 
illustrated essay upon ‘‘Insects Affecting the 
Strawberry” is contributed by Prof. S. A. 
Forbes, and considering f he care and efforts 
shown to make it practical and of value to the 
strawberry grower, it ought to be read by 
every grower of that fruit. In the discussion 
upon Southern fruits, our frieud Mr. P. J. 
Berckmans, of Georgia, said that he found 
the LeCoute Pear did better when upon other 
roots. He thinks it better stated to the light 
lands of the Southern States than any other 
variety that can be grown there. He says, 
‘‘Even should we make no further advance iu 
point of quality, the advent of the LeConte 
has made pear culture possible and profitable 
where it was a failure before.” Among the 
other numerous essays in this report are those 
by Mr. J. C. Plumb, of Wisconsin, on “Adapta¬ 
tion of Fruits to Climate and Soil;” A. C. 
Hammond, of Illinois, on “The Best Apples 
for Southern Markets;” “The Grapes of the 
Southwest” by Gilbert Onderdonk, of Texas; 
“The Scientific Production of New Fruits” by 
Dr. J. Staymans of Kansas; “Grape Culture 
and Civilisation,” by Isido Bush, of Missouri; 
“Influences of Forests on Health” by Dr. J. 
A. Warder: “Forestry on the Plains” by R. 
W. Furnas, of Nebraska; “Horticulture vs. 
Ruts” by Pres. T. T. Lyon, of Michigan, and 
“Pears and their Culture iu the South” by W. 
H. Cassell, of Mississippi. 
V. H. Hallock. Son & Thorpe, Queens, 
N. Y. Circular of Strawberries, The kinds 
Prince of Berrii*. Atlantic. Daniel Btwine and 
James Vick are offered. It is claimed for the , 
first that it is superior iu quality to any lierry 
known. 
Choice Strawberries.— We are always 
glad to quote what Ellwanger &■ Barry say re¬ 
specting fruits, because they speak from tests 
of their own. Their Summer catalogue, just 
issued, shaking of strawberries, says: 
The Longfellow is a large, handsome fruit 
of fine quality, valuable for the amateur, but 
the plant is not productive enough to render 
it a desirable variety for market. The War¬ 
ren, sent out at the same time, is large and of 
handsome appearance, but lacks quality. 
The Triple Crown is a delicious berry, 
but the fruit is very irregular in shape, and 
the plant is a poor grower. 
The Seneca Queen is large and of good 
quality, and the plant yields well, but too 
many imperfect berries are produced to ren¬ 
der it a profitable sort to cultivate. 
The Hervey Davis is a fine fruit, but the 
plant yields poorly. 
The Big Bob has not fruited with them yet 
but the plants have made a good growth, and 
promise well. 
The Sharpless takes the lead among the 
older sorts, and fully sustaius its reputation 
for size, vigor, quality and productiveness. 
The heat and drought of Summer and the ex¬ 
treme cold of Winter seem to have less effect 
upon it than on any other sort. It succeeds 
in nearly all localities, and the more it be¬ 
comes known the higher is the value placed 
upon it. 
Charles Downing comes next and holds 
its place in spite of all the new-comers. It is 
a very reliable variety. 
Bidwell, too, merits commendation. It 
lias done better than they anticipated and will 
be esteemed particularly as an early sort to 
precede the Sharpless. 
Cumberland TRruMPn has gained much 
favor over a wide extent of country, and de¬ 
servedly so. It must continue to occupy a 
prominent place on the select list. 
Crescent Shed ling (unequaled for pro¬ 
ductiveness), Jueunda, Kentucky, Seth Boy- 
den, Golden Defiance, Windsor Chief, and 
Wilson, all possess valuable characteristics 
and cannot be dispensed with. 
Those seeking berries of the highest quality 
must look to the Triomplie de Gand, Belle 
Bordelaise, and Montreuil. All deserve a 
place in the amateur’s garden. 
Mr. Blanchard, of Pa., sowed with Or¬ 
chard Grass a piece of land that was infested 
with daisies. They were all smothered out the 
third year. It is the most expensive seed we 
buy, as it costs two dollars per bushel of 14 
pounds. He thinks that farmers should raise 
their seed. It takes but a small patch to raise 
all one say one-half acre. The tops 
AUG 25 
may be cradled off as soon as they begin to 
turn light-colored, and the thick bottom 
makes very passable hay. It can be raised at 
an expeuse not to exceed fifty cents per 
bushel. It should Vie spread upon the stubble, 
after the hay is raked off, exposed to the rain 
from one to four weeks, according to the 
weather, and thrashed with a machine, hold¬ 
ing well to the bundles as it is hard to thrash. 
Mr. Blanchard would sow two bushels of 
Orchard Grass seed to the acre, mixed with 
four quarts of Red-top, four of Timothy and 
fom* pounds of clover. He would sow 
Orchard Grass upon all barren spots and 
waste places. 
Speaking of the striped beetle so harmful 
to squash, melou and cucumber vines, a writer 
in the Times says that he finds it in the grouud 
at the stem of a plant, where it lays its eggs. 
8oon after, the plant wilts; flirt a leaf, then 
several, will droop during the day; they will 
come up at night and droop worse the next, 
day, until iu a few days the whole plant will 
be dead. On digging it up carefully the root 
from the surface of the grouud will be found 
gnawed into, and the outer cuticle eaten 
away. The young is a slender white grub, less 
than half au iueli loug, and has a brown 
head. He found four on oue root. They 
stick to the oue root and have not so far iu 
his melon bed touched a second root iu the 
same hill, where there are two or three or 
more. 
A Remedy. —He makes a mixture as fol¬ 
lows: A pound of common washing soap— 
soft soap would do. as the solution is only a 
menstruum for making the emulsion—is dis¬ 
solved in a gallon of hot water: this is 
thinned down with sufficient cold water to 
fill a pail ; one pint of kerosene oil is then 
added, and the whole stirred until an emul¬ 
sion is formed ; this is sprinkled over the 
plants with a bunch of grass, and some of it 
is poured directly on to the root. A pint of 
it has done no injury to a plant, but much 
less has entirely stopped the damage when 
used as soon as a. leaf is seen to wilt. In a 
neighbor’s melon patch of 6,000 hills, fully 
one-tenth of the plants are “ down ” through 
the attacks of this pest and the damage done 
by the stinking squash-bug. 
The Squash Bug.— He finds busy sucking 
the sap from the stalks of the leaves and also 
the stems of the plants. He finds it also lay¬ 
ing its eggs upon the stems as well as upon 
the leaves. The kerosene emulsion is effec¬ 
tive in driving off this pest when it is sprayed 
over the plants, ami especially on the under 
sides of the leaves, by turning the vines. 
Fifty-seven Potatoes from One Small 
One, —The following report is sent to us in a 
printed slip: “ The Editor of the Recorder^ 
Rising Sun, Ind., is under obligations to give 
his experience with a new variety of potato, 
Blush,sent to him by the Rural New-Yorker 
for that purpose : Received by mail one potato, 
weighing 2& ounces. Product 15 pounds 
ounces. It was cut into tune pieces, one eye 
iu each piece, each eye producing a hill of pota¬ 
toes. Planted a week or 10 days after the 
proper or usual time of planting early pota¬ 
toes in tins region, date not remembered; 
fully ripe and dug August 4. Total number 
of potatoes 67; the smallest weighed two 
ounces, the largest weighed 1“ ounces. Jjocal- 
ity. on Ohio River, 06 miles below Cincinnati; 
soil, good sandy alluvial, well adapted to pota¬ 
toes, no manure of any kind used on the crop; 
cultivation poor for garden; other potatoes, 
peas and beets crowding upon the hills. This 
potato iu New York is classed as medium as 
to time of maturing, i. e., between early and 
lute; but the experience above given indicates 
that it may be classed as early in this locality. 
A peculiarity is. that every potato of the crop 
is a merchantable one, the smallest one weigh¬ 
ing two ounces, and there was no sign of any 
potato less than that. The above statement 
is absolutely true in evej'y particular. We 
have no potatoes to sell, and have no interest 
whatever in the potato. It is au excellent 
potato to cat. Last Spring it was offered for 
sale for seed iu the East at $1:1.50 per bushel.” 
Years ago when Mr. C. M. Hovey first be¬ 
came acquainted with the Yellow- Wood, he 
was surprised to find so very few trees, and 
even after so long a time it is still only to be 
found on the grounds of lovei-s of trees, who 
only seoui to know its claim to notice. Hardy 
as Oaks, though by no means such a rapid 
grower, it should be fouud wherever a hand¬ 
some tree is wanted, and he hopes his account 
of it may extend its culture, and cause it to 
be recognized as one of the very finest of our 
trees, indigenous or exotic Surely the Rural 
New Yorker has doue its share during the 
j>ast six yours to popularize this beautiful tree. 
Its botanical name is Cladrastis tinotoria or 
Virgilia lutea. A specimen at the Rural 
Grounds is a picture of symmetry—about 20 
feet in bight, though it has been growing in 
its present position but 11 years. 
A writer in the New York World says 
that he had a variety of sweet corn with tall 
stalks and ears set high. By selecting only 
the lowest ears formed on the stalks, regard¬ 
less of their size or general appearance, he has 
produced a corn iu every way equal to the or¬ 
iginal, but with the ears set comparatively 
low on the stalks. The fodder part of the 
plant has also been materially reduced in size. 
Selecting Peas for Seed.—To illustrate 
the value of selection in gathering peas for 
seed, the Director of the New York Experi¬ 
ment Station last season gathered a small 
quantity of the flirt pods that ripened of the 
Tom Thumb variety and a small quantity of 
the latest ones. He planted 100 seeds each 
from the earliest and latest pods, on April 21, 
and the same on May 12. He notes the differ¬ 
ence in the results of the two selections of 
seed to date, as follows: In vegetation of the 
seeds there was, iu the two plantings an aver¬ 
age difference of 14Jper cent, in favor of the 
earliest matured seed; in the date of blooming 
au average difference of three-and-one-balf 
d ys appeared, and iu the date of edible me. 
turity an average difference of five days, all 
in favor of the first planting. Perhaps of 
more importance is the difference in produc¬ 
tiveness of the two selections of seed. Here 
the first planting can only be considered. Ten 
plants from the earliest ripened seed have pro¬ 
duced, to date, 68 pods, of which B8 are well 
filled, while an equal uumber of plants from 
the latest ripened seed, have procured to date, 
only 49 pods,of which but 13 can be called well 
filled. The Tom Thumb variety was selected for 
this trial because the pods are formed during 
a longer period than in most other varieties. 
It is possible that in varieties of which the 
pods nearly all ripen at the same time the dif¬ 
ference iu the results obtainable from the first 
and last ripened pods would be less marked. 
This experiment serves, however, to illustrate 
the importance of selection in gathering peas 
for seed, and shows that the inherent quality 
of the seed used may have as much liearing 
on the resulting crop as the condition of the 
soil, or the methods of cultivation employed. 
A Cheap Silo. — The Nashua Telegraph 
says: Last year a farmer improvised a small 
silo by sinking a molasses hogshead into the 
grouud iu his barn cellar. He cut up all his 
com fodder with a hay-cutter, supposing he 
had enough to fill about four hogsheads, but < >n 
paekiug it fouud it wouldn’t till oue. He then 
bought of a neighbor as much more as one 
horse could draw, aud still there was room. 
He then cut up the stalks from u piece of 
sweet corn, aud with a lot of rowen managed 
to till his hogshead. He made a close-fitting 
cover, and with a jackscrew set. under oue of 
the floor timbers pressed it down as tight as 
possible. In the middle of December he opened 
his silo, and found the corn as sweet and fra¬ 
grant as when put in. From the hogshead he 
fed one cow half a bushel of ensilage morniug 
aud night for two months, aud considers it the 
best producing food that cau be fed. This year 
he proposes to till the hogshead with oats cut 
just as they are in the milk. If a silo on so 
simple a plan is practicable, there is certain ly 
no reason why everybody should not have one, 
and satisfy himself of the value of the ensil¬ 
age system. Rural readers of small mcaus 
may try such a silo as this without incurring 
much risk of loss. If they are satisfied with 
the results, a more pretentious silo rnay be 
constructed another year. A large packing- 
box would answer better than a hogshead. 
♦ •» •- 
A Good Farmer. — According to a writer in 
London Farm and Home, a good farmer must 
combine the judgment of many diff erent vo¬ 
cations; he must he a good financier—on a 
small scale, to be sure, but still a good ouo; 
also a good manager of labor; must combine 
the judgment of the glazier, the butcher, the 
gardener, and the merchant; lie must also 
have that judgment about the conditions of 
the laud and crops for which there is no writ¬ 
ten rule, and which careful observation only 
gives; and in addition to all this he most have 
that quality for which there is no name, but 
which generally adapts means to ends, and 
accomplishes things—which seizes the right 
moment to do the right thing—which knows 
when to finish one thing at a time (which is 
generally best), and when to leave that thing 
and do something which needs doing more— 
the faculty which keeps his whole business 
together. This Judgment is t he farmer’s first 
and greatest need; it is the High Court which 
must pass upon all that is brought before it. 
The only man whose success is hopeless, and 
who will uever acquire it, is he who thinks 
he knows it all iu the beginning. 
Dr. Nichols mentions in Popular Science 
News, that a curious result lias been noted 
on one of bis experimental grass plots. A 
field which was dressed in 1881 with a fer¬ 
tilizer supplying potential ammonia, and 
which, during the two past seasons, produced 
little besides a vigorous growth of sorrel, has 
this year experienced a complete transfor¬ 
mation. The sorrel disappeared, and a heavy 
erop of Timothy and Red Top took its place. 
He is at loss how to explain this. 
Considering that the selling value of two 
fine horses, if they are matched and bear in¬ 
spection and trial ns a pair, is much greater 
than as single horses, it behooves farmers who 
arc breeding two or more each year, says the 
Pittsburg Stockman, to so select these, and so 
breed them as to avail themselves of reason¬ 
able chances for securing a prospective high- 
priced team. 
Remedy for Ticks on Lambs.—M r. 
J. S. Woodward gives in the Husband¬ 
man, speaking against tobacco washes to rid 
sheep of ticks as poisonous, the following 
recipe which will neither make piatient nor 
applicant sick: 
Take lard or lard oil. or, what is better still if 
you have it, the grease that has resulted from 
fry iug pork, am 1 add to this one-t bird its bulk of 
kerosene oil, or, if handy, crude petroleum, 
which is better: after wanning sufficiently to 
melt the lard, shake thoroughly together, and 
keeping it as hot as it can Lie without banning 
the lamb, pour a quantity along the back from 
head to tail, letting a helper slightly part the 
wool as you proceed. By doing this a week or 
10 days after shearing and again in the Fall as 
the sheep are put into winter-quarters, not a 
tick need be found on any of the Hock, young 
or old. Doubts were expressed whether the 
above is any better than carbolic acid soap, a 
safe aud easy' remedy. 
From the decomposing masses of animal 
flesh, Professor Briggs, of Berlin, has isolated 
a very violent poison which analysis proved 
to be a hydrochloric salt of a new base, and 
which did not resemble any other known com¬ 
bination. The Dairy remarks that this bears 
closely'on the matter of burying all dead farm 
animals very deeply' underground, and not 
merely covering them with earth or hiding 
them in a manure pile. 
The Centrifugal Cream Separator, the same 
paper thinks, is the coming improvement in 
the dairy. By' and by the milk will be creamed 
as soon as it is sufficiently cooled, and the 
sweet cream churned aud made into good but¬ 
ter. All the talk aud disputing about sweet 
cream vs, sour cream is simply due to our 
waut of knowledge of how to make good 
sweet-cream butter. No doubt this is the 
sweetest aud most delicious of all kinds, but 
it is necessary to use it fresh. Aud why should 
it not be so used f Many years ago it was cus¬ 
tomary to churn the night and morning milk 
mixed all together, without setting it for 
cream. 
-♦♦♦- 
At a late meeting of the Elmira Farmers’ 
Club, as reported in the Husbandman, the 
opinion was expressed that bad results would 
always be found with wheat sown on laud into 
which the green growth of uuy enp had just 
been turned, although it was believed that 
buckwheat was the worst green manure. All 
green growth incorporated with the soil near 
the time of seeding will iu all cases be found 
prejudicial to wheat. 
MULTUM IN PARVO. 
The spot where a straw stack stood shows 
yet the enriching that came from that stra w 
The difference as compared with land im 
mediately about It can be seen to-day, yet the 
straw stood there only one season remarks 
the Husbandman. Similar cases have no 
doubt been observed by our readers. 
To Make Liquid Manure.—M r J. R. 
Moore's excellent method is to got a large tub 
aud place two strips of board across it. and 
on those to put a flour barrel filled with 
manure, and having holes bored in it. Water 
is then iKiured into the barrel and leaches 
through into the tub. It must of course lie 
diluted for use. 
The Burlington Hawkeyo mentions the ring 
iu a hog’s nose us a rooted prejudice. 
The Mark Lane Express (London) states 
that breeders begin to think that it is some¬ 
thing approaching very near indeed to folly 
to spoil their best stock in order to exhibit 
them before judges who will not award a prize 
nt a breeding stock show to an animal—other 
than a Jersey, or other dairy breed pure and 
simple—unless it be in such high condition 
that its reproductive powers are presumably 
ruined....... 
