4885 
Russian family as the Yellow Transparent. 
It is now added to the recommended list of 
the Iowa Society, and has received favorable 
reports from nearly all parts of the Mississippi 
Valley. It is larger in size than the Trans¬ 
parent ; but of the same shape, color, and 
quality. The tree is a better grower in the 
nursery and has proven as free from twig 
blight as the Duchess. The general belief 
now is that it will prove the best early apple 
over a large portion of the States east of the 
Rockies. 
The Loxofield Apple has been exhibited 
and reported favorably upon by dozens of 
careful observers. It bears heavy crops when 
young, and during our past extreme seasons 
it has made a growth of eighteen inches of 
new wood when maturing a heavy crop of 
fruit. Mr. Havilaud, of Fort Dodge, Iowa, 
reported that 42° below zero the present Win¬ 
ter had notoolored the wood of the Longfleld, 
while that of the Duchess was much reddened. 
This variety promises great things for the 
ssippi Valley,and are proving hardy even in 
Northern Dakota. Top-worked trees have 
fruited in Northern Iowa. 
Autonooka. —The specimens of this apple 
from Moscow were not in good condition 
after their long voyage; but its near relative, 
English Reinette, was as firm and bright as 
when packed in October. The family at¬ 
tracted much attention and brought out much 
discussion. The point was made that this 
ancient family of yellow apples of the Rus¬ 
sian steppes has planted its birth-marks on a 
number of our yellow apples noted for their 
hardiness. Autonooka, Possarts, Nalivia, 
Northwestern Greening, Tracy, Roman Stem, 
Grimes’s Golden, Maliuda and several promis¬ 
ing seedlings were grouped to show the prepo¬ 
tent influence of one of the most noted and 
aucient families of the Russian apples. 
Rossi an Pears.— Specimens of the wood 
of the Russian pears which had endured 42 de¬ 
grees below zero—after a thaw aud rain 
which had left a coating of ice on the twigs— 
m 
fPShi, y. 
\7:- V • • 
•W . 
if 
Liriodendron Tulipifera. (From Nature.) Fig. 70. (See Page 118.) 
♦ 
PIG CARE. 
COL. F. D. CURTIS. 
Because a sow is ugly aud perhaps fero¬ 
cious enough to eat up her new-born youug, it 
does uot follow that she will do so again. I 
have hail sows destroy their young as fast as 
born, and I have bad them destroy them after 
they were all boru, and apparently doing well, 
and the next time they had pigs they were the 
best of mothers. For a sow to eat her young 
is certainly an unnatural action. Some sows 
are more excitable than others, and more un¬ 
easy and liable to step on their pigs; some are 
careless or stupid, and more inclined than 
others to lie ou them; some are too fat and 
sluggish, and if any of them hears a pig squeal 
because she is lying on it, she will not get up, 
and so she kills it. These faults are quite na¬ 
tural and common; but for a sow to destroy 
her young is entirely unnatural. Quite often 
the udders are inflamed, or there may be a 
sore teat, and when the pigs begin to “nurse,’’ 
the pain will cause the sow to jump up. and 
she will turn on the pigs, as the cause of her 
pain, and she will bark at them, and snap at 
them, and sometimes actually bite them, and 
when she tastes the blood of the little pig she 
is very liable to eat it. 
Inflamed udders are the most common 
cause of ugliuess to the pigs; but it is also 
caused by the feverish condition of the ani¬ 
mal affecting the brain; and the poor, overfed 
sow is actually crazy, and all motherly in¬ 
stincts are overcome by her pain and frenzy. 
A breeding sow should never be fat, and she 
should always be fed light foods fora week or 
two before parturition. To give a sow all the 
corn she will eat, or any teeding of grains up 
to the time of the birth of the youug, is too 
common a folly. Sows thus treated never 
have as good pigs, nor do they do as well as 
when moderately fed with a variety of food— 
vegetables, swjll.bran, and a very littlegrain. 
If 1 were going to un extreme, l would feed no 
grain at all, rather than all grain, and I am 
positive the pigs would be better. My man 
kept his sow last year so thin, giving her 
nothing but raw potatoes and a handful of 
w heat middlings, and the little slop from the 
house, that her ribs could be counted. Three 
weeks before tbe pigs came he increased the 
middlings to about three quarts a day. This 
sow had a large litter of fine pigs and raised 
every one of them. This was the most extreme 
case I ever knew, unless it was a Duroo-Jersey 
sow of my own, which had 11 pigs in April 
before she was one year old, and then another 
litter of 12 five aud-a-half month* afterwards. 
This sow was running in the oat stubble at the 
time, aud had been fed nothing but grass for 
months; she raised all of the pigs. Two sows 
quite fat had eight aud nine pigs respectively. 
When a sow' has large udders she must not 
be fed strougly before parturition or there 
will be inflammation. Sometimes when the 
sow- is not ugly the inflammatiou will dry up 
the milk secretions, aud the pigs will do poor¬ 
ly. Thinness iu flesh is a better condition than 
fat, and light feeding is always the safest. 
Fancy kills a great many pigs, and spoils tbe 
breeding stock. Tbe poor man’s sow is always 
a good breeder, aud the rich man’s, the hand¬ 
somest. One Alls the pocket, and tbe other the 
eye. Choose according to your own notions. 
ontological 
HORTICULTURAL CONCLUSIONS. 
PROF. J. L. BUDD. 
Some of the conclusions reached by the 
experts at the recent meetings of the Mississippi 
Valley Horticultural Society at New Orleans, 
aud of the Iowa State Horticultural Society 
at Atlantic, are worthy of brief uotiee in the 
Rural. 
Wild Black Cherry.— Slowly but surely 
this tree is coming to tbe front as one of the 
most valuable for varied soils iu most parts 
of the Northern and Western States. Very 
many reported it easy to propagate from 
pits, very rapid in growth, aud best for many 
economic uses of timber. Dozens of examples 
have been given where, ou high, dry, prairie 
soils it has made more growth iu 15 years than 
Soft Maple. 
Yellow Transparent Apple. —From 
many States of the Union come good words 
for this curliest of summer apples. Even ex¬ 
perts from "New York, Connecticut, New 
Jersey and Ohio, agreed that it was earlier 
than Early Harvest, quite as large aud baud- 
some aud fully equal iu quality. Iu addition, 
it comes early into bearing, aud seems as re 
gular in its crops as the Duchess. Iu the 
Mississippi Valley it was reported favorably 
in Minnesota aud iu Texas. 
Charlottknhaler belongs to the same 
cold North, as above the 42d parallel on the 
prairies it is a goud keeper of really excellent 
quality. On our rich prairie soils it attains 
the size of Roman Stem, aud colors up as 
prettily as the Maiden’s Blush. It may be 
well to say that the variety which Dr Hos¬ 
kins has guessed to be Longtield is wholly dif¬ 
ferent in size, color, and quality, but promises 
to be valuable. 
W ixteraput.— In the exhibit^ apples from 
Moscow at New Orleans the plates of this 
ancient apple attracted much attention. It is 
smaller than Alexander, and more regular in 
form. Its striping is coarse aud Irregular; 
stem long, in deep, regular, russeted cavity; 
eye large, open, in irregular, ridged basin. 
It is a popular wiuter apple, of far better 
quality than Willard, iu Central Russia. The 
trees have beeu widely distributed in the Miss- 
attracted much attention, and drew out con¬ 
siderable discussion. It is well known that the 
Flemish Beauty colors its new wood in our 
mildest Winters, aud our last test Winters 
have destroyed the trees on cm- black soils, 
root uud branch. Hence the bright color of 
the wood of the pears from the home of the 
Oldenburg, has strengthened the belief that 
we will yet grow pears on our black soils pro¬ 
fitably. The reports in regard to the perfect 
health of the foliage of these new-comers during 
our past three trying Summers, were also 
very favorable. 
Ames, Iowa. 
SANFORD’S SEEDLING PEAR. 
On August 24th, 1SS4, we received, by mail, 
a box of peai's from Mr. H. W. Sandford, of 
Oneida Co., N. Y., who wrote us: “These are 
from a seedling tree. The seed was planted 
1870; in 1872 I budded the tree with others, 
but the buds did not “take" in this one, and it 
being a healthy looking, well shaped tree, I 
let it grow. It is a good grower, more spread¬ 
ing than upright, and is now in full bearing.” 
We had a cut made of the fruit, which we 
give in Fig. 76, p, 121. It is a handsome pear. 
Eaten August 27th, it was melting, juicy, 
tender even to the core, not quite as high- 
flavored as the Bartlett, but sweeter and less 
astringent. We also sent a sample to the late 
Mr. Charles Downing, who wrote us as fol¬ 
lows under date of September 1: “So far as 
I can judge from a siogle specimen, this is a 
promising pear, and to my taste better in 
quality than the Bartlett. It has not yet been 
fully tested, and has not been sufficiently 
fruited to gi ve an opinion. Seedlings some¬ 
times improve as the trees grow older, and 
sometimes not; and it is not safe to say much 
about them until they have had time to de¬ 
velop themselves. I came to the conclusion 
some time since not to give a decided opinion, 
short of ten years’ trial, on large fruits iap- 
ples, pears, etc.) as to all their mei*its, vigor, 
and beariug qualities of trees, value of fruit as 
to size and keeping, as well as fair and perfect 
form, and worthiness of general cultivation.” 
ABOUT GRAFTING. 
I felt some interest in the experience of 
the Rural’s Sonoma, California, correspon¬ 
dent, who reports such good results from 
using freshly cutcions As I have had similar 
results here in Eastern Ontario, his success 
caunot, I think, be explained by climatic in¬ 
fluence. I commenced cautiously in the 
Spring of 1883, using freshly cut cions (apple). 
These made such a surprisingly strong growth 
that I followed, last Spring, with several hun¬ 
dred more in the same way, which have done 
equally well—certainly less than two per 
cent, failed. j. g. h. 
Hawkesbury, Ont. 
OiKttylttXxvct* 
A TENNESSEE BARN. 
We are indebted to Mr. E G. Bennett, of 
Franklin, Tenn., for drawings and plans of 
the barn shown at Fig. 73, p. 120, The barn 
is 82 feet long and 82 wide. On a level with 
the basement is a silo walled with stone and 
cemented. At Fig. 74 is the plan of the 
ground floor: A is a granary 10x32x7}^ feet; 
C is a corn crib of the same dimensions; B 
and B are drive-ways 14 feet wide: D is a tool 
and harness room and workshop 82x32 feet. 
A hay loft above the ground floor is 80x32 
feet. At E is shown a chute 82x2 feet, reach¬ 
ing to the basement below. At Fig. 74 is the 
plan of the basement, and at G the silo. F F F 
are box-stalls 91^x12 feet. B is an open way 
for cattle; at E is a hay rack. The walls of 
the basement are two feet thick and nine feet 
high, the box-stalls are walled on three sides. 
•H&igfcllaiuous. 
CATALOGUES, ETC., RECEIVED. 
The Syracuse Chilled Plow Company. 
—There is uo implement on the farm more 
important or in the selection of which we 
should exercise more care than a plow. A 
poor plow is a continual aunoyauce to the 
plowman, aud a terrible drag upon the team, 
and nothing more clearly shows the great im¬ 
provement of our system of farming over that 
of our grandfathers than a comparison of the 
uncouth old wooden plows which they were 
compelled to use, with the finely-finished, well- 
proportioned, easy-working sulky plows now 
at our command. W e are led to these remarks 
by the examination of the illustrated cata¬ 
logue just received from the Syracuse Chilled 
Plow Co. This shows cuts of a dozen or more 
of the 40 sizes aud styles of plows which they 
manufacture; also their sulky plows, corn 
cultivators, and road scrapers. Instead of 
preparing one plow- for every kind of plow¬ 
ing, they make a specific plow tor each kind 
of work. It will pay to send for this circular 
aud see what they say of the various tools 
they make. Address the Syracuse Chilled 
Plow Co., Syracuse, N. Y. 
Storks. Harrison «St Co., Painesville, Ohio. 
To do justice to this splendid catalogue of 116 
pages would much transgress the limits of 
these notices. It should be examined by all 
our readers. Tweuty pages are devoted to 
novelties in the way of earnatious, roses, 
fuchsias, coleus, chrysanthemums, grapes, 
pears, Japan chestnut, small fruits aud vege¬ 
tables. A beautiful colored plate of carna¬ 
tions is presented. Dollar collections of roses 
and other plants are offered; also a list of 
plants any one of which can be bought for a 
