252 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
APR 43 
THE 
RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
A. National Journal for Country and Suburban Homes. 
Conducted by 
KfcBERT S. CARMAN. 
Address 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
No. 34 Park Row, New York. 
SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1889. 
The R. N.-Y. hybrid and crossbred 
wheats never looked so well as now at 
this season. The reasons are, first, that 
the little field is so graded that water 
does not stand in any part, and, second, 
the plants were carefully mulched with 
horse manure last fall after the soil was 
frozen. 
“ Am I alone in saying that the first prize 
should go to the woman who gets the largest 
yield and does the most work with her own 
hands?' 1 ' 1 — Mrs. F. L. Avery, page 248. 
-*--*-♦- 
Attention, friends of the Women’s 
Potato Contest 1 Read the “Instructions” 
given on page 246 and save it for future 
reference. If the R. N.-Y. has not 
covered the entire subject in an accepta¬ 
ble way, suggestions are now in order. 
Next week a complete list of the names 
of the contestants will be printed. 
--^ n » ■' m - 
11 By planting a mixed com I think the 
blossoming period is lengthened, giving the 
pollen a better chance to fertilize the ears and 
making them fill better.”—H. T., page 250. 
A small bag of peas was opened one 
day last weekend found to be alive with 
the pea weevil. They were placed in a 
paper box six inches square, one table¬ 
spoonful of buhach was added, the lid 
put on and the box shaken. They were 
kept in this box for 48 hours and shaken 
three or four times during that time. 
All the weevils were killed. If all who 
sow peas or beans would treat them in 
the same way, the pea and bean weevil 
would soon disappear. 
“Allow me to congratulate you on the very 
handsome way you illustrated the feeding 
experiment of this college and to thank you 
for the elaborate notice you gave of it." 
Edwin Willits, Director, Michigan (Experi¬ 
ment Station). 
This is given as a Wisconsin agricul¬ 
tural rule, but there is no reason to sup¬ 
pose it will not work wherever land is 
tilled: 
“ When I think my field is running 
down and see the old parrot on top of the 
fence, I plow from eight to 10 inches 
deep in the fall, and in the spring I mix 
14 pounds per acre of clover seed with 
wheat or barley and sow with a broad¬ 
cast seeder. When the clover comes up 
the old parrot leaves. j. b. 
Ripon, Wis.” 
“ From the day we began the work our 
health steadily improved. I think you de¬ 
serve great credit and many thanks from 
delicate ladies, for thinking of the plan of 
the Contest, etc., to induce women to work 
out of doors more." —M. B. H., page 248. 
Here is a point raised by an Ohio sub¬ 
scriber, that our readers are requested to 
think over: 
“Does the Inter-State Commerce Law 
benefit the average farmer? I shipped 
potatoes to a point situated on a Cin¬ 
cinnati and New Orleans road, not two- 
thirds of the distance to New Orleans 
from Cincinnati, and was charged the 
same rate as to New Orleans on the same 
road. The overcharge is about $100. 
My lawyer friend says we cannot afford 
to sue a railroad for that amount, and 
lawing is not in my line anyway. Is not 
this the common experience of farmers 
who use the railroads?” 
-- » -- 
“The latest trust is among the jobbers%ihey 
have all combined and their traveling men 
wi'l take orders from merchants but give no 
prices ; these are to be fixed to suit themselves , 
when the orders get to headquarters. We 
think it is about time somelegislation should 
protect farmers."— H. Bros., page249. 
Our venerable friend Alfred Rose, of 
Penn Yan, upon receiving a letter from a 
New York law firm in re his claim that 
the R. N.-Y. potato No. 2 is one of his 
seedlings, displays some feeling in his re¬ 
ply. The firm among other questions 
asked: “Do you declare that the R. N.-Y. 
No. 2 is the same as your seedling ? ” 
Mr. Rose replied: “Ido not. In the 
name of God what more do you want ? ” 
In the face of this and previous decla¬ 
rations to the same effect, his potato 
pamphlet is being sent about the country. 
What is said of the No. 2 and his own 
seedling is cunningly worded so as to 
lead the reader to suppose them to be the 
same. But he does not say sq. 
“ As to swine, I think they are entirely out 
of place on a large pile of heating horse 
manure ; they like to lie on it, but they gener¬ 
ally take cold from it and it is the worst place 
for them to lie down. Rooting it over and 
exposing it to the air is of no benefit to the 
manure." —H. N., page 249. 
The Next Special of the R. N.-Y. 
will treat of Hay and Haying Tools. 
The R. N.-Y. will be glad to have its 
readers send short answers to the follow¬ 
ing questions: 
1. What grasses are grown for hay in your 
part of the country ? Do you favor early or 
late cutting? Why? 
2. Give a list of improved haying tools in 
general use in your vicinity. 
3. How often do you seed down? With 
what crops? What season? 
4. What is the average yield per acre and 
what manure is used? 
5. Any new grasses or substitutes tried re¬ 
cently? What success? 
6. What in your opinion is the best way to 
increase the productiveness of our meadows? 
“ From the vantage point of the last half 
of an average life the experimental charac¬ 
ter of the world will be plainly discerned, 
which substantiates the triteness of the saying 
that our hind-sight is much better than our 
fore-sight , as during the first half of life we 
are quite apt to mistake mere surmises for 
actual truth."—A. T. T., Franklin Park, 
N. J., page 249. 
Under “Discussion” a correspondent 
makes some statements showing how 
Western farmers regard the “Binding 
Twine Trust.” It is evident that these 
farmers are in earnest. The injustice of 
those who seek to impose upon them has 
passed the limit ot endurance. The R. 
N.-Y hopes something will come of the 
effort to manufacture twine from flax or 
some other western-raised material, and 
it believes that the plan can be carried 
out. The writer passed many a day in 
boyhood turning the wheel in an old 
New England rope walk. Consequently 
he knows something about the economy of 
the manufacture of rope and twine on a 
small scale. Dakota farmers can make their 
own twine and defy the “ Twine Trust.” 
The R. N.-Y. ventures to say that there 
are plenty of men all through the West 
who were reared within sight of a “rope 
walk ” and who can hatchel and spin if 
called upon to do so. 
Milk dairymen near some of the larger 
towns and cities never raise their own 
cows. They buy cows in the full flush of 
milk, milk them until nearly dry and 
then sell them for about what they will 
bring as beef. Some farmers who have a 
good supply of hay and stalks buy these 
rejected cows and keep them until they 
calve and then sell them, perhaps to the 
very dairymen who owned them before. 
Several farmers living near the R. N.-Y. 
New Jersey farm have practiced this 
business for some years. It is a rather 
speculative business. The cow may or 
may not be in calf, she may prove a good 
milker or a poor one. The best that can 
be said of the practice is that it enables a 
farmer to speculate on a lot of fodder 
that would be worth but little in the mar¬ 
ket any way. The cost of raising a heifer 
calf increases as one comes nearer a large 
city. This fact, if nothing else, ought to 
show Eastern farmers the folly of trying 
to raise calves from poor cows. 
The seeds of Pyrethrum cinerarae- 
folium are now offered by nearly all seeds¬ 
men. As the R. N.-Y. informed its read¬ 
ers four years ago, these plants stand the 
winter without protection, give a profu¬ 
sion of bloom, while the colors vary from 
red, through rose to white, resembling 
large Oxe-eye daisies or White-weeds in 
form. They are really among our pret¬ 
tiest hardy herbaceous perennials. It 
may also be remembered that we tried a 
year or so later powder made from the 
flowers of the Oxe-eye daisy (Chrysanthe¬ 
mum— Leucanthemum—vulgare) thinking 
possibly that it would have the same ef¬ 
fect on insects. It had no effect at all 
upon them. 
It is an interesting fact that while the 
ground flowers of pyrethrum have such a 
remarkable effect in paralyzing many 
kinds of insects, the flowers while intact 
upon the plants are visited by insects the 
same as other flowers, without, in so far 
as the writer could discover, causing 
them any injury. 
The director of one of the Western 
Experiment Stations sends a rather 
pompous announcement in which he in¬ 
forms the R. N.-Y. that he proposes to 
send all his bulletins free of charge. 
Then he goes on to say: 
“It would afford me still greater gratifi¬ 
cation were you to reciprocate by ad¬ 
mitting the Station to your list of ex¬ 
changes and assure us of the regular re¬ 
ceipt ot your publication. I may further 
say that the policy of this Station from 
now on, will be to subscribe only to 
journals cf a special technical character 
and to none of those of a more general 
nature and circulation. We propose to 
issue monthly publications and believe 
they are equivalent in value to the ma¬ 
jority of the weekly or monthly agricul¬ 
tural or family papers of the country.” 
The R. N.-Y. believes that these 
Stations are fully able to pay for their 
papers. They have a fund large enough 
to cover all such expenditures. There is 
no reason why any farm paper in the 
country should make any of them a 
present of a year’s subscription. 
Last year an anti-oleo bill before the 
Massachusetts legislature providing that 
oleomargarine should not be colored in 
imitation of butter, was lost in the Senate, 
and earnest efforts were made at the last 
election to defeat enough of the opposing 
legislators to insure the passage of the 
measure this year. Just after the elec¬ 
tion it was supposed that this object had 
been attained, as several of the antago¬ 
nists of the bill failed to secure a re-elec¬ 
tion. This reasonable expectation of the 
Bay State farmers has, however, been 
disappointed, as a similar bill introduced 
into the present State legislature was de¬ 
feated by a tie-vote in the Senate the 
other day. The mishap was due mainly 
to the failure of the farmers of the State* 
to impress their wishes in the matter 
forcibly on their representatives, though 
one or more of the latter proved shame¬ 
lessly treacherous in violating the prom¬ 
ises they had made before election. 
The “oleo” men found little difficulty in 
securing genuine or bogus signatures to 
numerous petitions against the bill in 
the towns and manufacturing villages; 
whereas the farmers were lax in obtain¬ 
ing signatures to counterbalancing peti¬ 
tions in favor of the measure. If farmers 
will not take pains to help themselves in 
legislative as in other matters, they can 
hardly hope for success, however just 
their demands. 
Several of the agricultural papers ex¬ 
press considerable dissatisfaction at the 
selection of S. S. Rockwood. Editor of 
the State Gazette, Portage City, Wiscon¬ 
sin, as “ chief assistant” of the new Sec¬ 
retary of Agriculture, on the ground that 
he knows little or nothing of agricultural 
matters. These animadversions are. how¬ 
ever, misplaced. Mr. Rockwood has 
been selected only as Chief Clerk of the 
Department. True, the Chief Clerk was 
the principal assistant of the Commis¬ 
sioner of Agriculture; but the law creat¬ 
ing the office of Secretary of Agriculture 
at a salary of $8,000 a year, also provided 
for an Assistant Secretary at a salary of 
$4,500, who is to have the chief charge, 
under the Secretary, not of the clerical 
work, but of the agricultural business of 
the Department. After some delay, this 
office has been offered to Edwin Willits, 
President of the Michigan State Agricul¬ 
tural College, and the selection is gener¬ 
ally regarded as eminently proper and 
gives widespread satisfaction. The pres¬ 
ent salary of President Willits is $2,000 a 
year together with a fine residence and 
other advantages. His position too is 
permanent and congenial,so thatthere was 
some doubt whether he would leave his 
pleasant Michigan home, to make a new 
one in Washington. He has, however, 
just accepted the position. The office of 
Assistant Secretary of Agriculture, 
shouldjbe permanent to a competent in¬ 
cumbent. 
A METHOD TO PROTECT TREES 
FROM BORERS. TRY IT. 
L AST year we briefly alluded to the 
simple method employed by our 
neighbor Augustus J. Hewlett, to pro¬ 
tect his apple and peach trees against the 
borer. It has led to so many inquiries 
that it may be well perhaps to speak of 
the method more in detail. Fruit-grow¬ 
ers all know that tarred-paper about the 
trunk is harmful to it. Laths, etc , tied 
about the trunks are not altogether satis¬ 
factory. Mr. Hewlett’s mode reduces 
the labor and expense to a minimum and 
seems thoroughly efficacious, as he has 
practiced it for over 20 years. White 
lead and raw linseed are mixed as for or¬ 
dinary outside painting, though a some¬ 
what smaller proportion of the lead suf¬ 
fices. With this mix enough cheap 
mineral paint and lamp black to imitate 
closely the color of the bark. The 
young trees should be painted in the 
spring just as soon as transplanted and 
every year thereafter in early May. The 
paint is applied from a little below the 
soil to a foot above. In four or five years 
the bark will peel off after the paint 
has been applied. When this excoria¬ 
tion occurs, if before July, it is best to 
remove what bark still clings and at once 
give another coating of the paint. The 
new bark underneath will be found 
bright and healthy, showing that the 
paint does no harm. Mr. Hewlett 
painted some apple trees every spring for 
15 years or more. The painting was dis¬ 
continued for several years as he thought 
there might be no occasion for further 
painting. These trees however were at 
once attacked by borers and several were 
found six inches above the entrance. 
Peach trees are painted in the same way. 
He has never had a tree injured by borers 
if they were regularly painted. 
Try Mr. Hewlett’s method, friends. 
He is a careful, conservative farmer and 
his statements may be accepted as fully 
trustworthy. 
“ It is not enough to say that the railways 
carry cheaper than teams and wagons can. 
Of course they do. That is just what these 
great inventions of the past enable them to 
do. It is, however, a curious fact illustrat¬ 
ing this hidden fallacy of argument, that 
one of the first railways built in Iowa based 
its local rates upon the actual cost of wagon 
transportation on dirt roads, mud roads, 
usually in the then nexv country. This was 
an absurdity, an utter ignoring of the exist¬ 
ence of steam engine and iron track as 
ideas then and agents belonging to society, 
to the world at large ."— Pres’t W. I. Cham¬ 
berlain, page 245. 
brevities. 
Readers who have had experience with the 
“grain hay”noted in another column, are re¬ 
quested to write it out for the R. N.-Y. 
The Kentucky station confirms the R. N.¬ 
Y.’s conclusions as to the value of sulphate of 
iron as a fertilizer. IV hy not stop hinting at 
the mysterious fertilizing powers possessed by 
this substance. 
A Picture of an Ohio farm-house will be 
printed next week. Readers of the R. N.-Y. 
will be greatly pleased with it. Such a house 
is a certain indication that farming pays and 
is made comfortable—indoors at least. 
If you want to make a good hired man feel 
discontented get him to do all the work of 
caring for the farm team and then drive the 
team yourself. The man who takes care of 
the team ought to drive it—that is, if you 
waut the Dest work the team can do. 
The R. N.-Y. has just been shown an orna¬ 
ment fora woman’s hat in which bright-col¬ 
ored bugs take the place of birds’ heads. 
The wings of the bugs are colored and polish¬ 
ed in a beautiful manner. This is a good idea. 
Some of our most injurious insects are the 
handsomest. 
Poultry people who complain that pur¬ 
chased eggs do not produce chicks true to the 
standard or that some breeders hold their eggs 
for higher prices than others do, are respect¬ 
fully requested to try a breeding pen of their 
own and see how the chicks will vary in size, 
color and shape. 
Last fall the R. N.-Y. gave some facts re¬ 
garding the profit of mulching winter 
wheat with straw. Quite a number of read¬ 
ers wrote at that time that they proposed to 
experiment with various sorts of mulching. 
The R. N.-Y. will be very glad to hear from 
all who have tested the matter. 
Mr. Davenport writes us that instead of 
being surprised that varieties of potatoes are 
occasionally mixed by dealers, the wonder to 
him is that so many varieties are kept pure 
and true when it is considered that thero are 
scores of kinds that so closely resomble each 
other. He thinks that if the varieties in this 
country were weeded dowu to the selection of 
the fittest a dozen would cover the nest 
of them.;i.Truly many areicalled (by various 
names) but few.choseu after trial 
