THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
427 
raised on level land and better soils. In fact 
much of the buckwheat raised in New York 
and Pennsylvania is produced on level land 
good enough for wheat. It is usually sjwn 
on light soils for the very good reason that 
such soils will produce a paying crop of buck¬ 
wheat when too poor to produce any thing else. 
The varieties chiefly grown are the Gray, or 
Silver Hull, and the Black. The Gray is the 
general favorite and is the kind mostly used. 
The Tartarian, or “ Rough, ” is not much 
grown except for feed, as the flour Is of a dark 
yellow color and slightly bitter to the taste. 
It out-yields the other varieties, is hardier and 
can be raised farther north. I have not had 
any experience with the Japan buckwheat, 
but the farmers in this locality who have tried 
it, speak very highly in its favor. The center 
of production in the United States lies further 
north than that of any of our other cereals. 
Three-fifths of the crop grows between lati¬ 
tudes 41° and 43°. The 42nd parallel is about 
the center, and 41>£ degree north latitude is 
about the southern limit of the district. Its 
northern limit is bounded only by the region 
of early frost and extends some seasons far up 
into Vermont, Northern Michigan, and 
W isconsin. 
There is no doubt that, like all other plants, 
buckwheat will do the best where the ground 
is well plowed and made fine with the har¬ 
row; but if the plowing is poorly performed 
and the ground cloddy and lumpy—which is 
frequently the case when the field is baked 
hard by drought at the time the plowing 
must be done—it will still try to make the best 
of the situation and exert itself to pulverize 
the soil and produce a crop in spite of the ad¬ 
verse circumstances. 
Along the river in this region, it is usually 
sown from the first to the tenth of July. Back 
from the river, where the fog does not keep 
off the frost, it is sown in the latter part of 
June. The later it can be sown and get ripe 
before frost, the better will be the yield. A 
neighbor told me that the heaviest he ever 
raised was sown on the first of August; but 
the frosts held off unusually well that fall; 
and as such seasons cannot be expected often, 
the crop should always be put in earlier. 
There is one objection to raising buck¬ 
wheat—it does not seem to fit well into any 
regular rotation, and for this reason 1 have 
known farmers to sow the same field with 
buckwheat five or six years in succession and 
have a tolerably fair crop the last time. Some 
sow buckwheat ground with oats the follow¬ 
ing spring, but the scattered buckwheat on 
the ground will come up in considerable quan¬ 
tities and grow along with the oats, and al¬ 
though it does not injure the crop for the 
farmer’s own use, it lessens its value for mar¬ 
ket. I have raised good crops of rye sown 
after buckwheat came off in the fall, although 
it was necessarily sown late, and then by seed¬ 
ing with clover in the spring, I obtain a bet¬ 
ter catch than if the rye had obtained a large 
growth in the fall. I plowed the ground after 
the buckwheat was harvested, but this was 
hardly necessary, for the plants furnish such 
a dense shade, and the roots pulverize the 
ground so well that it is left in a very mellow 
condition, and I have frequently known farm¬ 
ers to sow rye on their buckwheat stubble, 
and, by harrowing It well, get a good crop. 
Dry weather and hot sunshine when the ker¬ 
nels are forming are usually the causes of light 
crops. Tho hot sun at that particular time is 
said to “blast” the buckwheat. I suppose 
that when the kernel is in process of forma¬ 
tion, and the shuck very thin and transparent, 
the heat of the sun, if great, drives out or 
evaporates the moisture in the incipient ker¬ 
nel, and causes it to wither and shrivel. 
About one bushel of seed is usually sown 
per acre in this section, although on good 
land three pecks are sufficient, the thinner 
seeding producing a heavier, stronger straw, 
less likely to lodge. Buckwheat does not 
tiller out at the root like wheat and rye; it 
sends up a siugle stem which, if not crowded, 
branches out like an apple tree. If sown 
thickly, of course, it will not branch out 
much, and the straw will be finer and weaker. 
Buckwheat is quickly grown, requiring but 
about three months of summer; it costs much 
less labor to produce it, and pays the farmer 
sooner on his investment tbau auy other 
grain. It will grow on poorer land and with 
more careless husbandry, although it responds 
with alacrity to better soil and more generous 
treatment. It is always in good demand as 
soon as thrashed, sells readily for cash, and 
the first sales are usually the best. It should 
never be held for a higher price except perhaps 
to sell for seed the following spring when it 
is sometimes scarce. The demand for buck¬ 
wheat flour always falls off in the cities after 
tbe holidays, and millers will not usually pay 
as much for buckwheat after that time. 
It was estimated by a miller who is Veil in¬ 
formed, that in the year 1888, Bradford 
County, l J a., produced a round million of 
bushels of buckwheat; that about one-third 
of the crop was consumed at home and the re¬ 
mainder converted into flour and sold in New 
York, Philadelphia, and the towns in South¬ 
ern and Eastern Pennsylvania. It is the only 
kind of grain raised in the East in which the 
farmers have not suffered a ruinous compe¬ 
tition from the great, fertile, grain-growing 
plains of the West. Instead of being a com¬ 
petitor for the buckwheat markets of the 
East, the West furnishes us with a good and 
growing market. The mill at Sugar Run has 
sold a good deal of flour to go 40 miles west of 
Chicago, and has also had orders from Kan¬ 
sas. Sheep will eat a little buckwheat straw 
if it has been saved in good condition, but it 
is not considered of any val.ie except for 
manure, and I am sorry to say that the straw 
when thrashed in the field is frequently burn¬ 
ed as soon as the machine is out of the way 
Sugar Run, Pa. j w. i. 
Clje ^cnt Itn) Jkvt). 
OSTRICH FARMING IN AMERICA. 
In the last report of the Department of 
Agriculture we find a long article on the 
above topic. The pictures shown in this issue 
of the R. N.-Y. are re-engraved from this 
report. 
It appears that ostrich farming is one of 
the largest and most profitable industries of 
South Africa. The annual exportation of 
feathers from that country amounts to mil¬ 
lions of dollars, while first-class breeding 
birds have been sold for over $1,000 per pair. 
General Le Due, while Commissioner of Agri¬ 
culture, tried to interest our Government in a 
scheme of importing ostriches with a view to 
establishing the business of ostrich farming in 
Southern California. Nothing came of this, 
but in 1882 Dr. Charles J. Sketchly, who 
had handled ostriches in Cape Town, came to 
this country with 200 birds. They came to 
New York and were shipped overland to Cal¬ 
ifornia. This long journey was a most try¬ 
ing one and but 23 of the birds survived it. 
They were taken to Anaheim, in Southern 
California, and placed on a farm. The first 
year they laid 270 eggs. The first chick was 
hatched July 2S, 1883. The next lot of im¬ 
ported ostriches, 23 in number, reached New 
Orleans in December, 1884, and were taken to 
San Diego, California. Since that time sev¬ 
eral importations have been made, though the 
Cape Town Government became alarmed at 
the large exportation and imposed an export 
duty of $500 on each bird taken out of the 
country, this duty making the cost of bring¬ 
ing an ostrich to America nearly $1,000. 
The first ostriches brought to this country 
were considerably weakened and impaired in 
vigor by the journey. The American-raised 
birds are said to be stronger and give fair re¬ 
sults. From tho best information we can ob¬ 
tain, the ostrich farms in California promise 
to pay a small profit eventually. The great 
cost of the early importations and the difficul¬ 
ties attending the acclimating of the birds 
made the early part of the work very expen¬ 
sive. A more thorough study of the habits 
and needs of the birds will result in better ap¬ 
pliances and methods. There is enough in 
the business to warrant the Government in 
establishing experiment farms in the dry, hot 
regions of the far Southwest where ostriches 
maybe kept. We spend millions for ostrich 
plumes. If these could be produced on the 
waste lands of the desert there would be a 
double gain. 
At Figure 159 we show a pair of ostriches 
brought from Cape Town to California to 
serve as breeders. Figure 160 shows a group 
of ostriches that were raised in California; they 
are one year old and over. Figure 161 shows 
a group of ostrich chicks two weeks old with 
the dog that watches them. In the picture 
we have two ostrich eggs with a hen’s egg be¬ 
tween them to show the comparative size. 
Figure 162 shows the incubator used in hatch¬ 
ing the chicks. 
On the California farms each breeding 
pair is confined in a small pen until the eggs 
are laid. The younger birds run in large in¬ 
closures, while the chicks run with the com¬ 
mon barn-yard fowls. The little chicks are 
delicate ana cannot stand the damp. The 
ostrich lays an egg every third day. The 
eggs are five to six inches in diameter and 
weigh three to five pounds each. The shell is 
often one-sixteenth of an inch thick, and it is 
generally necessary to assist the chick in 
breaking it. The average period of incubation 
is 39 days. The birds are not good mothers, 
leaving the eggs on slight provocation. The 
male bird takes his turn at sitting on the 
eggs, generally staying on them 19 hours out 
of 24. So much difficulty was experienced 
with hatching in the usual way that ostrich 
farmers have adopted the incubator, shown 
at Fig. 162, exclusively. The flesh of the 
ostrich is considered a great delicacy in Africa 
while the eggs are fully equal in flavor to 
those of the hen. 
KANSAS POULTRY NOTES. 
Raising poultry on the ordinary farm in 
Kansas, is, I suppose, not very different from 
doing so in the majority of the older States, 
especially those of the South. Here as well 
as there with trees, sheds, or fences for roosts 
and the high heavens for shelter the birds 
never lack fresh air. If they were as well 
supplied with drinking water as pure, fewer 
would die from “ cholera” or other diseases. 
But too many are supplied with no water at 
all and whatever they find to drink they 
drink from necessity many times rather than 
from choice, be it from a barnyard pool, hog 
trough, or a stream. Where many fowls are 
devoured by the swine the latter seem to 
crave for the feathered prey, evenw hen they 
have all the corn they can eat. Whether this 
appetite is caused by a too steady diet of 
corn, I have not been able to learn; but when 
a hog once acquires this habit, I have never 
heard of its abandoning it entirely. Fowls, 
as a rule, are never out of food, if a 
corn crop is raised; for they can have free 
access to that and to everything on the 
farm to the detriment of the profit from them 
in eggs. Nearly every farmer has trom 75 to 
150 fowls; but few get more eggs than they 
ought to get from 25 good laying hens. Many, 
however, think this number quite reasonable 
for they have grown up amid slipshod, care¬ 
less management of poultry and of every 
other branch of farming. Some years I have 
heard of whole flocks of poultry dying from 
cholera. For this the best remedy I have 
found Is carbolic acid. I put about one tea¬ 
spoonful into a pailful of water, stirring it 
around, and set it wherever the fowls can all 
driuk. Doing so two or three times will be 
sufficient. I think some breeds much more 
subject to disease than others. The three 
breeds of chicks I have raised,viz., Black Span¬ 
ish, Plymouth Rocks, and Dark Brahmas, 
range in hardiness in the order named; I have 
lost 10 of the last to one of the first by dis¬ 
ease. During a sudden blizzard before the 
fowls had all become accustomed to their 
winter-quarters two years ago, all of my Dark 
Brahmas that were caught in the snow died, 
but the Spanish lived. While the Spanish are 
so hardy, their feathering out in the'fall Is a 
great objection to them, but their excellent 
laying qualities as well as the great size of 
their eggs commend them. At our common 
country groceries eggs are sold at from five 
to 12 cents per dozen in summer, and in win¬ 
ter at from 15 to 25 cents. Some pack them 
down in salt after the hot weather of summer 
has past, and keep them for higher prices in 
winter. G 
Greenwood County, Kan. 
A STUDY IN REPRODUCTION. 
PROFESSOR A. J. COOK. 
Excellent new works in apiculture; influence 
of previous impregnation on subsequent 
progeny strongly controverted with re¬ 
gard to bees and poultry, and very doubt¬ 
ful with regara to mammalia—an inter¬ 
esting discussion. 
Bee literature has made very substan¬ 
tial progress during this year. A few weeks 
since that immortal classic “ Langstrolh on 
the Honey Bee” came forth from the hands of 
two of America’s most able bee keepers Chas. 
Dadant & Son, fully revised and embracing 
not only all that was admirable in the old 
work, but the very best of science and prac¬ 
tice as developed in Europe and America dur¬ 
ing the last two decades, during which the 
progress made in apiculture has rarely been 
excelled by that made in any other art. This 
new work confers great credit on American 
literature, and should be in the hands of 
every bee-keeper in the land. More recently 
G. M. Doolittle, one of our most able and suc¬ 
cessful bee-keepers, has issued a work on 
“ Queen Rearing,” which is doubtless the best 
work on this subject, ever issued in the Eng¬ 
lish or any other language. 
In this work Mr. Doolittle asserts, as the 
result of his wide experience and observation, 
that if queens are impurely mated, their drone 
progeny will be impure even though the 
queen.bears no taint in her blood. Akin to 
this theory is that held by some of our chicken 
fanciers, that if a hen of some distinct breed 
is mated with a cock of another breed or with 
a mongrel, this hen will be ever afterward im¬ 
pure. Analogous to this is the view often 
urged by breeders, that if any of our purely 
bred mammalia—hogs.sheep, cattle or horses— 
are impurely mated, they will be ever after¬ 
ward impure; and so their subsequent off¬ 
spring will very likely show taint, even though 
the male parent is of faultless breeding and 
of the same blood as the female. 
I do not feel that I can deny the truth of 
any of these views: but I can ask, very prop¬ 
erly, if we know that any of them is posi¬ 
tively true. I must say that I have grave 
doubis in' the matter. 
In case of bees, the only possible chances 
for the queen to be tainted is for her organism 
to be affected by the mere presence of the 
sperm cells in her spermatheca. As is well 
known, the egg of a queen bee that develops 
into a drone is never impregnated. Then if a 
pure queen produces a hybrid drone, it can 
only be because her organization is affected 
by the mere presence of spermatozoa in her 
sperm sack. I know the reproductive organism 
is very sensitive and that the sperm cells 
may be in the spermatheca of the queen five 
years; but as these cells remain unchanged, I 
see not how they can affect the queen. Even 
suppose some were absorbed, they must be 
changed before this absorption, and in the 
blood would be like any other digested fluid. 
Thus from our knowledge of physiology we 
should doubt this theory. 
But I have other reasons for doubt. When 
Mr. Jones first importea Syrian queens I got 
one, especially to test this theory, i had only 
Italian bees in mv apiary, so the many queens 
1 reared from this pure Syrian were all mated 
to Italian drones. There was no possible 
chance for an error, yet all the drone progeny 
from the mis-mated queens was entirely like 
the Syrian drones—not a trace was there of 
Italian. The Syrian drones are very marked 
in their characteristics and so, as this test 
was so extensive—there being thousands of 
these drones—and as I had many sharp eyes 
looking for Italian marks, I feel very certain 
that Mr. Doolittle is wrong. 
But what of Mr. Doolittle’s experiments 
that have led him to a contrary opinion f I 
simply think his queens were not pure. In 
my case there was no chance for error to 
creep in. In his I can’t see how he can be 
certain. I doubt if there is a man in the 
United States who has an Italian queen that 
GROUP OF CALIFORNIA OSTRICHES Ficr. 160. 
