VOL. XLVIII NO, 2065 NEW YORK, AUGUST 24, 1889. 
__ 7 7 $4.UU JrEK YEAR, 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1889, by the Rural New-Yorker, In the OOire of hs Librarian of Congress, at Washington,) 
farm (Topics. 
SUMMER SPECIAL. 
Facts For Farm Folks 
-TO- 
CONSIDER CAREFULLY and CRITICALLY 
Homely Hints—Thoughtful Themes. 
K. N. Y. 
Readable Records, Novel Notions, 
Yeomanly Yarded. 
Terry Tells The Truth. 
Stribling’s Sensible Statements. 
Grundy's Good Grist. 
Allen's Able Argument. 
Gillette Greatly Glorifies Garden Grubbing. 
Cook Casts Color Caution. 
Just Jersey isms Juicily Jumbled. 
Crosby Comments Carefully. 
Brown Beats Butter Brains. 
Howard Hits Hard. 
Pratt Points Progress. 
Halsted Hurries Harvest. 
Lyon Likens Lawton. 
Hoskins Hoes Humanity. 
Minch Makes Meaty Mention. 
Stewart Sounds Sunday Slogans. 
Smith's Simple Statistics. 
Lane Learns Lively Lessons. 
--AND A 1.80- 
OTHERS OFFER OCEANS OF OUTLOOKS 
NOTES ON A SEASON’S WORK. 
T. B. TERRY. 
Shallow cultivation for potatoes-, a careless 
boy's work; Mammoth Clover for hay. 
ripens at a time when farmers are not so 
busy; experience with clover-root beetle; 
dodging the midge. 
I was riding along the road, when I noticed 
a boy cultivating in a field of potatoes. This 
was early in July. I climbed over the fence 
to see what he was doing. I found the work 
just what I expected. The cultivator had 
five small teeth. It was set just as wide as it 
would go between the plants without tearing 
them up. There was a wheel on, which kept 
up the front teeth to a reasonable depth; but 
the boy was “ riding " on the handles, and the 
back teeth were going down four or five 
inches, cutting off a large part of the roots 
that the young plants had thrown out, even 
across the rows. In this cool, wet season the 
roots seemed nearer the top than I ever saw 
them before. 
Where was the owner of that boy? Well, I 
don’t know; but I do know that I would uot 
have had that boy go through my potato field 
in that way, at that time, for $20 an acre. 
Whether the farmer did not understand the 
growth of potato roots, and hadn’t common 
sense enough to|kuow that it was foolish to tear 
off half the roots and put the plants to the ex¬ 
pense of growing them over again, or whether 
he knew this and started the boy all right and 
then failed to watch him, I know not. The 
result was the same anyway. 
Before I left home I talked some plain Eng¬ 
lish to my man (not boy). I said: “ Now, see 
here; don’t you let the side teeth of that cul¬ 
tivator go more than an inch and a-half deep 
in one single spot in this field. One inch deep 
will do. Loak every few minutes and see just 
what you are doing Keep the cultivator 
just as I tell you or do nothing.” Then I ex¬ 
plained to him the reason for this. Much of 
my cultivating was done with Breed’s Weed- 
er, a very light slanting-tooth harrow, that 
hardly stirred the ground more than one inch 
deep. My first cultivation of the potatoes, 
before they came up, with the Hudson Bicycle 
sulky cultivator, was as deep as two horses 
could well give. After that, shallow cultiva¬ 
tion was given. Not only was the wheel set 
to keep the front teeth out; but I knew 
whether any one was riding on the handles or 
not. 
The last half of June was very wet with us. 
It was just impossible to do anything about 
curing clover. The Fourth of July it cleared 
up, and the weather has been good for seem¬ 
ing crops since then. But this brought haying 
and harvesting all together, and kept farmers 
from the corn and potato fields, where tillage 
was greatly needed. The clover cut in July, 
however, was past its best. I notice two 
farmers who have things in better shape than 
the majority. They have mostly Mammoth 
Clover, with a little Timothy in it. They 
are just cutting it now. after the middle of 
July, the clover being in full bloom. Thoir 
wheat is secured and they have had time to 
attend to their crops. Their potatoes now 
need no more attention, and their corn is 
laid by and they can attend to their clover as 
weli as not. This strikes me as a pretty good 
plan. It certainly puts some of the haying 
forward to a timo when the weather is usually 
better for curing and when the farmer is less 
busy. 
Is the hay from large clover as good ? They 
tell me it is about as good, if the seed is sown 
thickly. Certainly it is far better, cut in the 
full blossom, now, than hay made from the 
small clover, which is about dead. Many 
tons of such are being cut. 
I mowed one piece of my small clover about 
tbel.oth of May, when it was about one foot 
high, and left it on a field for a mulch. There 
is a grand crop there now, in full bloom, 
promising a good crop of seed, which will ripen 
at a time when we can attend to it. I wished 
in June that all had been treated in this way. 
The piece thus served, and the Mammoth 
Clover, escapes the midge which usually ruins 
the ordinary second crop of small clover for 
seed making. 
We have the clover-root beetle. The tap¬ 
roots of the plants were mostly eaten out last 
fall. It was aquostion how that clover would 
do if left to stand another year. A neighbor 
left a field. It had been mowed but one year. 
It started pretty well this spring, the clover 
throwing out numerous fibrous roots. But 
along in J une these seemed unable to sustain 
the plants any longer and the clover began to 
die. Tnere is only one way for us now, and 
that is to mow the clover one year and then 
plow that fall or the next spring for some 
other crop. The beetle then seems to do little 
harm. My clover last year matured a second 
crop that would have made two loads per acre 
of hay, in spite of the root beetle. 
Then is the time when clovor sod should be 
plowed any way, as soon as the roots have at- 
A GROUP OF GRADE JERSEYS. From a Photograoh Fig. 209 Page 556. 
