1902 
i 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
227 
1 
Jarmers Club. 
[Every query must be accompanied by the name and 
address of the writer to insure attention. Before asking 
a question, please see whether it is not answered in our 
advertising columns. Ask only a few questions at one 
time. Put questions on a separate piece of paper.] 
Potash and Caterpillars. 
How much potash will it take to one gallon of water, 
to kin the caterpillars on apple trees? J. c. 
I am afraid that when one got a potash or lye solu¬ 
tion strong enough to kill caterpillars, it would also 
seriously injure the opening buds and leaves of the 
trees. Hence, I do not believe that a potash solution 
can be safely used against caterpillars. It can be 
combined with soaps and other substances, and then 
used upon foliage, but a poison spray would be much 
more effective against caterpillars on apple trees. 
m. v. s. 
Cure for Powder-Post Beetles. 
A sure cure for powder-post in hickory or other hard 
wood is to soak 24 hours in strong barnyard liquid. This 
will not injure the wood. e. c. 
New Milford, Conn. 
While this “sure cure” for the Powder-post beetle 
may be all right, there would not be many instances 
where it could be applied, and I doubt whether it 
would last very long. I doubt whether any applica¬ 
tion to the wood that would not injure or render the 
wood unfit for many purposes can be applied as a 
preventive of this pest. M. v. 8. 
Liquid Manure from Chemicals. 
Can liquid manure be made from fertilizers? How much 
fertilizer to a barrel of water? f. p. b. 
Ayer, Mass. 
A 40-gallon barrel of average liquid manure will 
weigh about 330 pounds, and contain not far from 
four pounds of nitrogen, 4% pounds of potash and a 
little over one ounce of phosphoric acid. In order to 
put as much plant food in a barrel of water you must 
dissolve nine pounds of muriate of potash, two pounds 
acid phosphate and 25 pounds of. nitrate of soda in 
the water. While this would give much the same 
analysis as the liquid manure, it would not equal it 
for crop production, and would be too strong for most 
crops. Better use half these amounts of chemicals. 
Wood Ashes for Berries and Grain. 
1 have a few tons of wood ashes. How can I apply 
lliem to my strawberry plantation to best advantage, or, 
rather, would it pay to put them on the rows after straw 
is removed? How would it do as a fertilizer for small 
grain used with drill, or for potatoes? G. h. m. 
New Holland, O. 
We have not found wood ashes best for strawber¬ 
ries except on very sour or damp soil. The straw¬ 
berry seems to do best on a soil that is neutral— 
neither very sour nor very alkaline. The ashes con¬ 
tain lime, which will make an ordinary soil too alka¬ 
line for the strawberries to do their best. On a very 
sour soil the ashes would be likely to show excellent 
results. From our own experience we should use the 
ashes on the grain. Do not use them on potatoes 
if you are troubled with Potato scab. The lime in 
the ashes will encourage the work of the fungus that 
causes this scab. 
Cow Peas, Barley and Pigs 
1. Is it practicable to sow cow peas in standing corn 
before last working, and then, after corn is harvested to 
pasture same? 2. What do you know about the value of 
barley as grain crop to feed to stock? How does it com¬ 
pare with oats in quantity and quality of feed, and how 
does the straw compare with wheat straw for manur? 
and bedding value? 3. Can little pigs be bred and raised 
successfully without milk, and if so, will some one tell 
how? C. w. 
Philadelphia, Pa. 
1. In the South it is quite customary to drill a row 
of cow peas midway between the rows of corn when 
the crop is “laid by”—that is, when cultivation stops. 
In the Gulf States this comes in early July, so that 
the cow peas have several months to grow. In the 
North this practice has not been found very useful. 
With us the cultivation must be kept up later, and 
the cow pea does not do well in the shade. Some 
farmers have tried planting cow peas in every other 
hill of corn at the first hoeing, but experience shows 
that such crops as Crimson clover, turnips, rape or 
rye are better for this form of cropping. The cow 
pea needs the sun. 2. Barley is an excellent grain 
for all stock. On good land it will give a heavier 
weight of grain than oats. The two grains are near¬ 
ly alike in feeding value, though oats are generally 
considered the better horse feed. Still, some of the 
most noted horses have been and are fed on barley 
and barley hay. We consider that barley straw when 
cut green makes the best of all grain hays. The dry 
straw is not equal to rye for bedding. 3. Some of 
the most successful pig-raising farms are in sections 
where no dairying is done, and consequently the lit¬ 
tle pigs can have no milk. We raise over 100 pigs 
during the year and feed no milk at all. When 
weaned the little pigs are fed a thin slop of about 
three parts each wheat bran and middlings and one 
part oil meal. Cooked oatmeal gruel with a small 
portion of middlings will make them grow. The best 
hard grain feed for the little pigs is whole wheat— 
they will pick up every kernel, like the hens. We do 
not pretend to say that any of these substitutes are 
quite as good as the milk, but we know that good 
pigs can be grown without it. 
Potash for Quality in Potatoes. 
Can you tell me what fertilizer to put on our ground 
that will make the starch in the potatoes? Our potatoes 
always grow very fine tops and usually fair-sized tubers, 
but always lacking in mealiness. We use barnyard ma¬ 
nure on potatoes. I have always thought the fault in 
the variety, but at our recent farmers’ institute, R. Y. 
White gave a talk on “Plant Growth” which opened my 
eyes to the possibility that there is something lacking in 
the soil that causes this quality. c. e. a. 
Hicksville, O. 
We judge that your soil needs potash. The three 
essential elements of plant food, nitrogen, potash and 
phosphoric acid, have each a definite influence upon 
the plant’s development. For example, nitrogen 
makes itself quickly felt in the growth and rich green 
color of stem and leaf. The seed of the plant con¬ 
tains a high per cent of phosphoric acid. Potash ap¬ 
pears to influence the formation of starch, and gives 
color and firmness to fruit or tuber. Stable manure 
is a one-sided fertilizer—that is, it contains a great- 
THE BLOSSOMING CORN PLANT. Fia. 84 
er proportion of nitrogen than the potato needs for 
its development. A ton of average stable manure is 
said to contain 10 pounds of nitrogen, six of phos¬ 
phoric acid and 13 of potash. As a matter of fact 
many samples of such manure do not contain that 
much potash, for that substance is usually found in 
the liquids, which often escape. As a result of many 
experiments it seems settled that on most soils there 
should be at least twice as much available potash as 
nitrogen, when potatoes are to be grown. Your 
stable manure gave you large vines but only fair 
sized tubers of poor quality, and that is just what 
we should expect from using too large a proportion 
of nitrogen. By using 250 pounds of sulphate of pot¬ 
ash per acre we feel sure that you can improve the 
quality. _ 
HEADING YOUNG APPLE TREES. 
There seems to be an increasing desire for infor¬ 
mation as to the better ways of heading young apple 
trees. The practice of some has been to head them 
from four to five feet high in the Eastern States, that 
it may be possible to drive teams under the trees in 
cultivating the land about them. But there seems to 
be a change gradually coming over the orchardists 
of that region in some degree, and the tendency is 
for lower heads. In the Central and Western States 
there is much less of this practice, and, perhaps, be¬ 
cause of the more intense and longer continued sun¬ 
shine and the more advanced ideas that prevail. The 
reasons for low-headed apple trees are properly 
stated about as follows: The lower the heads the 
less purchase the winds have upon the roots, and the 
less liability to leaning and blowing over. The lower 
they are the more easily and cheaply they can be 
sprayed. The same is true regarding pruning. The 
fruit op lpw-bfikded trees is easier to gather than on 
those with high heads. On the other hand, the 
lower the branches the greater difficulty there is in 
tilling the soil under them, but there are tools made 
with extension frames that largely obviate this. 
Another very important matter is the form of the 
head. Some have held to the theory, and practiced 
it as well, of training the tops into vase form, or at 
least with very open heads. It is often that the main 
branches all diverge from one point, and sometimes 
the entire weight of the top comes upon one or two 
forks. This occasionally causes splitting and conse¬ 
quent loss or very serious injury to the trees when 
loaded with fruit or sleet. These open heads are like ¬ 
ly to induce the Flat-headed borer to work upon the 
large branches, where that insect abounds, and some¬ 
times sunscald is also invited. The more approved 
form is that which approaches the pyramid style 
This requires the main branches to come out on all 
sides, and continually, from a central stem. This di¬ 
vides the strain on the branches and forks and gives 
better opportunity for the air and light to reach all 
parts of the tree than where the branches come out 
from one place. The manner of growth of a pine tree 
should be the ideal, although this is not possible to 
attain entirely, because of the natural difference in 
the habits of growth of the pine and apple; but it 
should be approached as nearly as possible. There is 
rarely any danger of getting the central stem too tall, 
tor the natural tendency is for it to stop and be 
merged into the spreading branches. If any tendency 
to too high a center should appear it is easy to check 
it by cutting back the stem. As the tree approaches 
bearing age the upward growth becomes less pro¬ 
nounced, and there is little occasion with most varie¬ 
ties to head back the top. The weight of fruit also 
tends to hold back and spread the tops of old bearing 
trees. 
One of the main points to be most carefully and 
faithfully guarded is the proper forming of the head 
while the tree is very young. If the orchardist is able 
to understand his trees and foresee their future 
shapes he may avoid much cutting of large branches 
when they get old. To be able to do this one must 
know the peculiarities of each variety he plants. 
Some will need higher heads than others, and differ¬ 
ent training. When trees are first set the future form 
should be in the eye of the planter, and such branches 
as will finally be out of place should be cut off at 
once. In no case nor in any climate should the stem 
of an apple tree be cut out, but it may be cut back 
moderately, to correspond with the outer branches, 
which should also be cut back from one-third to one- 
half. Direction can be given to the shoots at the ends 
of these cut branches by being careful to have the last 
bud on the side towards which it is desired to grow. 
The more severe the cutting the stronger will be the 
succeeding growth. During the first few years of the 
life of a tree the rubbing out of sprouts and cutting 
away of small branches that are not needed will have 
a very beneficial effect upon its after life. Train up 
a tree in the way it should grow, and wnen it is old 
it will not be far from what it should be. 
H. E. VAN DEMAN. 
FIGHTING CURRANT WORMS. 
In The R. N.-Y. for March 1 (page 144), in answer 
to the question, “What is the remedy for wormy cur¬ 
rants?” it is stated that Paris-green in the proportion 
of “one ounce to four gallons of water sprayed over 
the currants before they are half grown” would be a 
“hopeful remedy.” Paris-green (which we always 
use in the proportion of one pound to 150 or 200 gal¬ 
lons of water) is an excellent remedy for the common 
Currant worm which eats the leaves, but is utterly 
useless as a means of destroying the insect in ques¬ 
tion. The Currant maggot (Epochra Canadensis), 
like the Apple maggot (Trypeta pomonella), is the 
larvae of a small fly, and its life history was fully 
worked up by Harvey in the report of the Maine Ex¬ 
periment Station for 1897. The flies emerge from the 
ground late in May or in June (in this latitude) and 
soon mate and begin depositing eggs. The females 
are said to be capable of laying at least 200 eggs, and 
as they live only about a month they must deposit 
several every day. Usually only one egg is deposited 
in a currant—the large berries at the upper part ot 
the bunch being selected first. The skin of the berry 
is punctured by the sharp ovipositor and the egg de¬ 
posited immediately at one side, and so close to the 
surface that it may be seen through the skin. It is, 
however, safely beyond the reach of poisons, and the 
young maggot which soon appears may eat in perfect 
safety. The larva matures in about three weeks, 
when it reaches one-fourth to one-third of an inch in 
length, and it then leaves the fruit, often before the 
latter drops from the bush—and burrows in the 
ground to the depth of about one inch. Here it re¬ 
mains in the pupa state until the following Spring. 
The affected fruit ripens prematurely and often drops 
before the maggot has completed its growth. Since 
the flies do not eat the foliage, they cannot well be 
poisoned, and the maggots are beyond the reach of 
poisons; so, as in the case of the Apple maggot, the 
only feasible remedy seems to be the destruction of 
all affected fruit for a time. In some sections of New 
England the pest has become so serious that growers 
have destroyed all of their currant and gooseberry 
bushes with the hope of ridding themselves of it. 
Maine Exp. Station. w. m. munson. 
