3o3 
April 26 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE BUSINESS FARMER'S PAVER. 
A National Weekly Journal for Country and Suburban Homu. 
Established 
Herbert w. Colltngwood, Editor. 
Dr. Walter Van Fleet,! , 
Mrs. K. T. Kovle, ^ Associate*. 
John J. Dillon, Business Manager. 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR. 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, $2.04, 
equal to 8s. 6d., or 8% marks, or loy 2 francs. 
“A SQUARE DEAL.” 
We believe that every advertisement in this paper is 
backed by a responsible person. But to make doubly 
sure we will make good any loss to paid subscribers 
sustained by trusting any deliberate swindler advertising 
in our columns, anu any such swindler will be publicly 
exposed. We protect subscribers against rogues, but we 
do not guarantee to adjust trifling differences between 
subscribers and honest responsible advertisers. Neither 
will we be responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts 
sanctioned by the courts. Notice of the complaint must 
be sent us within one month of the time of the trans¬ 
action, and you must have mentioned The Ruhal New- 
Yorker when writing the advertiser. 
Name and address of sender, and what the remittance 
is for, should appear in every letter. 
Remittances may be made in money order, express 
order, personal check or bank draft. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
409 Pearl Street, New York. 
SATURDAY, APRIL 26, 1902. 
The so-called “moth trap” is being pounded from 
one end of the country to the other. All the fruit 
papers are firing their most forcible words at it! You 
see this “trap” is not advertised this year! The out¬ 
burst against this cheap device is altogether too large 
for the target. What a world we would have if such 
a fusillade could be aimed at some of the larger 
rogues who do far more harm than this “trap” ever 
can! 
* 
The man who constantly sees “a lion in the way” 
is looked upon as a faintheart, yet, under some con¬ 
ditions, he makes the best fighter. Let him realize 
that debt, affliction, or some other adverse condition 
has built a wall behind him, so that he cannot go back, 
and he will go forward and fight the supposed lion 
with the courage of despair. We venture to say that 
the majority of people who have won competence and 
home saw “lions” at every corner. Spurred on by the 
feeling that they must fight or die, they went ahead 
to find that most of the lions were liars! 
* 
For thousands of years the hog has been capable of 
living and doing his duty on a diet of grass and hay. 
In spite of this most farmers have insisted on keep¬ 
ing him shut up in a narrow space to be fed largely 
on grain. Now we are all learning that the hog is a 
pasture and hay feeder. He will live and do well on 
a Winter ration of Alfalfa or clover hay and roots, 
and all he needs is opportunity to pick up his Summer 
living in a good pasture. We are learning from west¬ 
ern stockmen how to feed a hog. It used to be said 
that the western farmer should come Bast and learn 
how to save the little wastes. That is still true in 
many cases, but the eastern farmer should go West 
and learn how to make use of wasted opportunities. 
We need more of the “large methods” of feeding at 
the East. 
* 
The British government proposes a tariff of six 
cents per 100 pounds on grain and 10 cents on flour 
and meal. For years the English people have adhered 
to the policy of free trade and direct taxation. The 
English plan has been to provide cheap food for the 
factory workers in town at the expense of farmers. 
One result of this has been practical ruin to English 
agriculture. Lands have depreciated in value, thou¬ 
sands of acres of former grain land have been seeded 
to pasture or meadow, the farm laborer and small pro¬ 
prietor who formerly gave such strength to English 
country life have nearly disappeared. England is now 
at the mercy of Russia and America for her food sup¬ 
ply. For years the English farmers have grumbled 
and demanded protection against foreign food pro¬ 
ducts, but little attention was paid them so long as it 
was merely an argument for justice to the English 
farm. The present tax is not proposed because agri¬ 
culture has fallen into decay, but because more money 
is needed to conduct the war in Africa. Other means 
for raising revenue having been exhausted the price 
of food products must be raised! While England, the 
great champion of free trade, is turning to protection 
in order to secure needed revenue, the United States 
is working toward a lower tariff in order to secure 
foreign trade. England desired cheap food for her 
factory workers in order to maintain her manufac¬ 
turing strength. America secured a high tariff on 
manufactured goods in order to build up her indus¬ 
trial enterprises. Now England must increase the 
price of food in order to obtain money from her peo¬ 
ple, while American manufacturers are willing to give 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
away part of the market of the farmer in order to 
sell more goods abroad! What will be the effect of 
this English tariff? If the protectionists are right in 
saying that “the foreigner pays the tax” it will mean 
a loss to Americans. Probably the area of land de¬ 
voted to grain in England will be slowly increased. 
If Canada and other English colonies are enabled to 
ship grain free or at a lower tariff they will profit at 
the expense of this country. It will be interesting to 
observe the effect of this proposition upon the Eng¬ 
lish people. It is a war measure. Englishmen have 
paid their price of blood in patience—will they pay 
the price of bread without a murmur? 
* 
No, we do not believe that the new oleo bill will 
work such wonders that all dairymen will get rich in 
a year. That was not what was expected from it. It 
ought to steady the dairy business and give the cow a 
fair chance with the oleo factory. As for predicting 
a great “boom” for dairying and extravagant prices 
for milk as a result of this bill we see little to war¬ 
rant it. it is safer to be conservative, and we do not 
advise readers to rush into dairying expecting great 
returns as the result of this anti-oleo legislation! 
There is a flurry in butter prices now. This little rise 
is giving the oleo men a chance to flood Washington 
with letters from city people who protest that butter 
is so high as to be out of reach. That is just what 
the oleo Congressmen want. In the face of all this 
the Milk Exchange cuts the price of milk. 
m 
Every increase in the price of necessities is felt by 
the farmer, because it lessens the purchasing power 
of those who buy his produce. For this reason he is 
likely to feel the excessive prices now prevailing for 
dressed meats, even where his own iiurchases in such 
lines are limited. Working people in city and town 
feel that they must have meat, and this Spring many 
of them will regard tempting lettuce and radishes, or 
similar fresh vegetables, as luxuries to be dispensed 
with. Unfortunately, many women of limited means 
are not wise buyers of meat at any time; they have 
not been taught to get the highest nutrient value at 
the most moderate cost, and the recent rise in prices 
is felt by them very severely. It is to be hoped that 
the predicted break in the wholesale meat market 
will occur quickly; a continuance of the present prices 
means both loss and oeprivation to many. 
• 
Most farmers use stable manure as though it were 
a complete, well-balanced fertilizer. A few realize 
that it is chiefly useful for supplying nitrogen and 
add what is needed to make a balanced ration for 
plants. Suppose we use 20 tons of average manure 
per acre. We have supplied 200 pounds of nitrogen, 
120 of phosphoric acid and 260 pounds of potash. A 
ton of high-grade potato fertilizer would contain 
about 80 pounds of nitrogen, 180 of phosphoric acid 
and 150 of potash. Now eight tons of the manure 
will give us 80 pounds of nitrogen, 48 of phosphoric 
acid and 104 of potash. By adding half a ton of acid 
phosphate and 200 pounds of muriate of potash to the 
eight tons of manure we have nearly the full amount 
of plant food found in the ton of fertilizer. Used 
in this way the manure can be used to supply the 
nitrogen for twice the area that would otherwise be 
covered. It is evident that if we are to furnish all 
the phosphoric acid that the plant requires, in the 
form of manure, we must provide a costly excess of 
nitrogen. It is often cheaper to use the manure for 
providing as much nitrogen as the crop requires, and 
then add the potash and phosphoric acid in the form 
of chemicals. 
* 
We recently received some New York State evapor¬ 
ated apples which served as a practical exposition of 
many a sermon preached by The R. N.-Y. They com¬ 
mended themselves at first sight, because they were 
put up in a neat pasteboard carton similar to those 
used for oysters or ice cream, the package holding 
one pound of fruit The printed label showed the 
packer’s name and the character of the contents. This 
style of packing is a natural passport to favor in its 
contrast to a slovenly paper bag filled with evapor¬ 
ated fruit that has been handled and rehandled in 
weighing and packing. But the proof of the pudding 
is in the eating, and here again this well-packed fruit 
vindicated its appearance, for after proper cooking it 
was juicy, tart and well flavored, approaching closely 
to the excellence of fresh fruit. The attractive pack¬ 
age will naturally draw trade at first sight, but it 
takes the excellent quality to hold it. This is quite 
as true of fresh as of evaporated fruit. Put it up at¬ 
tractively by all means, but do not expect good pack¬ 
ing to offset poor quality. Pacific coast producers 
have taught us a good deal; it is strange if we in the 
East, with a fine market at our very door, cannot 
meet its demands in many lines which appeared to be 
drifting into the hands of producers at a distance. 
The training of fruit trees, which Mr. Wirth dis¬ 
cusses on the first page, is not necessary commercial¬ 
ly in this country, because of our favorable climate, 
and it entails the expense of much extra labor. To 
the amateur, however, it is a fascinating branch of 
horticulture. One of the prettiest sights we saw last 
Spring was a peach tree in a neighboring garden, 
which was trained flat upon the wall of a stone house. 
In Europe, where intensive gardening is carried out 
on a scale hardly known here, garden walls are often 
covered with fruit trees, trained flat like a vine, and 
they are beautiful either in flower or fruit, and profit¬ 
able also. A famous old pear tree in Dublin, Ireland, 
covers the whole front of a city residence, maturing 
an abundance of fine fruit, though there is only a 
little space in the pavement where the roots may re¬ 
ceive overhead moisture. Peach trees are very com¬ 
monly trained upon brick walls in Great Britain; 
also apricots, nectarines and pome fruits, and a high 
quality of fruit results, which could not be obtained 
otherwise with peaches particularly in that cold, damp 
climate. Whether such methods are adaptable here 
or not, Mr. Wirth writes of a very interesting part 
of horticulture. 
* 
The practice of renaming old varieties of fruits or 
flowers and offering them as “new,” is a dishonest 
nuisance which should be condemned by all fair men. 
Every man who has tried to make a collection of new 
varieties and prided himself upon the fact that he tries 
all the “novelties,” knows with what disgust he has 
dug up and burned dozens of high-priced trees or 
shrubs. They were introduced with high-sounding 
names at a fancy price, but close acquaintance proved 
them only some old sort or even some worthless seed¬ 
ling. Sometimes the “new sort” will really show a 
slight difference in color or habit from the older va¬ 
riety, but this difference is so slight that only an ex¬ 
pert can detect it. For practical purposes many plants 
of the so-called new sorts are not worth a cent 
more than the old ones, yet double the price is often 
charged. It is high time this business was ended, it 
has become so general that we make a practice of 
warning our readers that it is more or less of a gam¬ 
ble to buy any of the “new things” that are so loudly 
praised—and pictured. Until the experts have care¬ 
fully tested them and pronounced them worthy of spe¬ 
cial place and price we would invest only in a small 
way as an experiment Wait till the plants talk for 
themselves! 
* 
A curious law case is reported from Louisiana. An 
orange grower sold two crops in advance to a profes¬ 
sional orange buyer. A contract was drawn by which 
the buyer agreed to give $8,000 for the crops of 1899 
and 1900—"all the trees may produce.” He paid $4,000 
in cash, the remainder to be paid on December 1, 1900. 
It was stated that the “purchaser assumes all risks.” 
Within three months after this contract was made, 
before the trees even put forth bloom, a heavy freeze 
destroyed the trees, so that no crop could be made 
in either year. The buyer of course had no oranges, 
though he had paid $4,000. He brought suit to re¬ 
cover his money on the claim that the contract was 
conditional upon these crops appearing. He made the 
point that the unexpected death of the trees should 
make the contract void. The courts finally refused 
this claim and permitted the seller to retain the 
money, but also decided that the buyer need not pay 
the remainder. 
BREVITIES. 
Keep the chicken yards stirred up. 
The bee’s sting has its headquarters in the tail. I 
No information can be solid without being soluble. 
Be sure to put the proper label on your printed guesses. 
He who plants a thought assumes a big responsibility. 
That’s a very clear article by Prof. Munson on page 303. 
Our Maryland friend (see page 302) soon got rid of that 
tree fraud by stating what he had read in The R. N.-Y. 
What of codperlative creameries that contract their 
supply to the middlemen? Isn’t that a flat contradiction 
of their original object? 
Is it good dairying to take all the milk to the station 
and then hunt around for butter, and sometimes go with¬ 
out, as W. B. says on page 309? 
Senator Dryden, of New Jersey, is an oleo man. He 
should never receive another vote fron. a county in his 
State where farmers have any power. 
The Plum curculio is working westward, having been 
found in Idaho. When it gets fairly at work on the Pa¬ 
cific coast there will be trouble enough. 
Mr. Case gives sensible advice when he tells an evap¬ 
orator man to go to Sodus, N. Y., for information. That 
.is the banner town for fruit evaporation. 
We are told that the various corn growers’ associations 
in western States have done wonders in perfecting a 
standard ear for seed corn. We need just such associa¬ 
tions in the East. 
Some dairymen report that they are turning the cows on 
the rye and wheat until pastures are ready. We call this 
'bad practice as judged by the performance of a neigh¬ 
bor’s cows in our wheat field! 
