1902 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
463 
MAPES, THE HEN MAN. 
Raspberries on a Poultry Farm. 
A GOOD HEN.—The White Wyandotte hen Betty, 
which I thought possibly was the one I have been 
looking for so long, and could induce to lay me an 
egg every 24 hours, has proved to be a disappoint¬ 
ment. The best I have been able to do with her is six 
eggs in a week. She takes just a little over 24 hours 
to produce an egg, anS lays with great regularity. 
They seem to come in groups of five or six, each 25 or 
26 hours, then a skip from late afternoon to next 
morning is taken, when a fresh start is made. For 
the month from May 20 to June 20 her record is as 
follows: Laid May 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31; 
June 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. 
Each time she skips a day, as on May 26, June 2, etc., 
I can depend on her laying early the next morning, 
and each following day a little later, until another 
skip is made. She has been fed just as the rest of our 
hens have been, two meals a day of a mash made from 
Balanced Ration wet with skim-milk, with the excep¬ 
tion that she is closely confined in a small exhibition 
coop, while the others have free range. She eats about 
four ounces a day, which is more than those which 
have free range will eat. She lays a little more than 
the average of our flock, and gets no grass, insects, 
etc., which explains her better appetite for the mash. 
Twenty-seven eggs is a good month’s work. I am now 
satisfied, however, that she is not the hen I am look¬ 
ing for, and shall use her, while I have her confined, 
to test some new feed mixtures. I should like very 
much to find something in dry form that will take 
the place of skim-milk as an egg producer. There are 
so many times and places where milk is out of the 
question. Dried blood for one thing seems a prom¬ 
ising experiment. 
A RASPBERRY TRADE.—One of the best argu¬ 
ments in favor of eggs and poultry as a farm crop is 
the fact that the work is evenly dis¬ 
tributed throughout the year, and can 
be managed by the farmer and his own 
family, or by a regular force of hired 
help. I have tried some other crops, 
from which the profits were extremely 
good, but they required a good deal of 
extra help at certain seasons. In a 
sparsely settled farming community, 
this is hard to secure. Raspberries can 
be raised in great abundance in this 
locality, and prices are usually good. It 
wants a small army during the fruiting 
season, however, if much land is devoted 
to them. I consider it as easy to raise 
100 bushels of raspberries to the acre as 
to get 50 bushels of corn, and the berries 
are generally worth about 10 times as 
much as the corn. I have picked 150 
bushels from an acre. The Cuthbert is 
the most prolific variety I have tried, of 
the red sorts, but it is very perishable. 
Many a farmer’s wife or daughter could 
easily secure a year’s supply of pocket 
money from a small plot of ground devoted to rasp¬ 
berries. By putting them up in glass cans as fast as 
they ripen, they can be sent to a distant market, in 
their perfection, and the selling season is greatly 
lengthened. The women folks at Maple Dale Farm 
canned over 1,000 quarts one season. We found ready 
sale for them in New York to the same class of trade 
that uses our eggs and broilers. They came back 
hungry for more the next season, proving that the 
goods were satisfactory. It was hard, hot work, how¬ 
ever, and added to the hurry and bustle of berry time, 
so we shipped the fresh berries next season as fast as 
they were picked. Three women, with a little assist¬ 
ance from me, could put up 175 quart cans in a day. 
There was greater demand, however, for those we put 
into pint cans. Some were shipped to a commission 
house, where they sold at $4 per dozen for the quai’ts, 
and $2.16 for the pints, leaving a good big price for the 
berries and labor of canning, after paying for the 
sugar and cans. The recipe used is one that has f ong 
been in use at our place, and is here given: Dissolve 
seven pounds of granulated sugar in 2 y 2 quarts of 
boiling water, making a rich hot syrup. Fill the glass 
cans with clean fruit that is fresh and ripe. Set the 
cans of berries in cold water, and bring to a boil 
gradually, allowing them to boil until sufficiently 
cooked, usually five to seven minutes. Fill the cans 
of cooked berries with the boiling hot syrup, and seal 
immediately. The process is simple, the product is 
delicious, and the eye is pleased as well as the palate. 
You can fairly see the bloom on the whole berries, 
when the snow is flying the next Winter. A little 
practice in filling the cans soon enables one to put in 
the right amount of berries. The tighter they are 
packed the less syrup they will hold. A little jarring 
of the can will pack them sufficiently, and not break 
the berries. But very little more than a quart basket 
full of raspberries is required to fill a quart can, or 
two pint cans. 
GRAIN FOR HENS.—I have the following ques¬ 
tions: 
Do you consider oats or buckwheat anywhere near as 
good as wheat for laying hens? Do you feed No. 2 or 
damaged wheat, or do you feed the best? Is wheat a 
good grain to feed exclusively when hens run at large? 
What kind of incubators do you use? J. R. w. 
New York. 
I class oats with wheat, and buckwheat with corn 
as poultry food, but do not consider either quite as 
good, usual price considered. I have used a good deal 
of damaged or scorched wheat with satisfactory re¬ 
sults. Throw down some good wheat and some dam¬ 
aged wheat to a flock of hens, and they will not touch 
the damaged wheat so long as they can get enough of 
the good wheat. Place damaged wheat and good corn 
before them, and they will eat some of both. The 
question all hinges upon how badly the wheat is dam¬ 
aged, and upon the relative price. I consider wheat 
alone, as the very best of the single grains for hens. 
Wheat alone, in connection with free range, can be 
depended on to give good results, where the flock is 
not too large. We are using the Cyphers incubators 
at present. o. w. mai*es. 
A SUCCESSFUL WINDMILL POWER. 
I purchased a 13-foot power mill in 1898, and it has 
proven to be a profitable investment, furnishing me 
plenty of power during that time without a cent for 
repairs. I have the mill on a 24-foot steel tower on 
top of barn, the wheel being about 40 feet from 
ground. I drive two pumps (well and cistern) at the 
house about 200 feet off, by means of quadrants and 
wires from mill to pumps, furnishing water for house 
use and also for stock. The mill has furnished plenty 
of fresh water and ran every day pumping, with the 
exception of three days, during over four years’ time. 
A HORSE THAT EQUALS A HIRED MAN. Fig. 185. 
I have a grinder for shelled corn, oats, etc., at the foot 
of the mill, which is attached directly to the perpen¬ 
dicular shaft; also two-hole corn sheller with elevator 
to carry corn to bin above grinder. This grinder runs 
with little power, will grind fine meal, and in a fair 
wind will grind 15 to 20 bushels per hour; there have 
been very few days since I had the mill but w'nat I 
could have run the grinder. I also have a corn and 
cob mill which I run occasionally, grinding about 
eight or 10 bushels an hour in a good wind, doing 
more than I could do on this mill with four horses on 
a sweep power, which I used to have. I have run the 
sheller and elevator, the grinder at foot of mill, and 
the corn and cob mill at one time, and had power to 
spare. This cob mill stands about 15 feet from the 
foot of windmill, and is driven by a five-inch belt 
from a horizontal shaft, from which a No. 11 Ohio 
cutter with 12-foot carrier is also driven. I generally 
run about 10 acres of corn fodder through the cutter 
during the Winter. I cut feed while a steady breeze is 
blowing; then it gives me all I can do to keep the 
fodder to cutter, cutting the feed % inch long, and it 
has never failed to keep me in cut fodder and meal 
since I have had the mill. As the grinder for shelled 
corn and oats does not need any attention I generally 
shell the bin full with a light wind and then let the 
grinder run whenever it wants to; all that is needed 
is to keep the bin above the grinder full, and it will 
do the rest. I am satisfied I could grind sufficient 
feed for 40 or 50 cattle on this grinder. 
The grindstone and other small machinery are also 
driven from the horizontal shaft I have no wood 
saw, as we are in the gas belt, but there would be 
plenty of power to run a 20 or 22-inch saw. In a fair 
wind it will develop fully four horse-power, and, of 
course, the stronger the wind the more power you 
would get, but I have always had sufficient power to 
do the work since I have had the mill, and it has been 
a cheaper and more satisfactory power for me than a 
steam or gasoline engine could have been. There are 
several mills in our county, and the owners are all 
satisfied with them, but I would advise one not to get 
a mill that is too high geared, as it will not run in a 
light wind as easily as a low-geared mill. A mill that 
makes about five revolutions of the vertical shaft to 
one revolution of the wind wheel is about right; then 
you can speed your fast machinery from the hori¬ 
zontal shafts with proper pulleys. By doing this 
pumps and all slow-driving machines will have suffi¬ 
cient power to run nearly all the time. l. w. 
Hamilton Co., Ind. 
FARMING IN THE RED RIVER VALLEY. 
Noxious Weeds; How Destroyed. 
Part VIII. 
Noxious weeds have gained a good foothold on some 
parts of the farm. The most troublesome, those 
which we have to fight against, are wild oats, mus¬ 
tard, garlic and rose bushes. Wild oats are the worst 
weeds we have to contend with, and in some fields 
they are so bad that the wheat is very much in the 
minority. They resemble the tame oat in every way 
except that the berries are black, and they will live 
in the soil for several years. We have found the best 
method of destroying them is to mow the crop for 
hay before the wild oats are ripe. If they are cut 
this way the field may be entirely cleaned in one year, 
provided all the seeds in the soil germinate. Mustard 
is nearly as bad as wild oats, only it may be destroyed 
by pulling, and this method is impossible with wild 
oats. It may also be destroyed by Summer fallowing, 
and stubble fields are sometimes disked in the Fall 
and then plowed late in the Spring for flax. This 
allows the killing of two crops, one in the Fall by 
frost and another in the Spring by 
plowing. Garlic, French weed or shep¬ 
herd’s purse, as it is known in different 
localities, has a small foothold on the 
farm. It is a very troublesome weed as 
it goes to seed two or three times a 
year. Practically the only way to de¬ 
stroy it is by pulling, cultivation or fre¬ 
quent plowing. [Shepherd’s purse, as 
known in the East, is entirely distinct 
from garlic. It is a member of the 
Cruciferse or Mustard family, botanical- 
ly Capsella Bursa-pastoris. The name 
means a shepherd’s little purse, and al¬ 
ludes to the shape of the tiny seeds. It 
has white flowers of mustard shape, 
and is now naturalized from Europe. 
It is very common here in waste places. 
—Eds.] The greater part of the old land 
is infested with wild rose bushes to a 
greater or less extent. Deep and thor¬ 
ough plowing, Summer-fallowing and 
cutting the crop for hay is the favorite 
method of destroying them. Of all the 
weeds the Russian thistle gives us the least concern, 
as it will not grow on our heavy soil. Southeast of 
us several miles, where the soil is lighter, the fields 
are thickly infested with the thistles, and this Spring 
whenever we had strong southeast winds, Russian 
thistles would come bounding over the prairie by the 
dozen, until caught in some barb-wire fence or road 
ditch. On some of the bonanza farms of North Da¬ 
kota, located in the Russian thistle belt, they erect a 
high woven wire fence around the farm to keep the 
thistles out, and as they pile up about this fence the 
thistles are burned. It is said that the Russian thistle 
was introduced into this country through flax seed 
from Russia. Another way of cleaning our fields is 
by seeding to grass and cutting the hay, or pasturing 
for three or four years in order to allow the seeds 
in the soil time to decay. Land treated in this way 
will then produce several excellent crops. Perhaps 
the best and quickest way of cleaning foul land is by 
means of cultivated crops or oats or millet sown 
for hay. Corn, potatoes and oats for hay are always 
seeded on fields that are infested the worst, and in 
this way the entire farm is kept in a good state of 
cultivation. j. d. b. 
Wolverton, Minn. 
FRUIT IN OHIO.—We have a good prospect for 
Rome Beauty apples again this year, more than we 
have had for several years, and they are nice and 
smooth generally, but a few have scab on them since 
it has been so rainy. Most of the trees are too full. 
There are few on other varieties except Russet and 
Grimes. The prospect for this part of the State is 
about a half crop taken all together, some orchards 
being full and others few or none. Buyers are look¬ 
ing around considerably, and wanting to option crops 
now. In all probability we may get as much as we 
did last year, and nearly three times the quantity of 
fruit if the weather favors proper development. There 
are few peaches here, plenty of plums and pears. 
Grapes look nice. Crops generally look well, except 
wheat and hay. tr. t. cox. 
Lawrence Co., Ohio. 
