544 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
August 3 
FA RMERS’ CLUB 
[Every query must be accompanied by 
the name and address of the writer tp in¬ 
sure 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.] 
An Infertile Mulberry. 
F. M. L.. No. Wilmington, Mass. —I have a 
Russian mulberry tree five years old which 
has never borne fruit. Each year it makes 
a rank growth, so that I have had to trim 
it freely to keep it within bounds. For 
two years it has blossomed, but the fruit 
withers and falls. The tree stands in 
ground that is under thorough cultivation. 
Have any of your readers had a similar 
experience, and why does not my tree 
bear fruit? 
Ans. —It is almost certain that this 
tree has infertile flowers, as some mul¬ 
berry trees always have. It is not prob¬ 
able that setting another tree with fer¬ 
tile flowers near it or grafting some of 
its branches with scions of a fertile va¬ 
riety would cause it to hear fruit, but 
this is possible. If its flowers are stami- 
nate, which is probable, there is no way 
to fertilize them. Some of them might 
he submitted to a botanist next year to 
determine their true character. 
H. E. V. D. 
Budding Peach Trees. 
F. E. 8., Youngstown, O.—Can two and 
three-year-old peach trees be budded with 
success? A neighbor told me they must 
be of this year’s growth. I have a num¬ 
ber of two or three-year-olds that I would 
like to bud. Do you take this year’s 
growth to get the buds? What are the 
best peaches for this section? What is 
the right time to bud? 
Ans. —Peach trees that are two or 
three years old or even larger ones can 
be budded, but the expense is too great 
to be practically profitable, except in 
very rare cases. Trees that came from 
seed the past Spring are the kind to 
bud, and the time to do the work is in 
August or early in September. Older 
trees must he budded in the branches, 
and with peach trees this rarely pays. 
The buds are cut from sticks of this 
year’s growth. The varieties that suc¬ 
ceed generally will do well in Ohio. 
Sneed, Carman, Elberta, Chairs, Fitz¬ 
gerald and Salway are all good kinds. 
They are named in their order of ripen¬ 
ing. If. e. v. D. 
Care of a Young Orchard. 
U. F. M., Freeburg, Pa.— Last Spring I set 
an orchard with several hundred apple 
trees, applying bone meal to the trees as 
(hey were planted. A crop of rye was 
growing at the time, hence the cultivation 
of the soil was dispensed with. The grain 
is harvested. What shall I do with the 
orchard so as to promote the growth of 
the trees? 
Ans. —This is a case of very unwise 
planting of an orchard, like many that 
we see all over the country. The trees 
should never have been set in a field of 
rye, nor of any other small grain or 
grass, because tillage is impossible, and 
this is one of the essentials to good 
growth. It is too late to do much 
good this season, although thorough til¬ 
lage of the entire surface of the orchard 
(or what might have been properly call¬ 
ed an orchard), and mulching about the 
trees may do them a little good. I would 
rather have trees now in the nursery and 
plant them next Spring than those 
standing in the rye stubble. Let this 
case be a warning to the owner and all 
who may read this never again to set 
trees in a field of small grain of any 
kind. They should be set where they 
may be cultivated frequently, and espe¬ 
cially early in the growing season. The 
main part of the growth is made before 
July. As I look out of my window to¬ 
day, July 29, I see a young tree that had 
formed its terminal buds over a month 
ago and' was about to develop and har¬ 
den its wood without any further length 
of growth, when I pruned off a lot of 
needless branches. This induced a fur¬ 
ther growth of over a foot in length on 
the main branches. These have now 
formed their terminal buds again and 
are hardening their wood and filling out 
their buds ready for the dormant stage 
and the next year’s effort to grow. This 
is the way all fruit trees do, except that 
some are a little earlier or later than 
others in doing it. Whatever we expect 
our trees to do we should help them to 
do earlu in the growing season. No 
aftiount of after care will make up for 
past neglect. h. e. v. d. 
Cross-Fertilized Fruit Trees; Peach Yellows. 
E. J. 8., Middletown, N. Y. —1. What about 
cross-fertilized fruit trees? I have been 
corresponding with a nursery company 
that wishes me to invest in some cross- 
fertilized apples, plum, pear and peach 
trees, said to be of the best American and 
Russian crosses. The price is reasonable. 
Do you consider these trees valuable, or 
would many prove worthless? 2. What 
are signs of Peach yellows? I have some 
trees six years old; last year fruit ripened 
prematurely and was of inferior quality. 
This Summer foliage is pale green and 
does not seem to make much new growth. 
Although they have been well fertilized 
with stable manure and fertilizer, the 
trees look little better than last year. 
Ans.— 1. This matter of a nursery 
wanting to sell cross-fertilized fruit trees 
appears to me decidedly fakish. There 
are no such peach, pear or plum trees, 
if they exist at all, that are of any 
value, and apple trees of this character 
are very scarce and only fit for experi¬ 
ment as yet. If the trees offered are 
seedlings then I would at once pro¬ 
nounce them costly as a gift. If they are 
budded or grafted and of named varie¬ 
ties they are of little value, to say the 
best of them. My advice is to let them 
alone and all other stock offered by 
these parties. There are plenty of well- 
known varieties and reliable nursery¬ 
men to buy them of, so there is no need 
to go into any mysterious or uncertain 
business of the kind proposed. 2. From 
the symptoms described I would believe 
the peach trees mentioned have the yel¬ 
lows. Premature fruit of poor quality is 
the first one, feeble growth and pale 
foliage the second and wiry shoots the 
third symptom. They should be dug up 
and burned at once. . h. e. v. d. 
Labor on a Fertilizer Farm. 
0. F., Ridgefield, Conn. — The recent article 
on Mr. Lewis’s farm at Cranbury, N. J., 
was extremely interesting and inspiring 
to those who are striving in the same 
direction. On looking over the items of 
expense I am struck with the small 
amount of the labor bill. How can this 
amount be so small? It certainly would 
take two men the year round to care for 
such crops, and at $30 a month for each 
this would be $720 a year. To harvest all 
hay and potatoes sold would certainly re¬ 
quire more lhan two men. The feed item 
seems very small unless Mr. Lewis raises 
his own oats for his horses. 
J. H. B., Thornburg, Pa .—I was just read¬ 
ing your very interesting article on farm¬ 
ing in central New Jersey, but when I 
came to the statement, “Other items of 
farm expense were labor, $400,” I came to 
a dead stop. Is this a printer’s error, or 
do you expect a practical farmer to be¬ 
lieve such a statement as a fact? Why, 
it is only at the most the labor of one man 
to set against an array of produce that 
would be creditable to a farm of 200 or 
more acres! 
Ans. —Mr. Lewis writes that the exact 
cash figures for hired labor are $310. The 
item of $400 covers all cash labor and 
board, and $50 in addition will pay for 
thrashing, filling silo, shredding corn¬ 
stalks and pressing hay. I should have 
stated that Mr. Lewis’s son is the active 
manager of the farm—working with the 
men. The elder Mr. Lewis also helps 
somewhat at raking or driving machin¬ 
ery. There are several reasons why this 
cash labor account is small. The farm 
is well arranged and has been kept clean 
for years. The fight against the weeds 
requires far less muscle and expense 
than is the case on a weedy farm where 
the soil is stuffed with weed seeds. Fer¬ 
tilizer farming saves labor in two ways. 
It returns little if any weed seed to the 
soil. On this farm but little hay is fed. 
Cornstalks, either dry shredded or in the 
silo provide roughage for the stock 
while the hay is mostly sold. Cornstalk 
manure contains little seed of either 
grass or weeds and after a few rounds 
of the rotation, with clean culture, weeds 
are well killed out. Then again the cost 
of handling and applying fertilizer is 
considerably less than that of handling 
manure. A ton of high-grade fertilizer 
may he put in the machine and spread 
or drilled quickly by horse power. Com¬ 
pare this with the labor of man and 
horse required to cart and spread 20 
loads of stable manure! This farm ex¬ 
perience shows how improved farm ma¬ 
chinery will lighten labor and cheapen 
the cost. By using a hay loader and hay 
slings the cost of haying could be 
brought still lower. As to the cost of 
feed Mr. Lewis buys only such feed as 
cotton-seed meal, linseed and bran for 
the cows. The horses are fed on corn, 
as is the general custom in that section. 
Mr. Lewis and his son do not figure their 
own labor on a cash basis any more than 
a storekeeper would. They charge items 
of cash expense against cash receipts, 
and take what is left as their own wages 
and income. The farm really contains 
101 acres—90 being under cultivation. 
D WYER'S Summer and Au¬ 
tumn Catalogue {now ready) 
of Pot-Grown Strawberry Plants, 
Celery, Cabbage, etc. Pot-Grown 
Clematis, Honeysuckle, Ivy, etc. 
A full line of Fruit and Ornamen¬ 
tal Trees Vines and Plants. 
This Catalogue, with beautiful oolored plates, 
mailed fre&—write for It. T. J. DWYER & SON, 
Orange County Nurseries, Box 1, Cornwall. N. V. 
THE PRESIDENT 
S TRAWBERRY 
Poisons for Grass and Weeds. 
J. S. W., West Galway, N. Y.— Will you 
print a recipe for making a weed de¬ 
stroyer? I am looking for some liquid 
compound that will remove the weeds that 
grow in the path and along brick walks. 
If you can recommend any such mixture, 
will you also state if the same will injure 
trees or other vegetation growing near 
the weeds on which the liquid is applied? 
Ans. —The Vermont Experiment Sta¬ 
tion recommends arseniate of soda, one 
pound in eight gallons of water. This 
sprinkled over a square rod of surface 
killed grass and weeds permanently. It 
will probably destroy all vegetation that 
it strikes but, used in this strength, will 
not kill the roots of trees or shrubs. 
One quart of crude carbolic acid in eight 
gallons of water blasts the grass and 
weeds but does not kill them perma¬ 
nently. This is said to be better for use 
on ground that is to be reseeded, for the 
arsenic will poison the soil for some 
years. A “weed killer” is sold by Peter 
Henderson & Co., New York. 
Crimson Clover; Late Fodder Crops. 
E. A. Q., Norfolk, Mass. —I have a piece of 
ground that I had intended to seed down 
and use some lime, but I find I cannot 
buy lime cheap enough to get all that I 
desired, so shall only seed a smaller piece. 
What can I plant for a fodder crop now 
that frost will not hurt? Some say that 
barley is not good for hay. As I can’t 
do as I wish to I should like to do some¬ 
thing, and thus get it ready for nex’t year. 
Is it too late to sow Crimson clover, and 
would it not be better to sow half Red 
clover with it to turn under for potatoes? I 
have an acre where I am trying to get 
some oats off, and shall have to do some¬ 
thing with it. What will be best to make 
a lot of green manure or humus for that 
ground? It needs this very badly. 
Ans. —We would sow Crimson clover 
up to August 15. This wet season will 
start the clover «and give it a good 
chance. For green manure alone you 
can mix from one to two pounds of tur¬ 
nip seed in the 12 pounds of clover seed 
used on an acre. This will give a large 
crop of turnips, which can be pulled for 
feed or left to rot on the ground. We 
find beardless barley a good hay plant. 
We prefer it to any other grain 
for hay making. At the New Jersey Ex¬ 
periment Station barley and peas have 
been sown as late as August 20—produc¬ 
ing a good crop, which was cut October 
20 and gave over six tons of green fod¬ 
der per acre. The barley and peas were 
sown about like oats and peas, and were 
not troubled by frost. 
For the land’s sake, use Bowker’s Fer¬ 
tilizers. They enrich the earth.— Adv. 
The Rural Ne'*’ Yorker calls it ‘ the most 
promising new variety of the year." 
It has been carefully tested for four years, and 
not offered for sale until fully matured. It lias 
been grown in field culture, and marketed in 
large quau’ities by the side of other leading 
varieties leadiDg them all in the qualities de¬ 
manded in big berries for a critical market. 
Large, Firm, High Colored, Well Flavored. 
POTTED PLANTS FOR SALE! 
Fer dozen, S3. Per 50, tBlO. 
Per 100, 1818. 
Stock all In originator’s hands. Buyers protected 
THOMAS R. HUNT, Lambertville, N J. 
Send for Circular. Mention this Paper. 
Potted Strawberry Plants, July I. 
T. C. KEVITT, Athenla, N. 1. 
Clenwood Nurseries 
Most complete assortment of choice 
Ornamental Trees, Shrubs and Fines 
Send for Descriptive Illustrated Catalogue. 
THE WM. H. MOON CO . MORRISVILLK, PA. 
60 miles from New York; 30 miles from Philadelphia. 
Peach, Apple and 
Pear Buds. 
Send list ot wants to do priced can tarnish In 
large or small quantities. 
G. HARRISON & SONS. Berlin. HA 
Trees, Vines and Plants. 
Apple, Pear, Peaeh, Plum and Cherry Trees, 
of all the leading varieties, in any quamlty, at very 
low prices Trees, extra tine, free from scaleor Insect 
pests. We offer, by the thousand or carload, a beau 
tifullotof Peach Trees. Don't miss writin us for 
prices on them, and for handsome descrlptl . c ;ata- 
logue. One dormant bud tree of our new Lis'on 
peach mailed free to each person answering this 
advertisement Add ,ss 
THE VILLAGE NURSERIES, IlamedsviLe, Ta. 
PEI EDV Dl AilTC _not spindling ones 
U£LCfll rLiell I O and not raised by Irri¬ 
gation method—$1.50 per thousand. CLOVER SEED 
—Choice, cleao Crimson orScarletof myown raising. 
13.10 per bu.: sacks free J C ELLIS Millsboro Del. 
Celery Plants—G iant Pascal, Golden 
Heart. Boston Market and White Plume al $1 per 
1,000: 15c. per 100. Caleb Boggs & Son, Cheswold, Del. 
T]W CpNn-Germlnaied seed ready to plant 
this Fall. Full directions for 
growing, and price of seed and plants. FREE 
ROYAL GINSENG GARDENS, Little York. N. Y. 
fa I MCE lift -We have grown the Plants since 
UMaCHU 1893. Plants and Seed for Sale. 
LYNDEN GINSENG AND STOCK FARM, 
Silas Timerman & Son. Clockville, N. Y. 
Crimson Clover Seed.—New crop now 
ready. R. 8. JOHNSTON, Box 4. Stockley, Del. 
Fruit & Ornamental, 
Shrubs, Roses, Bulbs 
and Plants. 
Correspondence solic¬ 
ited.Valuable Catalogue tret. 
49th year. 44 greenhouses. 1000 acres. 
THE STORRS & HARRISON CO., 
Painesville, Ohio. 
Ca4w~No more of them. Sow my 
UniOn wClS hardy White, earliest, Yellow 
and Red. 3 kinds. Send for testimonials and prices. 
BEAULIEU, the Onion Specialist, Woodhaven, N.Y. 
Big New Seed Wheats. 
Strong, vigorous new blood; pure clean, fiy-proof; 
immense ytelders Samples and catalogue No. 45 free 
for the asking. Our choice graded seed wi 1 double 
your yield. Maplewood Stock Farm, Maplewood, Mich 
Q15ED WHEAT—Dawson Golden Chaff, American 
^ Bronze. Fultz-Mediterranean, Harvest King, 
Rudy. Fulcaste .from heavy yielding fields Clean; 
moderate prices. Samples free. Circular shows re¬ 
sults of comparative tests made at experiment sta¬ 
tions. A. H. HOFFMAN, Bamford, Pa. 
/"ORDERS booked now for new crop Crimson Clover 
seed ready June 15. Popular prices. Seed guar¬ 
anteed. Write JOHN J. ROSA, Milford, Del. 
[■ A — C* _ I 600 bushels Early Black Oow 
™ dulv Peas. $2 bu.: 100 hutnesEarly 
Black-eyed Peas $2 bushel; 500 busheis Delaware- 
grown Crimson Clover Seed $3 50 bushel 
J K. HOLLAND, Milford, Del. 
li/UPlTQ tested 20 to 38 bmhels; W. 
VV n CH I 0 Chaff, Jones. -McKinley, 
Bald, Democrat, Reliable Rudy. Tus¬ 
can, Arcadian,Gold Coin. Mealy Fultz, 
Red Wonder, Dawson. Description; 
save dollars experimenting. Prices 
reasonable. Write at once. SMITH'S 
Wheat Farm, Box A, Manchester, N.Y. 
IMPORTED "M1UK0FF" WINTER SEED WHEAT 
50 Barbels per Acre; Product of our own crop; grown from seed imported by us last rear 
from near Black Sea in Crimea. Russia. PRICE, $2 per bushel here, bags free. All other leading 
sorts of Seed Wheat, both hard and soft, $1 per bushel and up. Write for free catalogue, samples 
and descriptions. Address J. R. RATEKIN & SON, Shenandoah, Iowa. 
TREES AND PLANTS 
i —Free from Scale. New and Choice Varieties. 
Blackberries, Strawberries, Raspberries. 
Our FREE CATALOGUE will save you money. MYER & SON, BrldgeviUe. Del. 
BUDS OF NEW PLUMS. 
We will send 50 buds each of Luther Burbank’s new Plums, FIRST and COMBINATION, to¬ 
gether with sufficient raffia to tie them, and, if desired, model showing how to bud, all for SSI 10 
postpaid. We also have Climax Sultan, Shiro, Bartlett and America, and will send 10 buds 
each of these five new kinds with above, for 40 cents additional, or alone for SSI. Everything fumi¬ 
gated, healthy, clean and SAFE. ROGERS ON THE HILL, Tree Breeders, Dansville, N. Y 
MIMSON GLOVER 
V *<* HENRY A. DREER, 714 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 
In sowing this valuable clover It Is important 
that American seed is used. We supply gen¬ 
uine Delaware Beed only. Our special circular 
describing uses of Crimson Clover Is mailed 
