1899 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
5a9 
Farmers’ Club. 
[Every query must be accompanied by the 
name and address of the writer to insure atten¬ 
tion. 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.] 
When to Plant Blackberries. 
C. O'. It., Itethel, Conn.—When shall I plant 
new blackberry canes? 
Ans.—A good time to set a new black¬ 
berry patch in Connecticut is in the 
Fall, provided the ground is moist. 
Early Spring is also a good time, but 
the plants are sure to get an early start 
if set the Fall previous. The rows 
should not be nearer than seven feet 
apart, and the plants about 2 y 2 feet in 
the row. Some persons plant six feet 
apart in squares, so as to be able to 
cultivate both ways. H. e. v. d. 
When to Transplant Raspberries. 
C. P. II., Freeport, L. /.—I have a quantity 
of raspberry bushes, and the canes are so 
old that the berries are all drying up, now 
that there are a great many new shoots 
springing up all over. Would it be ad¬ 
visable to transplant them now or later? 
Ans. —It may not be known to the in¬ 
quirer that raspberry, and blackberry, 
canes, too, come up one year, bear the 
next, and die as soon as the berries are 
done ripening. The dry weather may 
have caused the berries to dry up, and 
the same reason would account for the 
premature dying of the bearing canes. 
The young canes or sprouts should be al¬ 
lowed to stand until Fall, when they may 
be moved to a new piece of ground, to 
form a new patch. If the old patch is 
a neglected one, it may be the better 
plan to abandon it for a new one. 
Whether the berry patch be old or new, 
the addition of plenty of manure to the 
soil will be both necessary and very, 
profitable. h. e. v. d. 
Pear Tree in a Lawn. 
Header, Paradise, N. J.—What shall I do to 
encourage a neglected Sheldon pear tree, 
standing on a lawn? It is about 25 years 
old, has some suckers, is dense headed, and 
bears a fair crop each alternate year. The 
grass grows thickly right up to the trunk.' 
Would I better remove the turf for a small 
radius around the tree? What fertilizer 
may be used, and how applied? How and 
when prune it? 
Ans.— Lawns are nearly always poor 
places to grow fruit trees, and it is only 
by the best of care that they may be 
made to flourish in such places. Grass 
robs them of both fertility and mois¬ 
ture. My plan would be to remove the 
turf for a wide radius about the tree, 
and the wider • the better. It would 
make the lawn look unsightly to do so, 
no doubt, but looks must give way to 
utility in some degree. The grass 
should not be nearer the tree than the 
ends of its outer branches. Spade up 
this bare area, and manure it with 
anything that will make other things 
grow. Keep this space cultivated. 
Watering with wash-water, or with any 
water, will make a great difference in 
the vigor of the tree. h. e. v. v. 
Fruits in Illinois. 
A. A. P„ Braidwood, 111— My lot contains 
about one acre of ground, sandy soil with 
quicksand underneath. Vegetables and 
small fruits seem to do well here, but for 
some reason fruit trees do not. Very little 
attention, however, is given to fruit grow¬ 
ing. 1. What fruit trees, if any, will do 
well here? I would like to plant a few 
apple and plum trees. 2. How late In the 
season can peas be planted to be of any 
service? As late as August 1? 
Ans.— 1. The fact that “very little at¬ 
tention is given to fruit growing” in 
A. A. P.’s locality is not a sure indica¬ 
tion that fruits will not succeed there, 
but experience there has undoubtedly 
had something to do with the present 
condition of things in this line. North¬ 
eastern Illinois ought to have a fairly 
good climate for apples and plums of 
the hardier types. But sandy soil with 
quicksand underneath is not the kind 
of soil and subsoil that best suits these 
fruits. The apple, especially, does bet¬ 
ter on stiffer soil. Such varieties as 
Yellow Transparent, Red Astrachan, 
Oldenburg, and Wealthy ought to do as 
well as any there. Plums of the Amer¬ 
icana type, such as Wolf, Stoddard, 
Hawkeye, Cheney, Wyant, Ocheeda and 
Weaver ought to do very well there. 
Possibly some of the Damson class 
would succeed, but I would not advise 
trying the Domestica type. The Ama- 
relles and Morello cherries may do well 
there. Of the former, Richmond is the 
best, and Ostheim and Louis Philippe 
of the latter. 2. Peas like cool weather. 
The sun is quite hot in August, but dur¬ 
ing the latter part of that month or 
early in September it may do to sow the 
seed if the soil is moist. This would 
give time for the maturing of the very 
early kinds, such as Alaska, Little Gem 
and Nott’s Excelsior before frost would, 
usually, damage them in that region. 
H. e. v. D. 
Forcing Cucumbers. 
F. C. C., Bandy Creek, Me.— Prof. Bailey, in 
his Forcing Book, says that a house of 68 
White Spine cucumber plants, yielded 6,180 
fruits, or 90 to the plant from April to 
June, following lettuce. What was the 
method of handling the plants to obtain 
such a yield? How were they trained and 
manured, and particularly how were they 
pinched? Do they require a larger quantity 
of phosphoric acid or potash? Would not 
cotton-seed meal be preferable or nitrate 
of soda? 
Ans.— The Massachusetts growers sow 
the seed in boxes, and transplant from 
these to six-inch pots, two plants to a 
pot. The little plants cannot stand a 
chill, and the soil into which they are 
transplanted should be of the same 
temperature as that from which they 
are removed. Two plants are put in a 
hill, the hills 42 inches apart. The soil 
is extremely rich in stable manure, 
which supplies heat as well as fertility. 
Stable manure is the great plant food of 
the market gardeners, and they use 
little of anything else. One grower told 
us that, in making his compost heap, he 
mixed sods and manure, half and half, 
and then chopped down the pile and 
again added half the bulk of manure. A 
trench is made in the bed, one foot deep, 
where the plants are to go, and a ridge 
of manure placed in it, which makes the 
little plants fairly jump. Eight weeks 
from seed to cucumber is calculated 
upon. 
Some of the growers train the vines 
up the roof, on wires about one foot be¬ 
low the glass; others have a trellis like 
an inverted V running along the middle 
of the bed, a row of vines being trained 
up over it from either side. Very little 
pruning or pinching- out of shoots is 
done, though the tip may be removed, 
when the vine has grown to as great a 
length as is desired. If a strong growth 
is made, it may be advisable to remove 
one of the two plants put together in a 
hill; the advantage of planting the two 
is that it avoids risk of a gap. 
The houses have a temperature of 65 
to 70 degrees, and bees are kept in them 
to aid in pollination. We do not know 
of any cucumber grower who uses cot¬ 
ton-seed meal; stable manure used lib¬ 
erally gives the results sought, and, so 
long as the growers can obtain it, they 
do not feel the need of experimenting 
with chemicals. 
Caring for Strawberry Beds. 
A. M. P., Canton, N. Y.—What is the best 
way to take care of a small strawberry 
bed after the fruiting season is past? 
Ans. —Our own way is about as fol¬ 
lows: As soon as possible after fruiting, 
we mow off the vines and rake the tops 
away. Then, with a sharp plow, or a 
spade, we turn a furrow away from each 
side of the row, leaving but a narrow 
space where the old row stood. We 
scatter fertilizer, chicken manure or 
fine stable manure at the bottom of 
these furrows close up to the roots of 
the plant. In a large bed, we begin cul¬ 
tivation at once. In a small bed work 
is done with a hoe. The object is grad¬ 
ually to level down these furrows, bring¬ 
ing the earth up to the plants, and keep¬ 
ing down all weeds and the greater part 
of the runners. This cultivation is kept 
up through the season, the ground being 
thoroughly stirred. We do not like the 
matted-bed system, but prefer a nar¬ 
row row, with not more than three new 
plants from each old one. The object 
of fertilizing the strawberry imme¬ 
diately after fruiting, is to supply its 
food just when it is most needed. The 
most important growth of the straw¬ 
berry is made during the late Summer 
and Fall. The buds which are to pro¬ 
duce the next year’s fruit are formed in 
the crown late in the season. It is put 
close up to the plants, because the 
strawberry roots are short and cannot 
run out after their dinner. We consider 
it a mistake to wait until Spring before 
applying the fertilizer, or to neglect the 
plant during the Summer and Fall, and 
allow it to become choked up with weeds 
or io send out too many runners. 
Grain Hay for Stock. 
Several Subscribers.— Can we cut wheat or 
rye as Winter fodder for stock? 
Ans. —Green wheat cut and cured like 
hay while the grain is in the milky or 
dough stage, will make excellent fodder. 
In California, the best hay on the mar¬ 
ket is wheat hay. This is cut while the 
plants are green, and cured like Tim¬ 
othy. In central New Jersey, the pres¬ 
ent dry season has cut down the hay 
crop, and dairymen are cutting the 
wheat and the rye to feed to their cows. 
Rye hay is poor stuff, as it makes a 
hard, tough fodder, but hay made from 
wheat, oats or barley, is excellent fod¬ 
der, and is relished by all classes of 
live stock. 
Piling or Broadcasting Manure. 
rear end of the cultivator. It drags or 
scrapes along and crushes or levels the 
ground with something the action of a 
light roller, leaving the ground in better 
shape for the seed to sprout. In seeding 
on oat stubble, we would use a light 
spike-tooth harrow or a weeder for 
working in the seed. The weeder does 
well at this work. Do not leave the seed 
on top of the ground. 
Fall Grains 
need a good start to stand 
the winter ; therfore feed 
them well in the beginning. 
This will produce hardy 
plants with plump grain. A 
good fertilizer should contain 
plenty of 
Potash 
Potash increases stiffness of 
stalk and plumpness of grain. 
Our books tell the rest — tent free. 
GERMAN KALI WORKS, 
93 Nassau Street, New York. 
Cyanide 
A. M., Warsaw, N. Y.— In drawing manure 
from a village to be used on sod ground 
for beans next year, is it better to spread 
it on now as fast as drawn, or put it in a 
pile until Autumn or early Spring? If 
there be any lost from evaporation when 
spreading it on the field now, what ele¬ 
ments would be most likely to evaporate, 
arid how extensively? 
Ans. —It depends on several things. 
The safest place for manure is in the 
soil—that is, plowed well under. You 
are less likely to lose fertility than when 
it is piled, or spread on the surface. 
There will be practically no loss from 
evaporation when manure is spread 
thinly on the sod. Experiments show 
that the loss of nitrogen from this cause 
is too small to be worth considering. 
There will be a greater loss by evapora¬ 
tion when the manure is piled and not 
well cared for. The chief losses in 
broadcasted manure are nitrogen and 
potash leached out by rain water. On 
level ground, most of this is retained in 
the soil. On hilly ground, especially 
when frozen, much of it is lost by sur¬ 
face drainage. By piling the manure 
and keeping it moist, you will have it in 
fine condition for spreading in the 
Spring. We would prefer to pile, and 
work over at least once during the 
Winter. 
How to Sow Crimson Clover. 
II. J. E., Clarence, N. Y.—Which is the best 
way to sow Crimson clover in corn—to sow 
it ahead of the cultivator, or after it, 
allowing rain to wash it in? I have no 
spike-tooth cultivator. In sowing after 
oat stubble that has been well harrowed, 
should the seed be harrowed in with a 
light harrow, or sown on top? 
Ans. —We consider it a mistake to 
leave the clover seed on top of the 
ground. It should be worked in lightly, 
but not too deep. We sow the seed 
ahead of the cultivator. On a large 
acreage a boy can ride a horse through 
the corn with a box or bag of the seed, 
and cover four rows at the time. We 
follow with either a Planet Jr., or dia¬ 
mond-tooth cultivator, the latter being 
better on very light soil. We like to use 
a piece of plank or a light drag behind 
the cultivator. This is about the width 
of the row, and hung by wires to the 
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