1808 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
The Farmers’ 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.1 
THINNING PEACH TREES IN AUTUMN. 
One of our readers in Sussex County, New Jersey, has a peach 
orchard two years old last Spring. It was cut back early last 
Spring, and the trees are very thick. As he has plenty of time 
just now, he thinks of thinning them, but is told by local peach 
growers to jvait until Winter. In your opinion would it be detri¬ 
mental to the trees to thin them now ? 
New Jersey Says Thin Now. 
In my opinion, now is the best time to thin peach 
trees, unless, perhaps, it be in June. It has always 
been practiced in this section ; one of the most suc¬ 
cessful growers here is thinning his trees now. I don’t 
know how it would affect trees that had been cut 
back last Spring, as I never saw a peach tree cut back 
without ruining it. joiin DAWES. 
Hunterdon County, N. J. 
I am sure it would not injure the trees to thin out 
the branches now. The sliortening-in process ought 
to be delayed until growth has started next Summer ; 
then if there be peaches on the trees, a few might be 
left on, but the greater quantity should be sheared off, 
clipping the ends of all limbs. I would not hesitate 
to thin the branches out at any time of year. 
Hunterdon County, N. J. joiin t. cox. 
Jf the man has the time to trim them, it would be 
all right to thin them now. Where he has to top the 
branches off, leave that until Spring, as they might 
die back if cut now ; but as to cutting out full limbs, 
and thinning out the center of the trees, it certainly 
can do no harm to do it this Pall. He would be sav¬ 
ing time, perhaps, if he is not busy, but as a rule, we 
advise Spring trimming, as people are very likely to 
cut the limbs back, and in that case, there might be 
some danger of their dying back, and they would have 
to trim them all over again, jos. h. bi.ack, son & co. 
Mercer County, N. J. 
Prefer Late Winter. 
For myself, I would prune the peach trees in late 
Winter, but I would prefer to do it this Pall rather 
than not at all. I assume from the inquiry that the 
pruning will be confined to small limbs, in which case 
Pall pruning will, probably, result in no injury. 
Cornell University. L. it. bailey. 
In my opinion, the proper time to thin or prune the 
wood of any fruit tree is at a time when the tree is 
dormant, or just before expanding its buds in the 
Spring. This may not be practicable for all possessed 
of large orchard interests ; if not then do it late in the 
Winter when the wood is free from frost, but I con¬ 
sider it unwise to do it at this season of the year. 
Ontario County, N. Y. s. D. willabd. 
As any pruning is more or less of a wounding and 
weakening process, and peaches are somewhat tender 
any way, I never consider it advisable to prune in the 
Fall. I would prefer to let the trees stand just as they 
are until the freezing weather of Winter is over, and 
then prune any time from the latter part of February 
to early April, before the buds begin to swell. 
Connecticut. j. ir. hale. 
All About Peanut Culture. 
L. IV., Lutherville, Ark. —Ilow are peanuts best grown on a large 
scale? Ought the seed to be hulled, and is there a machine to 
doit? How deep should they be planted ? What soil'is best ? Is 
stable manure necessary ? 
Ans.—T he growing of peanuts is neither very diffi¬ 
cult nor expensive, if the soil and climate are right. 
This crop requires a rather long season to mature 
properly, and this fact is sufficient to restrict it to the 
more southern States. It is more of a bean than a 
pea, and a warm climate is most suitable to its proper 
development. From childhood, I have been experi¬ 
menting with peanut culture in the various places 
where I have lived, and know by experience that it is 
useless to attempt it where there are not, at least five 
months of good, warm, growing weather. It is no 
use to put the seed in the ground until all danger of 
frost is over and the soil is warm enough to sprout 
beans. Arkansas is a very good section in which to 
grow the peanut.. 
The proper soil is of a loose, sandy nature. If it 
has an abundance of lime in it, so much the better, 
for this seems to be necessary to the peanut, and ap¬ 
plications of it are usually made every year or two to 
land in which this crop is grown. Too much stable 
manure, or other kinds in which there is an abundance 
of nitrogen, are not desirable. The crop gets some of 
its nitrogen from the air as do other leguminous crops. 
I have often seen the nitrogenous nodules on the 
roots. The land is prepared by good plowing and har¬ 
rowing, and the rows are laid out about the same 
distance as for corn, or a little closer. The seed 
is planted in drills about a foot apart in the row and 
two inches deep. It may be shelled, or the pods simply 
broken into single-seeded sections before planting. 
Two bushels in the hull are enough for an acre. I 
know of no machine for hulling them, although there 
may be such a thing. 
The cultivation is much the same as for potatoes, 
special care being taken to keep the soil perfectly 
clean of weeds and as mellow as is possible well up to 
the plants. As the little shoots begin to run down 
from the blossoms to form the pods, bed up or “ dirt ” 
the drills a little, which will enable them to set easily. 
After that, they should not be disturbed until fully 
ripe. 
The gathering is done about the time of the first 
frost. The vines are pulled, and make a most excel¬ 
lent fodder for cows, mules, horses, etc, after the nuts 
are taken off. There is no better food for hogs than 
peanuts, and some farmers in the South make it a rule 
to grow a field of them upon which to turn the hogs 
in the Fall. They will do their own harvesting of the 
crop. The principal part of the market crop is grown 
in southern Vii'ginia, the Carolinas, Tennessee and 
California. I have been in peanut fields that were of 
vast extent in those States. u. e. y. d. 
Preparing Sod Lands for Fruit, 
J. R., Metuchen, N. J .—What is the best preparation of grass 
land for growing berries ? The land is mostly rolling—a sandy 
loam, and is all in grass, with the exception of a small orchard. 
What would be the best crops to plant next Spring on sod turned 
over this Fall ? 
Ans.—I t is not desirable to set small fruits directly 
after a tough old sod. You should use one or two 
cleaning crops, that is, crops that will receive careful 
cultivation, before you set out fruits. Such sod may 
be plowed this Fall, leaving the furrows standing up 
as straight as possible. The frost and air will destroy 
a good many of the grass and weed roots, and also 
help to break up the soil. In the Spring, cross-plow 
or work up the sod with a tool like the Cutaway har¬ 
row ; then plant either corn or potatoes in hills, using 
what manure or fertilizer you can afford, and giving 
constant culture, so as to keep the weeds subdued. 
At the last cultivation of the corn, we would sow 12 
pounds per acre of Crimson clover. If this make a 
fair growth, which is likely, plow it under the next 
year, and either repeat the crop or set out small fruits 
as seems most desirable. 
A Starving Apple Orchard. 
II. P. K., Pittsburgh, Pa. —In my apple orchard, the trees are 
about 25 years old. The bark is hard and rough. The trees have 
not been pruned for three or four years. Part of the orchard is 
in sod, and part was in corn this year. On about 200 trees, the 
crop this year amounted to about 100 bushels. The farm has 
been let out on shares, everything taken off and nothing put on. 
The apples are knotty and wormy. I would like to put the orchard 
in first-class shape. Will hogs and sheep be of any benefit in an 
orchard ? 
ANSWERED BY J. 8. WOODWARD. 
The first and greatest trouble with H. 1*. K.’s orchard 
is just as he says, “ everything has been taken off and 
nothing put on,” and the orchard is starving. To 
make the matter worse, it has not been pruned, and 
so is carrying two or three times more leaves than 
the material brought up from the soil can properly 
develop. He does not say so, but I have no doubt 
that the trees are very full of yellow, sickly leaves. 
The knottiness and wormy condition of the fruit do 
not come from the trees being starved, but from the 
attacks of insects and fungi. 
There are two ways in which he can treat this 
orchard to bring it back to a healthy and fruitful 
condition. In either case, it should be judiciously 
pruned ; not hacked and sawed until it is simply a 
lot of trees with long, bare limbs surmounted by a 
canopy of leaves, but thinned and opened up to the air 
and sunlight, with fruit spurs left all along the limbs 
and through the tree. He can then give it a good 
dressing with stable manure and a liberal amount of 
hard-wood, unleached ashes, or what is cheaper, more 
easily applied and, I believe, just as good, muriate of 
potash, also a few hundred pounds per acre of bone 
dust or dissolved South Carolina rock ; he can buy 
that which will give him the same amount of phos¬ 
phoric acid the cheapest. He should then plow it 
early in the Spring, and keep the surface stirred often 
enough so that no weeds can grow until the middle 
of July, when he can sow it to Crimson clover or Can¬ 
ada peas and rye, to be plowed under again in the 
early Spring following. 
In addition to this course, he should spray this 
orchard, at least three or four times, with Bordeaux 
Mixture, using Paris-green or arsenate of soda at least 
twice with the mixture. He should spray once just 
as the leaf buds have broken so as to show blossom 
buds; next, just after the petals have fallen, and 
again when the apples are the size of quails’ eggs. 
737 
This course followed will surely give him fruit of a 
fine quality. 
Sheep and hogs, if properly kept in the orchard, 
will accomplish the same result, perhaps not quite so 
quickly, but just as thoroughly in the end. Mind, I 
say, if properly kept. By this, I don’t mean to put 10 
or 20 sheep and half as many hogs into the five acres, 
and let them run there. That number would, prob¬ 
ably, be able to live in the orchard, but they would 
add nothing to the soil ; no matter how long he kept 
them there, they would do nothing toward putting 
back the plant food of which the land has been robbed. 
Suppose he put 75 sheep on the five acres. Of course, 
they would starve unless he fed them something be¬ 
sides what they could get from the soil. If these sheep 
were hired pastured in the vicinity of Pittsburgh, it 
would cost him $3 per week, or four cents per head. 
For this $3, he would get the growth of the sheep. 
With them in this orchard, he feeds them $3 worth of 
wheat bran. This can now be bought for less than 
$12 per ton, but at that price, the $3 would buy 500 
pounds which, fed to the sheep, would make them 
thrive better than the finest pasture he could hire. 
So it would be just as profitable, so far as growth of 
sheep is concerned, to keep them in the orchard and 
feed the bran, as to hire them pastured on the other 
fellow’s land. 
But beyond the keeping of the sheep, the effect upon 
the orchard would be almost marvelous. By putting 
the sheep in May 1, and keeping them there until the 
middle of November, excepting two weeks in apple¬ 
picking time, they would be there 2(3 weeks, and in 
that time, eat 6% tons of bran. That 0% tons of bran 
would put upon the five acres 347 pounds of nitrogen, 
376 pounds of phosphoric acid, and 281) pounds of pot¬ 
ash, equal to a very heavy dressing of the best stable 
manure. Besides this, these sheep will keep the grass 
eaten to the very roots, and they will, also, by taking 
every wormy apple as soon as dropped, do much to 
keep down the injury from apple-eating insects. 
If now the orchard be given a liberal application of 
potash and phosphoric acid in some form, and be 
persistently sprayed, it can’t help but bear if buds are 
not injured by frost or cold storms. The almost gen¬ 
eral trouble with people who attempt to keep sheep in 
their orchards, is that they do not keep one-fourth 
enough, and then don’t feed them anything from which 
the sheep can manufacture manure for the benefit of 
the orchard. If the trees are hidebound, he can start 
the bark by washing them with a solution of soda 
ash or caustic soda—two pounds to a gallon of water— 
early in the Spring, from the ground up as high as he 
can reach. This will take off all the old, rough bark, 
and make them smooth and nice. 
Storing Celery. 
W. S. E., Casey, III.— Can you give me any information on the 
management of celery ? We have ours pulled and put in trenches 
about 8 or 10 inches deep, with a little sand put around the plants 
sufficient to fill the trenches. Have we done the proper thing, 
and how shall we proceed to keep it through the Winter, or for 
Fall and Winter use ? 
Ans. —Celery is best stored in trenches. We judge 
from your letter that you have not filled the trench 
with the plants closely set, as should be done, or it 
would not be necessary to put sand around them. 
Truckers usually dig a trench not over a foot wide, 
and just deep enough to sink the tops of the plants to 
the surface level. In taking up the plants, some soil 
may be left on the roots. Most growers knock all the 
soil off to save space. Pack the plants in the trench 
very closely together ; then either lay a single board 
across the top, which covers it, or make a species of 
trough from two boards, put together in a V-shape 
and place this cover over the trench. Close the end 
with straw or leaves, so that there will be some ven¬ 
tilation. When cold weather begins, put some soil 
over the top, and later, coarse manure, if desired. As 
the celery sweats a good deal, when first stored, it is 
not wise to put the soil covering on at once, but it 
must be put on when really cold weather starts. Some 
growers use a wide trench, making it about four feet 
wide, a board being run through the center to keep 
the celery from crowding too closely together. This 
is covered with a peaked roof of boards, having ven¬ 
tilators at reasonable distances, which are filled with 
litter in very severe weather, to keep the frost off. 
Where only a little celery is grown for family use, it 
is quite practicable to stand the plants into a box, 
deep enough to hold them, having a layer of loam on 
the bottom. A few holes may be bored into the sides 
of the box, and through these a little water can be 
given from time to time, as the loam dries out. Such 
a box as this may be placed in a corner of the cellar, 
and the celery will then keep well. Still another way 
for the home-grower is to take the old soil and manure 
out of the hotbed, put in a little loam, and stand the 
celery close together in this. Cover with the shutters, 
and when very severe weather comes, fill the frame 
clear up to the top with hay or leaves. Replace the 
sashes or shutters and pile hay or straw over the top. 
