THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
51 
1904 
STRAWBERRIES ON CLAY SOIL 
1 have good clay soil that has been in cultivation for 
several years—for the last two in corn. I wish to plant 
strawberries, using chemical fertilizers alone so as to pro¬ 
duce an immense crop of large berries. How shall I do it? 
Michigan. reader. 
IiV. F. Taber's Experience. 
The growing of immense crops of large berries is 
dependent upon the most favorable conditions of soil 
fertilization, cultivation and climatic conditions. I 
use commercial fertilizers exclusively to grow the 
plants, having previously secured abundant supplies 
of vegetable matter by the plowing under of green 
crops—Crimson clover or clover and rye sown to¬ 
gether at the last cultivation of the previous corn 
crop. I fear that the two successive corn crops have 
depleted this clay soil of its vegetable matter to such 
an extent that best results may not be realized from 
the use of commercial fertilizers unless an abundant 
rainfall is had to prevent the drying and baking of 
the soil. My method of applying the fertilizer is as 
follows: Prepare the ground thoroughly, making the 
surface as fine as possible; then with a plank-drag 
smooth the surface for marking, which I do with a 
light marker which can be drawn by men. Then sow 
the fertilizer along the lines as evenly as possible from 
eight to 10 inches wide at the rate of 1,000 pounds per 
acre. Harrow lightly or better still (if acreage is not 
too great) rake it in, thus keeping the soil from 
being packed by the horse. Mark the ground 
and set plants 16 to 20 inches apart, rows three 
feet eight inches apart. I use a complete high- 
grade fertilizer, four to five per cent nitrogen, 
10 per cent phosphoric acid, eight to 10 per cent 
potash. I have sometimes made a light applica¬ 
tion during the growing season, but not often. 
If the ground is properly prepared and weather 
favorable when set the plants will soon g.et hold 
of the available food that the fertilizer furnish¬ 
ed. I prefer to use commercial fertilizer in 
growing, my plants, as we get more or less weed 
seed in stable or barnyard manures. These I 
use for a Winter covering. Walter f. taber. 
Dutchess Co., N. Y. 
Advice from Thomas R. Hunt. 
I do not think I can help your Michigan cor¬ 
respondent in his strawberry problem. My 
practice is to set strawberries on ground that 
has been devoted to celery or onions for two 
or three years previously, and very heavily fer¬ 
tilized during that time, without applying any 
fertilizer or manure whatever at the time the 
patch is set out. I have invariably had better 
success when following this plan than when 
fertilizers were used at the time of planting. 
Both commercial fertilizers and stable manure, 
applied at the time a bed is set out, seem to 
burn the roots of the plants and produce in¬ 
jury. I do not say that your correspondent can¬ 
not get a good crop from such a piece of land as 
he proposes to plant, but it will be contrary to 
my experience if he should do so. If the land 
he proposes to plant were mine I would give it a 
rather light application of bone and potash, say 
700 pounds of bone and 300 of potash per acre 
in Spring and harrow it in. I would set part 
of the field with strawberries and put the remainder 
in early potatoes or some other crop that could be 
taken off in midsummer, and plant the rest of the field 
with strawberries (without additional fertilizer) after 
this crop had been taken off. In September, when 
the cooler weather is beginning, I would scatter along 
the rows (keeping it off the leaves), and cultivate in, 
a light dressing of some complete fertilizer and a lit- 
lle nitrate of soda. It is important to keep the ground 
thoroughly cultivated during the Summer and Fall. 
I find a small spike-tooth harrow best for this pur¬ 
pose. Following the plan outlined above your corre¬ 
spondent will probably get a good crop, but it will 
not be so good, nor the berries so large, as if his land 
bad been well cultivated and heavily manured for 
two or three years prior to setting the strawberry 
patch. THOMAS R. HUNT. 
New Jersey. 
MAKING WATER CARRY ITSELF. 
After carrying water three times daily for 1,000 
breeding pigeons for a time, I decided I would make 
it carry itself, so procuring about 200 feet of second¬ 
hand 114-inch iron pipe I set about it and after a few 
hours’ work I had the pleasure of seeing the watering 
done as perfectly as before without the work of carry¬ 
ing about 12 buckets of water daily. They would not 
drink this amount but it is quite necessary that 
pigeons should have fresh water each time they are 
fed and plenty of it for bathing in afterwards. The 
pump that furnished the water was some distance 
from the yards, and the piping had to pass two doors 
that were used several times daily, so that it was 
necessary to lower the pipe to the ground, passing the 
doors, then raising about two feet above first water 
pans and giving it a gradual fall to about one foot 
above the last pan, there being 10 watering pans in 
all. I then drilled an eighth-inch hole in pipe di¬ 
rectly over each pan, the pipe being connected with 
pump trough, which would hold enough water for all 
pans. We would only have to pump the water and 
the piping would do the rest, and at the same time 
rest the attendant somewhat. To prevent freezing I 
put in a small valve at lowest point near pump to let 
water out of pipe on ground ,t. e. s. 
Columbus, N. J. 
THE DRUNKEN COW AGAIN. 
Referring to the article on page 818, last volume, 
headed “Can a Cow Get Drunk on Apples?” written 
by Dr. Smead, I am compelled to take issue with the 
Doctor, not so much from personal experience, but 
from a scientific standpoint. Inasmuch as Dr. Smead 
also claims to draw his conclusions from the same 
source, I hope my opinion will receive the same con¬ 
sideration as his, which seems to be drawn from a 
physiological standpoint alone. There is no ques¬ 
tion of doubt that Dr. Smead, as a veterinary, under¬ 
stands the anatomy of a cow’s digestive apparatus 
completely, but his views upon the process of fermen¬ 
tation are sadly at fault. For instance, he speaks of 
apples with decayed spots in them, as fermenting. 
VERMONT GOLD COIN POTATO. Fig. 23 
See Ruralisms, Page 54. 
The process of decay is putrefaction, an entirely dif¬ 
ferent process from that of fermentation. Therefore, 
a cow would be no more liable to become intoxicated 
from eating decayed apples than she would from 
sound apples. Again, a person cannot help seeing the 
absurdity of a cow’s becoming intoxicated from eas¬ 
ing apples, when he thoroughly understands what 
takes place during a process of fermentation. 
Figuratively speaking, 50 per cent of the'saccharine 
matter contained in the juice of any fruit passes ol'f 
in the atmosphere in the form of carbonic acid gas, 
and the other 50 per cent of the saccharine matter is 
formed into alcohol during fermentation. Therefore, 
I am compelled to draw my conclusions as follows; 
If, after eating say a bushel of apples, fermentation 
takes place in a cow’s rumen sufficiently to form al¬ 
cohol enough to make the cow intoxicated, her rumen 
would become distended to the size of a 40-ton hay¬ 
stack, owing to the greater volume of the gas over 
and above the volume of the alcohol formed. If the 
old cow in her intoxicated condition had found room 
to store the gas without rupturing her rumen, she 
would be so miserably uncomfortable that a pint of 
whisky would be a “Balm of Gilead” to her sufferings. 
I do not claim that fermentation would not take place 
in the cow’s rumen. In fact, I believe it does upon 
some occasions, but the symptoms which have been 
attributed to intoxication are rather symptoms of dis¬ 
tress from the formation of carbonic acid gas. Verily, 
“there are some things going on in a cow’s stomach” 
that other people besides chemists do not understand. 
Dr. W. H. Ridge in his article on page 862, has hit 
upon the true course of the supposed-to-be symptoms 
of intoxication. j. i>. davis, m. d. 
Chautauqua Co., N. Y. 
HOW TO BUILD A COLD ROOM. 
A reader on Long Island sends us the following ques¬ 
tion: “I wish to build a cold storage room to hold from 
500 to 1,000 barrels of apples or other fruit in the first 
floor, the second story to be used for storing the ice, 
from 150 to 200 tons, perhaps more. How large and of 
about what form should this building be? How large 
and how close together should the floor timbers be placed 
to carry the ice, and how many upright posts should 
there be? What timber will best withstand the damp¬ 
ness? Oak, spruce and a little locust are at hand, enough 
of the latter for the heavier timbers if desired. How 
many walls will be required? What is the best substance 
to put between? What is the best way to ventilate such 
a plant?” 
The cold storage plan indicated by your correspon¬ 
dent. is objected to on the grounds that it requires 
such a large ice room, and so much work to fill it. 
Cold rooms of the capacity desired are frequently 
built with an ice box within which is filled with ice 
at intervals during the warm weather. This plan, 
while requiring less ice, necessitates much work in 
Summer in transferring ice from the ice house to the 
cold room. Where the ice pond is conveniently situ¬ 
ated the plan suggested is entirely practicable. How¬ 
ever, it will require more ice than the amount men¬ 
tioned. A. room 20x40 feet and six feet high will ac¬ 
commodate about 500 barrels of apples, and over all 
of this there ought to be a thickness of 12 feet of ice, 
making a building 20x40 feet on the ground and 18 
feet high to the eaves. The upper room of this 
building will hold about 250 tons of ice. The 
success of the scheme will depend upon the 
thoroughness with which the building is con¬ 
structed. No makeshift job as is permissible in 
an ordinary ice house or the ice will not keep 
long enough to make the cold storage effectual. 
It must be built above ground with foundations 
of the best, and perfectly tight. There must be 
a foundation wall running through the center of 
the house the long way to support the ice floor 
which has to be built very strong. The storage 
room floor should be double, and well laid. 
There should be an air space and layer of build¬ 
ing paper between. The walls of the entire 
building should have two air spaces and two lay¬ 
ers of building paper. The roof should be dou¬ 
ble with a foot of space between. A window for 
light should have three sashes, and should be 
where the sun never strikes it. The room should 
only be opened, if possible, early in the morning 
when it is cool, and there should be two or 
three doors to go in by, with spaces between so 
you can shut one before you open the next. 
White oak is good for the beams of the ice floor. 
They may be made 4x12 inches and 20 feet long, 
and should be placed about two feet apart. They 
should be supported through the middle by a 
purlin one foot square resting on eight-inch 
posts eight feet apart through the long way of 
the building. The whole structure should be 
well braced, having to bear such a heavy load 
so high up. The ice floor is covered with gal¬ 
vanized iron sheeting to be water tight, and 
should slope a few inches to where an outlet 
drainage pipe is attached. This pipe should ex¬ 
tend to the ground and there be trapped; that 
is, should bend upward at the outlet so that 
there will always be water in it to exclude the 
warm air that would otherwise enter and melt the ice. 
In a storage house of this kind, and in ice houses 
in general, there should be no more ventilation than 
absolutely necessary. When the sun shines on a 
Summer day the air above the ice is partially warmed 
and does not cool off readily at night unless thex-e 
is some means of ventilation. Slatted windows at 
each end of the roof near the ridge are all that will 
be required. As for the cold room all the air that 
passes out during the process of ventilation will be 
replaced by warmer air, and to that extent raise the 
temperature of the room and melt the ice above. Keep 
the air out at the bottom and open a flue under the 
ice floor, and connecting with the slatted windows in 
the gables. This opening may be usually kept closed 
except at those times when ventilation is thought 
necessary. 
The reason that an ice house with room beneath re¬ 
quires to be built with so much care in order to pre¬ 
serve ice through the season, is because of the large 
space beneath the ice. Warm air is always seeking to 
rise, and that which gets in the storage room, as some 
will under the most perfect conditions, keeps playing 
against the ice floor and ascending into the ice. But 
there is no doubt a house of the kind described will 
keep apples as long as desired into the Summer. 
GRANT DAVIS. 
The newspapers report a raid on a whisky still in 
South Carolina. The still was smashed. Returning from 
the raid the officers heard a negro woman say: “Glory— 
now me an do chillun will have bread and meat!” Did 
you ever stop to think how many thousands would cay 
this if all the rum shops were closed? Ever think how 
this would boom farm products? 
