1904. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
6i9 
IN FARMING FOR HIMSELF. 
For nearly one year I have been reading The R. N.-Y. 
with much interest, and I am pleased with the sociability 
that is displayed by the editor and its writers, really creat¬ 
ing the sensation of being one large family. I own a farm 
of 40 acres, four miles from central square of a city of Go,000 
people. The farm Is but 600 feet wide and slopes to the 
west Its entire length. Its soil is a yellow clay, with hard- 
pan underneath, then gravel or loam. It has fall enough 
to wash some. House and barn are along* the front, from 
whence the whole farm runs eastward. There is a small 
orchard of about GO trees of nearly everything; then comes 
15 acres of plowed land, or which there are four acres of 
corn, three acres of oats and about eight acres of Timothy, 
with a little clover. In the rear of the farm and of course 
next to plowed land lies the pasture, to which runs the lane 
from barn. Along the northern line fence are about 22 
acres, eight of which are a wood lot with many blackberry 
thorns. In this wood lot Is a never-falling spring well up 
the hill and in eight Summers I never saw any difference in 
its discharge, Summer or Winter; it runs through the center 
of the farm in a ditch, never causing any trouble. For eight 
Springs I had a desire to work the farm, but was always 
afraid of being unable to provide for the family, so back to 
shop I went again, leaving the barn, 30x50, standing about 
idle. Street cars pass closely, making it convenient to work 
in town. I had the place worked on shares, but the man said 
the land is run down and phosphate made but little show. 
This year I managed the farm, paying for the work done by 
the day and raising the above crops, which are looking fairly 
well. I take very much the same view regarding children as 
the Hope Farmer does, and heartily agree with him on many 
points. Having three girls and two boys, oldest girl 10, and 
boy 8, I believe my staying home now would have a good 
effect on their future. 
From The It. N.-Y. I learn that many farmers could make 
a living under those conditions, although we lack a mort¬ 
gage (not a bad fault), but I am no farmer. Coukl I keep 
that howling wolf, a mortgage, away from the farm? From 
the age of 1G till 21 I worked on three different dairy farms 
as hired hand, but for 13 years I did no farm work. Dairy 
would be my choice and I have closely studied (but not 
practiced) the methods of Mr. Manchester. Would some 
experienced farmer tell me now to proceed to start right? 
If 1 take courage to start under above conditions, would it 
be best to start in Fall or Spring? What would be most 
profitable, lo make butter at an average of 23 cents the year 
round if sold to stores, or sell milk to depot, driving daily 
four miles, average price 12 cents the year? On the east 
side of the barn is a good well 1G feet deep, built up with 
two-foot sewer tile, over which I could build a little cream¬ 
ery. What would be best to raise for feed, or most profitable 
under above conditions, aud how can I raise bedding, as I 
cannot thrash? It is hard to get a thrashing machine, and 
next to impossible to get the help, as the whole surroundings 
are working people with from one-half to 10 acres of land. 
Ohio. F. 
It scents to us that the first thing you 
need in order to make a success is to have 
more confidence in yottr own ability to 
succeed. Make up your mind that you are 
going in to win regardless of discourage¬ 
ments and the minor failures that one is 
sure to meet. Half the battle is in having 
an ideal ahead of you and working steadily 
toward that end, and making everything 
count. You have an excellent opening for 
a small hut safe dairy business. There are 
many men who would be glad if they could 
have a sure market for all the milk they 
could turn out at three cents per quart the 
year around. Milk at three cents per quart 
is better than butter at 23 cents unless you 
have too long a haul for the milk. For 
the milk business you want cows that will 
average 10 quarts per day for 300 days in 
the year, and you want to exercise your 
best judgment in selecting these cows, be¬ 
cause it may mean much to you. If you 
are to sell your milk good grade Holsteins 
will probably be best for this purpose. If 
possible get some good honest dairyman 
who knows what a good cow is to help 
you in your hrst buying. Do not go in 
for fat nice-looking cows, but for the ones 
that show by their form that they will 
give lots of milk if properly fed. Prob¬ 
ably your farm as it now is will keep six 
to 10 head from the coarse fodder you can 
raise, but by good management you can 
increase the number, and even double the 
highest. Others have done so, and what 
other men have done is possible for most 
of us. 
Fix the barn so that the cattle will be 
comfortable. Have plenty of windows for 
sunlight and air, and save every particle of 
manure, both liquid and solid. If you are at 
all handy with tools you can do most of this 
barn repairing yourself, and all stormy days can be made 
to count towards improving conditions for the cows. We 
should prefer a tight drop back of the cows about seven 
inches deep and 15 inches wide. Have absorbents to 
use in this gutter (the manure from the horse will be 
good), so as to save all the manure. If you can get 
eight or 10 cows plan to have a silo next Fall either 
in the barn or outside, as it will help you greatly to 
keep up a good flow of milk at small expense. We 
should put at least half of the 15 acres into corn next 
season, and get every bit of manure possible on to the 
corn ground and the meadow. As t soon as the oats are 
off plow and sow rye, and do the same on the corn 
ground. You can feed this late in the Fall and early in 
the Spring or mow it early for rye hay; then turn under 
the stubble for corn. Be sure and put the land in good 
shape before you plant the corn, as it will insure a better 
crop at much less expense. One of the great causes of 
failure among our New England farmers is that they 
plant before the ground is half fitted. 
Tt is not necessary to raise bedding; leaves, sawdust 
n 
EGYPTIAN PERENNIAL ONION SETS. Fig. 275. 
or shavings will answer; the first you can gather your¬ 
self, and the two latter you can probably buy at a reason¬ 
able price at some of the saw or planing mills near you. 
What your land needs is manure to raise big crops from 
it. Perhaps you can buy horse manure near you at a 
reasonable price. We are offered lots of it at 50 cents 
a two-horse load by people who keep a horse and are 
glad to get rid of the nuisance to them, but a valuable 
article for the farm. The coarse fodders that you raise 
on the farm will not be enough to make a good flow of 
milk, and the cows will need some grain feed. Buy 
feeds that are high in protein, such as linseed meal, 
cotton-seed meal, corn distillers’ grains and gluten feed. 
If you have silage any of these can be fed alone with it, 
but if you have dry fodder only better have some bran 
to mix with the grain. Do not buy cornmeal, oat feeds 
or patent feeds of any kind. Keep the cows clean and 
comfortable, so that your milk will ho better than the 
usual run, no matter if it doesn’t bring a better price. 
Perhaps there arc opportunities near you to supply cream 
to hotels, bakeries or restaurants. If you could find a 
good market for sweet cream it would leave you the 
skim-milk at home to feed calves, pigs and hens. Put 
up ice in the Winter to help keep your milk in the 
Summer; do not depend on the well alone. Whether to 
start in Fall or Spring makes little difference. Your 
row may be a little difficult to hoe at first, no matter 
when you start, but never mind that, hut keep at it and 
if there is the right stuff in you you will succeed. 
H. G. M. 
ARTIFICIAL HEAT FOR POULTRY. 
On page 422 Zimmer Bros, talk about supplying heat for 
500 heus at a cost of iflO during the Winter. I would like 
to learn more about how it is done, what they beat with, 
and if their buildings are built on the colony plan or are 
in sections? c. w. f. 
Summit, N. J. 
We have one poultry house 30x00, which is divided 
into 12 pens and has an alley through the center of 
house. We use a hot-water heater and pipe system for 
heating it at a cost of $100 for the heating system. 
Last Winter we used one ton of coal to keep this build¬ 
ing at a temperature of 35 or 40. We let the fire go out 
when a thaw was on, and only ran it when the ther¬ 
mometer came to the freezing point inside the building, 
which was about half the time. This building is used 
for a brooder house during the Spring months, and 
this is when we get full value from our heating system 
by using the hot-water pipes for brooders. We have 
another house 20x50 divided into six pens with a stove 
in one end and the smoke pipe running the whole length 
of house. One ton of coal has run this stove during the 
past cold Winter, keeping the inside temperature above 
freezing. Both these houses are lined, which makes the 
coal bill small, but when we build again we will not line 
the building because the lining is of no use except 
during two or three cold months, and the interest on the 
cost of lining will buy enough coal to keep the house 
from freezing, and we have severe Winters in this 
section. C. h. zimmer. 
Cayuga Co., N. L———— 
NOTES FROM CENTRAL ILLINOIS. 
You speak of three-cornered hoes. We keep two or 
three hoes of this shape for light picking work. I take 
a new hoe and with the corner of a sharp flat file I file 
a little along the corners and putting the wings in an 
iron vice snap them off. To be sure, the 
hoe will not last quite so long, and it is 
worthless in covering potatoes, or where 
any dragging up of earth is needed, but it 
is light and very convenient in ordinary 
hoeing, and does away with part of that 
“tired feeling” that “slants the brow” (ac¬ 
cording to one of our poets). 'We have 
no rocks here and we ile our hoes sharp 
and keen, morning and noon, and some¬ 
times oftener. A neighbor says he don’t 
want his hoes wasted away by filing and 
grinding. My hoe is shown on page 620 . 
Apples are not showing up very well. 
Blight, scale and curculio have got’most 
of them. Most here do not spray, and 
many who have faith in it were so rushed 
by work because of the scarcity of help and 
wet weather that they stopped too soon. 
1 have easily 10 times as many good apples 
on trees that were sprayed, even only once 
or twice, as on those unsprayed. Of 
course blight cannot be controlled, but 
scale can, and I incline to think that either 
the Bordeaux or the arsenic, or both, have 
a beneficial effect as to curculio. The 
plant lice that work on the apple and 
melon are about as difficult to manage as 
blight. We have first got to know how 
to manage tl\e ants that herd the lice, in 
my opinion. 
Among the soft-fleshed apples that per¬ 
sons with defective teeth like to get hold 
of I have come across an old one, here 
little known, that has proved a good bearer 
for two or three years. It is as tender and 
soft as Yellow Transparent or All Sum¬ 
mer and of about the same size. It is the 
Sugarloaf Pippin. It is described by 
Downing as being “firm,” but it is not— 
it is very tender when fully ripe and there 
is considerable green to the color until it 
arrives at its best condition. It is nearly “very good” 
in its prime. Of course the color unfits it for market, 
for light-colored, tender apples show slight bruises too 
badly, even with careful handling. It should be sprayed 
to deliver it from all scab, and then, as Downing says, 
“it is very showy on the tree.” b. buckman. 
Central Illinois. 
R. N.- Y.—Stopping too soon discourages many a be¬ 
ginner. Progressive orchardists now know that they 
must spray if they would have marketable fruit; one 
who ignores this may as well leave the business. 
A BUNCH OF SAND VETCH. Fig. 276. 
