1904 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
475 
FARMING ON A PAYING BASIS. 
Having as a florist and landscape gardener come in 
contact with several farm owners and managers, I would 
like to express my views upon this important subject. 
First, where is the capitalist to find a practical and suc¬ 
cessful farmer with up-to-date ideas who will consent to 
leave his own farm (for he surely has one) to work 
and manage and receive orders from any man unaccus¬ 
tomed to farming? There are many farms in this 
locality worked by hired help exclusively. None of 
these pays any interest whatever on investment; no, 
they don’t pay expenses. The price of farm labor is 
none too high; it should be higher, and the number of 
hours constituting a day’s work reduced to place the 
worker on an equal footing with those in the factories. 
Will some practical and successful farmer kindly tell 
us what interest he would expect to make should his 
employees commence work at 7 A. M. and quit at 5 or 6 
P. M., as they do in the manufactories where the profit- 
sharing system is so successfully in operation? 
A competent manager in a manufactory receives 
$ 1,000 and upward for his services of six days per week 
and observes all the legal holidays, and in many cases 
has at least two weeks vacation. How fares the farm 
manager? Would a thousand dollars per year be too 
much for him? He who has up-to-date ideas and is 
educated to the business through long years of practical 
experience and study, and is on hand to look after 
things seven days a week, shall we grant him the thou¬ 
sand dollars? Yes, he is worth it, and at five per cent 
it is the interest on only $ 20 , 000 . Next, comes the un¬ 
skilled labor at a low estimate of $500 per annum repre¬ 
senting another $ 10,000 investment at five per cent. 
Here we have an investment of $30,000. It must pay 
five per cent to pay the help. It ought to pay five per 
cent more for the owner, and the depreciation of value 
of buildings, fences, stock and machinery is no small 
item, and must be accounted for. How can a farm be 
run on a paying basis is a hard question. Perhaps the 
price of farm prod¬ 
ucts is, and always 
has been, too low. It 
is an honest fact that 
the average farmer 
cannot run his busi¬ 
ness as does his broth¬ 
er manufacturer or 
merchant. If after 
counting cost of pro¬ 
duction he should add 
a small percentage as 
profit, he would be 
undersold by his 
neighbor, who claims 
his crops don’t cost 
as much because he 
does most of the 
work himself, except¬ 
ing what his wife and 
children do, and that doesn’t cost him anything. The 
condition of the average farmer is improving. Yet it 
is deplorable, for he is the poorest paid of all the toilers, 
who are extracting from the earth all that is to feed, 
clothe and make rich their city cousins, who are ever 
welcome to try farming, and show how a farm can be 
run on a paying basis. They are the people who are 
bringing back the wealth to the farm, from whence it 
came. c. f. c. 
Hamburg, N. Y. 
WATERING COWS. 
Which is the Best System? 
To read the answers to the above questions that 
have appeared in recent numbers of The R. N.-Y. one 
would think it was merely a question of the opinion and 
convenience of the owner, and that the old cow had 
nothing to do with it. To get really down to the bot¬ 
tom of this matter we must study the cow and her 
nature and needs. It is true that the cow can live and 
be watered only once a day, sometimes once in two 
days; but that is not her nature, nor the way to make 
her give most profit. The cow is a ruminant, and as 
such never drinks because she is thirsty. No one ever 
saw a cow drinking on an empty stomach provided she 
could get water at will. Watch a cow running in a pas¬ 
ture bordering a creek. She first fills up her “hay mow" 
with what she thinks a full meal, then she goes to the 
creek and stands in the water and “eatswe call it 
chewing the cud, but it is really eating, and every 
now and then she sips a little water, not because she 
is thirsty, but to keep the contents of the “hay mow" 
(her stomach) in the best condition for rumination, 
“eating,” in this way she gets all the water she needs. 
I have watched my cows in the stable. They first take 
in the feed to fill the “mow,” then they take a sip of 
water and commence to “eat” (chew the cud). In a 
little time they sip more water, and so on continually. 
I have seen them get up in the night, take a little water 
and lie down again, the whole operation not taking 10 
minutes; in an hour they would do the same thing again, 
busy eating (chewing the cud) all the time. Now the 
cow knows a heap much more than nine-tenths of the 
men who care for her, and she says clearly by her 
actions that she wants it often instead of a half barrel 
once or twice a day. We have a cow now in our stable 
here in town that drinks not less than 75 quarts, about 
150 pounds of water, every day, for which she is giving 
at least 25 quarts of milk, about 54 pounds. She could 
not do that only watered once or even twice a day. 
Now supposing one uses a cement trough or a mov¬ 
able trough, and waters the animals all at one time. 
A GROUP OF JERSEYS. Fig. 206. See Page. 477. 
Many of the cows will not just then wish to drink, 
and as a result they can have none till next time for 
watering, when maybe they want to drink in a half hour. 
It is objected, the permanent basins sometimes get feed 
and dirt into them. This is true, but one-fourth the 
time spent in keeping the cement or movable trough 
clean, and in watering the cows will keep the basins 
clean enough for the owner to drink from. But by using 
automatic or self-closing covers, the basin is always 
shut except when cows are drinking, and all feed, dirt 
and stable odor is excluded. This also entirely prevents 
the cow from lapping water out and wetting manger and 
feed, a habit an occasional cow will acquire, but this 
can be prevented by putting a float (a small piece of 
board) into the basin. As to the objection raised that 
water pipes and basins are liable to freeze on cold nights, 
by simply turning a stopcock placed in proper place all 
the water can be quickly drawn from the entire system 
as a prevention on extremely cold nights. But any 
dairyman whose stable is so cold as to cause the pipes 
to freeze can make no more profitable investment than 
to use enough paper and boards to shut out the frost. 
AN OCTAGONAL SILO. Fig. 20S. See Page 477. 
Such things are cheaper than feed to keep cows warm. 
More cows fall short of the maximum flow of milk by 
reason of lack of water than lack of feed. Give the 
cows a fair chance before you swing the ax. The cow 
is the best judge of the utility of any stable appliance 
intended to supply her needs or add to her comfort, 
and it is only by consulting her comfort that most profit 
can be had. j. s. woodward. 
FORM TREE CULTURE. 
Pruning and Training for Permanent Results. 
A short time ago there was a picture in The R. N.-Y., 
page 176, of a pear tree trained to a trellis. While, to 
the “uninitiated,” it seemed the acme of elegance and 
perfection, I cannot refrain from criticising it as some¬ 
thing crude and, as far as modern “form tree culture” 
is concerned, long out of date. The reason for this is 
more or less irregularity in its shape, and regularity in 
shape is in modern form trees one of the principal 
demands, since only by exactness it is possible to form 
all the different shapes correctly, and, what is still 
more important, to keep such shape permanently correct. 
The form figured favors, in a few years, a strong run 
of sap to the top, thus drying up the fruit branches and 
spurs on the lower parts and, on the other hand, when 
grown above the espalier or wall, forming there prac¬ 
tically a standard tree in the clouds. Too many 
branches are retained, since every one hates to cut them 
away, thus keeping light, sun, air and rain away from 
the fruits, if there are any left on the lower part, and 
these are necessary to get the finest, largest and best 
possible fruits, the principal object of this artificial 
form. When it comes to trimming, there can, of course, 
be but guesswork as to what to cut off and what to 
leave, since it is impossible to give rules for such shapes. 
Now to the merits of the shape shown in Fig. 205. 
By training all branches first for some distance hori¬ 
zontally, and afterwards vertically, we retard the flow 
of the sap sufficiently to be able to control it ever after. 
The shape is, as you see, absolutely regular, and can be 
kept that way forever by very little work. The sap pre¬ 
fers to run straight to the top; we prevent and circum¬ 
vent this by making one series at a time, adding annually 
a new series. By keeping the lower series much longer 
than the next higher, and that one longer than the one 
above, we counteract their disadvantage in location. 
By keeping trees in this shape we can keep the fruit 
spurs continuously 
alive and bearing, 
even on the lowest 
parts of the tree. 
Light, air, sun and 
rain have full access 
to every part; we can 
constantly inspect 
every part, see any 
fungus or insect dan¬ 
gers at their begin¬ 
ning and stop them 
early. We receive, in 
return for our care, 
perfect, large and 
beautiful fruits. After 
the tree is formed 
there is a certain 
rule, plain to anyone 
with average intelli¬ 
gence, as to the pruning. We have but six main 
branches in this case, but, of course, we may, if the tree 
grows vigorously enough, form eight or 10 branches, but 
the latter are exceptional; therefore, in Fall we have to 
cut back (prune) the four main branches, only guided by 
the simple principle that if one branch is weaker than 
the others, that we favor that one by cutting it back 
very little, or not at all, while cutting the others back 
more vigorously. If three are weak and one grows top 
strong, we cut that strong one back considerably, and 
the others, according to the difference in growth, very 
little or not at all. One gets the “hang” of that very 
soon, as the next season shows the results of the 
pruning. 
In Summer (beginning about this time) it is neces¬ 
sary to pinch back the green fruit shoots, not permit¬ 
ting them to grow longer than six inches, in order to 
favor the formation of fruit buds. By thinning out the 
fruit we get fruit every year. We do not know such a 
thing as pear or apple years, since we keep our trees 
in condition to nourish the growing fruits as well as 
form fruit buds every year. This form is called Verrier- 
Palmetto, after the inventor, a Frenchman named Ver- 
rier. It is, for walls (barns, houses, garden walls, if 
high enough) the very best form, having all advantages 
and no disadvantages from the standpoint of a lover of 
form trees. It is, for one who takes some interest in 
such trees, comparatively easy to train them. If 
desired, I could explain that some other time. The 
tree represents a Doyenne Blanc pear, budded on quince 
stock. It started to bear (two fruits) in 1898, had 10 
in 1900, 12 in 1901, 47 in 1902 and 22 in 1903. I should 
add that last year, in fighting the ubiquitous San Jose, 
I reduced the harvest by applications of whale oil soap 
and lye washes. An advantage, as far as fighting the 
San Jose or other “vermin” is concerned, is obvious to 
anybody; we can take a whitewash brush and in very 
little time cover every part with. a thick coating of 
slaked lime, to which I have added for Winter wash 
(in December) five ounces of liver of sulphur, 10 ounces 
of blue stone and one pint of fresh oxblood; all these 
ingredients to lime milk made from four gallons of 
water and 2^2 pounds of freshly burnt lime. I found 
that this application killed everything, insects, fungus, 
etc. I have other shapes which I wili describe some 
time for your readers if they should be interested in 
this style of trees. henry r. wirth. 
Rhode Island. 
A TYPICAL VERMONT MOUNTAIN FARM. Fig. 207. See Page 477. 
