1897 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
4o5 
Moles Will Injure Asparaqus. 
J. D. Y., Lexington, Ky .—Do moles injure asparagus or their 
roots f 
Ans.—Y es, moles do injure asparagus roots—not by 
eating them, but by burrowing around and under the 
roots for the worms and other insects that accumulate 
there more than in other parts of the bed. 
Grass on Muck Land. 
J. if., Brasher Falls, N. Y .—I have a muck Hat with muck about 
two feet deep, which is well drained. What would be the best 
grass to seed it? I have sown Timothy and Alsike clover, but 
fail to get a good crop. 
Ans —We would seed that ground to Timothy and 
Red-top. Possibly the land is sour and this may 
account for the failure. A good dressing of lime or 
wood ashes harrowed into the ground after plowing, 
would very likely keep the grass. 
Ashes and Bone on Clover Sod. 
G. C. B., Fairland , N. 5".—How near a balanced fertilizer for 
general farm crops are ashes applied with a drill on '.and (clover 
sod preferred), with fresh stable manure (liquid and solid) ? 
Ans.—H ere is a comparison of the chemical com¬ 
position of ashes and manure : 
Pounds in Ton. 
Nitrogen. Phosphoric acid. Potash. 
Ashes. 36 100 
Manure. 10 5 13 
On a good clover sod, especially if the clover be 
plowed under while green, the clover will supply 
nitrogen which is as available as that in the stable 
manure, while the ashes will furnish potash and 
phosphoric acid in more available form than in the 
manure. The ashes also furnish lime in considerable 
quantities. The trouble with the ashes is that they 
do not give enough phosphoric acid in proportion to 
the potash. If you could use, with them, equal parts 
of fine ground bone, you would have a better com¬ 
bination with the clover sod. On our own farm, we 
would use the ashes and bone for the sod and the 
manure on the lighter land. 
Value of Lime and Ashes. 
G. E. B., St. Lawrence County, N. Y. —What is slaked lime worth 
per ton ? I can buy it for $2.50 and have to drive it 15 miles. Is it 
good for peach trees ? Which is cheaper, lime or ashes at $8.50, 
hauled four miles? 
Ans. —Most soils that have been long in cultivation 
need lime every few years. We do not use lime as 
we would use nitrogen or phosphoric acid, as a direct 
plant food, but chiefly because it “sweetens” the 
soil, and also, has various chemical effects that give 
the plants that grow in the soil a better chance to 
develop. At $2.50 per ton it is cheap enough, and on 
fruit land of average condition we would use it, at 
least once in four years, if the soil be found to be 
acid. It must not be used in the place of manure or 
complete fertilizers. It will not take their place any 
more than salt will take the place of grain in a cow’s 
ration. A ton of average wood ashes contain about 
100 pounds of potash, 35 pounds of phosphoric acid 
and 700 pounds of lime. You could buy the potash in 
other forms for $4.50, and the phosphoric acid will cost 
you about $1.50, leaving $2.50 as the cost of 700 pounds 
of lime. With half a ton of the lime at $1.25, and 
$6 50 invested in muriate of potash and acid rock, you 
will have a greater amount of fertility-than you will 
have in a ton of average wood ashes at $8 50. Of 
course you understand that, if the ashes have been 
partly leached, they are not worth as much as we 
have figured. 
Crimson Clover Seed in Canada. 
J. L. //., Leamington, Ontario. —No doubt it was through the in¬ 
fluence of The It. N.-Y. that I decided to sow about 25 acres of 
my newly-planted peach orchard to Crimson clover. I also think 
there is no doubt that the investment will pay my subscription 
to The R. N.-Y. for the rest of my life, even though I live to be 
100. At this date, most of it that is left (we plowed under about 
eight feet of a strip at each row of trees early), is about 18 to 20 
inches high and very thick; it would cut a heavy crop of hay and 
we intend to cut some for feed, but will let most of it ripen seed if 
it will. I would like very much to have information on the follow¬ 
ing points : 1. If cut as soon as most of it is in bloom (which will be 
in three or four days), and made into hay is there any danger in 
feeding it to horses along with Timothy hay ? 2. Will it be likely 
to fill well with seed where it is so thick and heavy ? 3. Is an 
ordinary clover huller such as is used for thrashing Red clover 
the proper machine for thrashing this ? 
Ans. —1. Seed grown so far north ought to be valu¬ 
able. We would not feed the hay to horses, though 
Delaware farmers do not hesitate to do so. We would 
feed both millet and Crimson clover to cattle and 
sheep. Thousands of horses eat Crimson clover hay, 
while only now and then is one injured by it. The 
only danger is the fact that, when the heads of clover 
get too hard, they are liable to form balls in the 
stomach. Such balls, the size of a man’s fist, have 
been found in the stomachs of horses and mules, with 
a Crimson clover head in the center. We doubt 
whether there would be any trouble if the horses were 
fed oil meal, ensilage, or other laxative food, but the 
perfectly safe way is to feed Crimson clover hay to 
cattle and sheep. 2. There ought to be a fair amount 
of seed in such a crop. 3. The Red clover huller will 
answer, but it must be adjusted differently, and have 
sieves and riddles to suit the size of the Crimson 
clover seed. 
Tickets for Berry Pickers. 
Several Subscribers .—Will some of your readers tell us bow they 
keep account with berry pickers ? 
Here is a berry-pickers’ ticket that I have found 
very useful. I think it is better than the one pic¬ 
tured on page 341. c. s. crego. 
While in the canning factory, we had a card we 
used for hulling strawberries. I would hand out 
checks in receipt for berries, and then when I got 
time, I would take up the checks and punch them on 
the cards. The card is shown herewith. The price 
usually is one cent per box ; should one pay more, 
say 1)4 cent per box, punch it in the number of boxes 
Card for Picking (1*7) Berries at ( ) per Box. 
For W. C. DEMPSEY. 
Week ending.1897. 
Name. 
No corrections made next day. Preserve this card. 
11111111111111111111111111 
22222222222222222222222222 
333333 3 3 333333333333333333 
44444444444444444444444444 
5555555555555555555 5 5 5555 5 
6666606666606 6 666666666666 
TOTAI,. 
instead of changing the price. These cards will 
tally 546 quarts, about all one woman will pick in a 
week. They can be made with a hole in one end to 
tie on the basket or carrier, if desired. h. c d. 
New York. 
The accompanying card is the one I use, and prefer 
it to any other I have ever tried. I use six-quart 
stands and prefer them to fours. Each card holds 
just 100 quarts, and when it is full, I pay the 
holder a dollar for it, and issue another card, num¬ 
bering it one higher. I keep the cards paid for, and 
at the end of the season, give the pickers who stay 
by me through thick and thin, 25 cents bonus for each 
card filled. Transients and pickers who come late, 
drop out on circus days, and are unreliable in any 
way, do not get the bonus. In this way, I hold my 
best pickers, and have them when I need them. The 
picker holds his card until full, and presents it with 
his berries, and has it punched. A good quality of 
shipping tags is used, and enough for recording 500 
bushels of berries can be ruled by a boy or girl in an 
evening or two. j. h. van. 
Meridian Fruit Farm, Michigan. 
I notice in The R. N.-Y. of May 22, a cut and de¬ 
scription of a berry-pickers’ card. I have just had a 
number printed, and in some ways, I think mine an 
improvement over anything I have used or seen. 
I inclose a sample card, on which part of the numbers 
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are punched. I use picking stands holding nine 
quarts, and pickers like them because they do not 
have so much running back and forth to do. I am 
expected always to be at the shed to receive the ber¬ 
ries from the pickers. Each picker has a card which 
is numbered ; the picker keeps this card until it is all 
full; I then pay it off and issue another card. The 
first card a picker gets is No. 1, the next No. 2, and 
so on throughout the season. After I pay off the 
cards, I file them away for future reference. Each 
picker also has a number which is his number through¬ 
out the entire season. For instance, Mrs. Smith is 
No. 14 ; when she comes with a picking-stand full of 
filled boxes, I receive them, set them out of her pick¬ 
ing-stand on a table, and as I hand her empty boxes, 
I place her number (14) on the bottom of each box. 
If I think necessary, I can inspect the full boxes 
which I set on the table before putting them in the 
crates, and if anything is wrong with the berries, the 
picker’s number is on the bottom of every box. Pick¬ 
ers know that their boxes are all numbered, and are 
careful not to be tricky in the way they fill their 
boxes. If any one has an improvement on this, I 
should like to see it. c w. Conner, 
Iowa. 
Calomel for Pear Blight. 
E. n. L., Newkirk, 0. T.— Has the following been tried at any of 
our experiment stations as a remedy for blight in pear trees ? A 
certain physician told me that to cut the bark of a pear tree in 
the form of a cross, turn up the bark so cut and put under it a 
little calomel, and then replace the bark with a bandage, that 
the calomel would enter the circulation of the trees and effectu¬ 
ally kill blight. 
Ans—I have never before heard of treating pear 
trees for blight in the manner described by E. H. L. 
I very much doubt whether calomel injected under 
the bark would enter the circulation of the tree to an 
extent sufficient to produce any effect upon the 
bacteria which cause the blight. If E. H. L. has 
sufficient faith in the remedy, he can very easily test 
it -on a few trees. It will, doubtless, not injure the 
trees, and if applied soon after the blight starts in a 
tree, one could very soon determine whether it had 
any effect upon the disease. m. v. s. 
Insects in Cow Peas; Melon Disease. 
,/. F. K., Gainesville, Fla. —1. Last year, I ordered five bushels 
of cow peas, but received them too late in the summer, so planted 
two bushels and saved three bushels to plant this spring. I 
looked at them in December, and the weevils were eating them so 
that I would have had nothing left of them by spring. I had a 
quart of turpentine handy, so I poured it all into the barrel over 
the cow peas. This spring, I tried some to see whether they 
would grow, and they all seemed to come up and grow as well as 
if never soaked with turpentine. Can I put turpentine on all 
seeds to protect from worms and weevils without injury, and how 
much ? Or is there something better that I can use and the seed 
be fit for sale or use as food for animals or human beings 
without injury? 2. I planted some watermelons in January, 
about 500 plants; they came up nicely and grew for about four to 
six weeks, then some of them began to die, and they kept on 
dying. Some of the vines have almost ripe melons on when they 
wilt and finally die. It looks as though I wouldn’t get a single 
ripe melon from the whole patch. I also planted about 100 plants 
of cantaloupes, and none of them has died. I put a pailful of 
well-rotted stable manure into each hill, and worked it well with 
the garden soil, and hoed and watered all alike. What is the 
cause of the melon vines dying, and not the cantaloupes ? 
Ans —1. The insect which destroyed J. F. K.’scow- 
pea seed was, doubtless, the Southern pea or bean 
weevil. I think that carbon bisulphide would prove 
more effectual than turpentine in killing the insects 
in whatever stage, and experiments have shown that 
it does not injure seeds of any kind for use as food or 
for sowing. The seed must be put in nearly air-tight 
boxes and the liquid either scattered over the top or 
placed in a shallow dish put upon the top of the seed. 
The liquid quickly evaporates, and the vapor being 
heavier than air sinks all through the mass of the 
seed. The box should be left closed until the liquid 
is all evaporated. As it is explosive, no light should 
be brought near the treated seed. 2. The Florida 
Experiment Station is located at Lake City, and I 
would advise J. F. K. to send fresh specimens of his 
diseased melon vines to Prof. P. H. Rolfs at the 
experiment station. Without specimens, I cannot 
diagnose the trouble. m. v. s. 
Work of the Currant Louse. 
G. S. G., Newport, N. Y. —I inclose two currant leaves infested 
with an insect that I would like to destroy in an easier manner 
than by picking the leaves off and burning them. What is the 
name of the insect? 
Ans. —The insects upon the currant leaves sent by 
G. S. Q. are the common currant aphides, which seem 
to be unusually numerous this season in many parts 
of the country. The plant lice appear upon the 
leaves, soon after they expand, and begin sucking 
the sap. They seem to multiply in great numbers, 
and by their work upon the underside of the leaves, 
cause the foliage to wrinkle or curl up, and often 
these wrinkles change to a dark, reddish color. The 
insect is not often a very serious pest, because its 
enemies among the lady-bird3 and other insects usu¬ 
ally soon check it. The aphides can be readily de¬ 
stroyed by spraying the bushes, before the leaves have 
begun to curl very much, with kerosene emulsion 
diluted with from nine to ten parts of water, or with 
whale-oil soap used at the rate of one pound in six or 
eight gallons of water. It is important that the 
bushes be sprayed before the leaves are curled much. 
Otherwise it will be difficult to hit the insects. No 
poisonous applications will reach the pest, because it 
is a sucking insect and gets its food from the interior 
of the leaves. Only the contact insecticides, like those 
mentioned above, will prove effectual. m. y. s. 
