114 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
February 18 , 
SALT OR LIME ON HAY. 
In your answer to J. P. B., on page 38, “Why Use Salt 
on Hay?” you say: “It absorbs moisture, and thus dries 
out the hay.” Salt absorbs moisture, but does it dry out 
the hay, or does salt by absorbing moisture, make a brine 
or water and make that spot of hay wet, and when it 
comes from the mow and dusty? The more salt used 
the more brine or water formed, and more damage done. 
Use air-slaked lime. Lime absorbs and dries up moist- 
EIGI1T HOUSES ON SUBSOIL l’LOW. Fig. 48. 
ure, the opposite of salt. If horses are fed on limed 
hay they will not be troubled with heaves. If they have 
heaves limed hay fed regularly in ordinary rations will 
give perfect relief, but not permanent cure. According 
to condition of the moisture of the hay. use two to four 
quarts of lime to an ordinary two-horse load. Sow 
about half the air-slaked lime, broadcast over the bay 
when half unloaded, the remainder when all unloaded. 
I am writing personal experience. If anyone will use 
lime once he will never again use salt. E. A. D. 
West Orange, N. J. 
A WESTERN FARMER ON EASTERN FARMS 
Considerable interest is shown throughout the West 
in your cheap eastern farms, and I know of many buying 
them and many going there to buy. They are the cheap¬ 
est and best farm propositions on earth now. It is rank 
folly to sell them at the prices they do. If the young 
folks have all gone West, old folks died, some of the 
relatives would better keep those farms, and I am quite 
sure some of the western sons would better return to 
the old home farms rather than take the chances of the 
West now. Twenty-five to 40 years ago Greeley’s advice 
was good: “Go West, young man.” Then our best land 
was $2.50 to $6 per acre. The writer, then from old 
New York State, took in several thousand acres at that. 
I know what it is to grow 100 bushels of corn per 
acre, and sell it shelled and delivered'at 12^2 cents per 
bushel. I know also what it is to grow 60 bushels of 
barley per acre, and sell same at $2.15 per bushel, and 45 
bushel of wheat and sell at $2.40; not little seed lots, 
but hundreds of acres. These extraordinary sums only 
once, though, ancient history, probably never to repeat 
itself. Present conditions are that land would be quick 
sale at $65 to $140 per acre, and as far as I am con¬ 
cerned, not one acre sold yet. An easy way to make 
money farming, of course. Time did it, and time is 
making an old man of me. Were it not, I could be 
found during the past three years “down East,” buying 
those cheap good farms. 1 know where land can be 
bought here in the West at 12J /2 cents per acre now, and 
I know where $1,000,000 per acre will not buy it, neither 
of which is suitable for farming. As I have traveled over 
this country everywhere, hardly a city or town of small 
size that I have not visited for pleasure, also much of 
Europe, I would say to the young man who intends to 
farm, “Buy these eastern farms; put intelligent hard 
work on them; your chances are better there than any 
where 1 know of, for the value and opportunity offered.” 
_ILLINOIS FARMER. 
THE PECK'S PLEASANT APPLE. 
In a recent isssue of The R. N.-Y. Irving D. Cook- 
Si: Son, Genesee Co., N. Y„ write favorably about the 
Peck’s Pleasant. They say their experience with it is 
somewhat limited, both in time and the number of trees 
planted, but so far as they have tried it they seem 
pleased with both fruit and tree. This is an old variety 
that originated near here. Downing describes it as: 
“A first-rate fruit in all respects belonging to the New¬ 
town Pippin class, deserves extensive dissemination. 
We have known of it and grown it in our own orchards 
somewhat largely for more than 35 years. With us the 
fruit has many excellent qualities; the tree is an annual 
bearer, the fruit holds on the tree well. We always pick 
the Baldwin. Greening and other varieties first, leaving 
the Pecks till the last because they hang on better. The 
fruit is of good size, hard and dark green when gathered, 
but gradually turning to a bright yellow with a faint 
blush. About January it becomes a beautiful fruit, very 
attractive in appearance, fine for the table, for cooking 
or the market. When well colored it is at its best ; 
after a few weeks it depreciates, especially if kept in a 
warm room. The surface scalds and its beauty and 
quality depart. The time to put it on the market is just 
before it reaches its best; at that time it often brings 
fancy prices. We have thought so well of the fruit 
that we have planted this variety somewhat extensively. 
In 1894 we put out a new orchard, in which we set 50 
Pecks. We are sorry now that we have them, for in 
recent years the trees have shown serious defects. The 
bark on the trunks dies in large patches, often half way 
or more around the tree. These places, if large, will not 
grow over; in time decay sets in and weakens the tree 
so that high winds break it off. Some of the trees in 
our 35-year-old orchard go down every year. It looks 
now as though all of them would be gone in a few years. 
No other Variety in the older orchard is affected that 
way, but in the younger orchard the Nonsuch trees have 
the same trouble. A neighbor has some large old trees, 
top-grafted with the Peck, that are a success. Just 
what the cause of these dead places on the trunks is we 
do not know. Perhaps it is the severe cold. Some 
varieties are exempt; some seem to have constitutional 
Weakness that way. We know of no preventive, and 
no remedy except to top-graft, or else plant varieties that 
do not show this weakness. Perhaps in other localities 
the Peck tree may not show the defect it does here. We 
hope it does not, for it is one of our favorite apples. 
New Haven Co., Conn. geo. f. platt & son. 
HARD SUBSOILING IN ARIZONA. 
We have recently taken some photographs of sub¬ 
soiling, shown ill Figs. 48, 49 and 50, that we think will 
interest the “Hope Farm man.” In old fields of Alfalfa 
that have been irrigated and pastured for several years 
the surface is so compacted that the water will not go 
in. The subsoiling was undertaken with a view to rem¬ 
edying this condition without destroying the stand of 
Alfalfa. The results so far are satisfactory, though it 
is too new yet to be absolutely certain about. The 
engine is a 20 horse power. Furrows were run 14 inches 
deep and about five feet apart. The plow was an Oliver 
subsoiler, as shown in Fig. 48, with horses. The engine 
burned \/ cord hard wood and used 2,000 gallons water 
per day, and could cover about 12 to 13 acres per day 
when we had no breaks. The outfit proved too light 
SUBSOILING BY STEAM POWER. Fig. 49. 
for the work. We broke friction clutch collar, then 
pulled a plow standard in two, and last twisted off the 
main shaft. I he work will require a plow built to order, 
and a much heavier engine. In Figs. 48 and 50 the plow 
is running 10 to 12 inches deep, and we made the furrows 
about four feet apart. The eight horses were all heavy, 
weighing 1,200 to 1,500 pounds each, but could only 
stand it a portion of the time. We could cover about 
five acres per day. This plowing is a little different from 
the one-horse plowing of the South, and serves to illus¬ 
trate in a measure the heavy problems the irrigation 
rancher has to tackle. ream bros. 
Arizona. 
R. N.-Y.—It would never do for that outfit to strike 
one of the hidden rocks at Hope Farm. 
STATEMENT BY A FENCE MANUFACTURER 
The following letter is from a well-known fence man¬ 
ufacturer. For obvious reasons his name cannot be 
given: 
"The spelter now used for galvanizing wire is a zinc 
composition, but at the same time the coat is so thin 
and put on so hastily that it might just as well be a 
composition of lead, as you state. It used to be that the 
mills gave the wire two distinct coats on different days, 
but now it is run through the tank at lightning speed, 
then immediately through tjie wiper, and the amount of 
galvanizing left on is perhaps a matter of chance. There 
are times when we get shipments from our mills with 
the wire so poorly galvanized that it must be returned, 
and again there are times when the galvanizing is so 
thick that we cannot run the No. 7 wire through a 
machine set for that gauge, as it is larger. It would be 
like committing suicide for any fence company to aban¬ 
don the present commercial wire and use only a high 
quality of galvanized, for their prices would be pro¬ 
hibitive to possible customers. I believe that no one 
regrets this matter of poor galvanizing any more than 
do the fence manufacturers themselves. It used to be 
that they were able to sell a light woven wire fence that 
would last a long time, or to put it in your words, it 
would outlive two sets of posts, but now the farmer 
gets the quality of galvanizing that will not permit the 
fence to last half as long as the old, and he, therefore, 
decides that the manufacturer has made his money and 
is now lowering the quality. There is one way that a 
man cm. secure a good fence at about the present price 
of the cheap woven wire fabric, and that is by using 
what is known as a “knocked-down fence,” but most 
farmers do not have the time to do the work them¬ 
selves, and the gigantic trust has beaten down the price 
of the woven wire fence so that it is hard for the manu¬ 
facturers of the knock-down style to secure men to sell 
and build a fence at the low rate of commission Caused 
by the trust; You can buy the old kind of wire from 
several mills, but the Lord only knows at what pfice. 
They make such a small quantity of it that the price 
must needs be high.” manufacturer; 
HORSE POWER OF A WATER WHEEL 
I have a water wheel, an overshot, eight feet in diameter. 
There are 30 buckets; when a bucket is turned half way 
down it holds 20 pounds of water. Can you tell me how 
much power this wheel develops or tell me how to find the 
power? I am thinking of buying a gasoline engine, and want 
to get one that will develop as much as the water wheel. 
D. C. Bfs 
The data given in the above correspondence is iiot 
sufficient to permit the horse power of his water wheel 
to be Computed. The case can, perhaps, be so stated as 
to enable him to make an approximation sufficiently near 
for his purposes. The ability of water to do work de¬ 
pends upon its weight and the height through which it 
falls. If each bucket of the wheel carries 20 pounds of 
water and it falls eight feet its maximum ability to do 
work per 20 pounds is 20 x 8 = 160 foot pounds. In 
other words, it can lift 20 pounds eight feet high, or 
160 pounds one foot high. As the wheel has 30 buckets, 
in making one revolution its working power per revo¬ 
lution would be 30 x 160 = 4,800 foot pounds. Now, if 
it be supposed that the wheel can make 30 revolutions 
per minute, its working capacity per minute would be 
30 x 4,800 = 144,000 foot pounds. But one horse power 
is equivalent to 33,000 foot pounds per minute, and the 
horse power of the wheel, on these assumptions, will be 
144,000 -T- 33,000 = 4.36 horse power. It is seldom, 
however, that overshot water wheels make available 
more than 60 to 75 percent of the theoretical power, and 
60 per cent of the above value is 2.62 horse power. If 
your correspondent can count the revolutions of his 
wheel when running without a load he may then com¬ 
pute the probable horse power of his wheel in the man¬ 
ner suggested, provided, of course, the wheel is not 
turned too rapidly for the buckets to fill or take on 20 
pounds of water. F. h. king. 
Wisconsin Agi. College. 
STEAM HEAT FOR COUNTRY HOUSES . 
I observe that many of your readers are giving their 
experience with the various systeiiis of heating resi¬ 
dences. I have had five years’ experience with a steam¬ 
heating plant, and have had opportunity to contpate its 
working with other systems among my neighbors and 
friends. The result of my observation and experience 
is that I would recommend steam above any other sys¬ 
tems. Hot water has the advantage of being more easily 
adapted to mild weather than the steam, but this advan¬ 
tage is offset by its slowness when you desire to warm 
a house quickly. My father and my sister have each 
had hot water apparatus in their homes, and I have 
compared notes with them. I am inclined to think that 
the hot-water system is more economical of fuel. So far 
as hot air or the ordinary heating stoves are concerned, 
they are not in it with steam, where convenience and 
comfort and freedom from dust and annoyance are 
appreciated. I find upon looking up my coal bills for 
the past four years that during the seasons of 1901, 1902 
and 1903 we used on an average 12 1-5 tons of coal in 
our heating plant. During the Winter 1903-4, which 
was abnormally long and severe, we used 16 tons 800 
pounds. This was to heat a large house standing in a 
very exposed position. There are 11 good-sized rooms 
and 11 radiators are employed. Furthermore, all the 
rooms in the house are required to be comfortably 
warmed practically all the time, inasmuch as any of 
A SUBSOIL PLOW FOB ALFALFA FIELDS. Fig. 50. 
them are likely to be used for study purposes at any 
time. For an exposed position like the one occupied by 
my house, I would not for a moment consider the prop¬ 
osition of putting in hot air, because I. find as a result 
of the experience of my neighbors who have the hot-air 
system that they are not able to warm all parts of the 
house on cold windy days. S, 
Tompkins Co., N. Y. 
