1905. 
5o5 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
A WOMAN'S FARM NOTES . 
Changing to the Farm. —It seems to 
me that each year sees an increasing num¬ 
ber of city people looking hopefully toward 
farm life as an escape from uncongenial 
employment in the city, or as a means to 
regain broken health and at the same time 
earn a livelihood from the soil. It is a 
hopeful sign, but many of these people 
are doomed to disappointment and dis¬ 
illusionment—merely on account of ignor¬ 
ance. City life and country life are t so 
different that a thorough knowledge of 
how to make a living in the one is hardly 
any help when a change is made to the 
other. But the average city man does not 
realize this, and he buys his farm and 
moves upon it with a blind confidence in 
his ability to get a living from it, and 
without any but the vaguest ideas of how 
he is to do it. If the man who is about 
to make this radical change in his manner 
of living would give serious thought to 
one or two points, he would stand a much 
better chance to make a success of his ex¬ 
periment and make it much more quickly. 
The points I have in mind are these: 
That first of all he should decide upon the 
kind of farming he wishes to engage in, 
whether dairying, poultry farming, stock 
raising, market gardening or mixed farm¬ 
ing. He should remember that this is 
the age of specializing, in farming as well 
as in other business; this may be a difficult 
question for a city man to decide, but if 
he reads agricultural papers, and visits 
farms where the different kinds of farm¬ 
ing are carried on, lie ought to be able to 
make up his mind which branch has the 
most attractions for him and for which 
he is best fitted. After his decision is 
made, comes the next point,—getting the 
farm best suited to the branch of farming 
he is to undertake. To many city people 
a farm is a farm, and if it is attractive 
and suitably located they are satisfied. 
But farms vary as much as other indus¬ 
trial plants. A man who was going into 
the manufacture of woolen cloth and was 
looking for a building and machinery for 
carrying on his business, would not think 
of buying a fully equipped shoe factory 
for his purpose. And so if one intends to 
raise chickens, he does not want to buy 
a farm consisting mostly of low, heavy, 
grass land which would exactly suit the 
dairyman, and on the other hand the 
dairyman does not want a high, dry sandy 
farm which would be just what the 
poultryman could use. Given an intelli¬ 
gent, energetic man—even if he never 
lived on a farm—who knows what he 
wants to do and has a farm that is 
adapted to the requirements of his busi¬ 
ness, and it is hard to see how he can fail. 
The Farmer’s Best Friend. —In this 
locality it seems to me that the cow is 
the farmer’s best friend. If a man has a 
few good cows it seems as if he manages 
to get along and pay his bills and make 
improvements and get ahead. Cows bring 
in a daily income, not very large it may 
be, but sure and regular, and oftentimes 
this counts for more than the spasmodic 
income—?' large sum coming in a few 
times a year and nothing between. There 
are places where milk brings such a low 
price that there is hardly a living in it, 
but here the price is high, and it takes 
a poor manager indeed not to make a 
good living if the cows are what they 
should be. To be sure, the keeping of 
cows involves a sort of slavery. The 
dairyman knows not holidays nor Sun¬ 
days, for the cows should be milked and 
fed and watered every day with the reg¬ 
ularity of clockwork, but this daily grind 
brings its reward in the daily income and 
the steady improvement of the land. 
Humus.— We read more and more 
about the necessity of there being humus 
in the soil. For years I have proved the 
virtue of organic matter in the soil which 
I used for my house plants. I have used 
half garden soil, and half leaf mold from 
the woods, with the addition of bone flour 
and wood ashes. The plants have re¬ 
sponded nobly and shown the effect of a 
light, porous soil combined with suitable 
fertilizers and moisture. 
Caring for the Hands.— I have always 
rather scorned to wear gloves when doing 
rough work, but this year when I helped 
get in the next Winter’s supply of wood, 
1 put on an old pair of loose fitting, 
leather gloves. I found that I could work 
much faster, not having to be careful how 
I handled the rough sticks of wood, and 
when I got through I had not a scratch, 
sliver or blister, or even a hangnail as a 
souvenir of my work. So in the future I 
advocate the wearing of gloves whenever 
practicable. 
Dynamite Again. —In talking with a 
neighbor about dynamite, he. said he fol¬ 
lowed a little different method from ours, 
and it might possibly be a little safer. 
He is careful to keep the caps away from 
the dynamite while he is working. He 
puts the charge into the hole in the rock, 
then with a small wooden stick makes a 
hole in the dynamite, into which he puts 
the cap and fuse. He is using the 70- 
per cent dynamite this year, and likes it 
much better than the weaker kind. 1 oo 
much care cannot be taken in the handling 
of the caps. 
Grass. —For some time we have experi¬ 
mented in a small way with different 
grasses, and we have reached the conclu¬ 
sion that nothing comes of it but vexa¬ 
tion of spirit, and that if one wants to 
raise hay he had better stick to the old 
standbys—Timothy, Redtop and clover. 
Orchard grass looks well, but it grows in 
bunches, and has a way of dying out for 
no apparent reason. Tall Meadow oat- 
grass looks promising, as do some other 
varieties, but one can’t make good hay out 
of promises. But of all the delusions we 
think grass mixtures are the greatest. We 
seeded an acre with a kind that we 
thought must be good, as it was very 
highly recommended by an old established 
seed firm. Some of this grass matures in 
the latter part of May and some of it in 
July, so when we harvest it in the latter 
part of June, the greater part of the “mix¬ 
ture” being ready to cut then, some of it 
is woody, and some of it immature. While 
some of the grass is amazingly tall, there 
is no “bottom” to the stand, and it is very 
unsatisfactory. One must live and learn, 
but we have decided that it is more prof¬ 
itable to learn by some one’s else experi¬ 
ence—Mr. Clark’s, for example—than to 
waste time and money and land trying 
new grasses and patent mixtures. 
SUSAN BROWN ROB11INS. 
without injury to the tenderest foliage. I 
would try it at the rate of five pounds in 
50 gallons for the Striped melon beetle. 
I do not think the spray of Paris-green 
mentioned would prove effective, and if 
used stronger it might injure the vines. 
One of the most effective sprays now used 
for this insect is Bordeaux Mixture. It 
probably does not kill many of the beetles, 
but they do not like to eat plants thor¬ 
oughly sprayed with it. I would use this 
fungicide freely at least every week or 10 
days, until the plants get beyond the dan¬ 
ger of injury from this pest. 
M. V. SLINGERLAND. 
Cause of Double-Flowered Blackberries. 
M. L. B., Donyola, III .—’What is the cause 
of double-flowered blooms on the blackberry? 
Is it a peculiarity of the variety, or a dis¬ 
ease? I have a plantation of Erie, which is 
very badly affected this way, and appears to 
get worse each season. 
Ans. —Double blossom or rose bloom in 
blackberries is a disease due to attacks of 
a peculiar fungus. It is a very obscure 
trouble, and no effective means of con¬ 
trolling it are known. Erie and Wilson’s 
Early blackberries are readily affected by 
it, whole fields often being ruined, as dis¬ 
eased blooms produce no berries. The 
only treatment appears to be to root out 
all affected plants and burn them to check 
further spread of the trouble. 
Round or Square Silo ? 
C. 8., Potsdam, N. Y.—I have a bay 14x15 
in which I want to build a silo. Would you 
build it square or round? Stone is plenti¬ 
ful, lumber $16 for hemlock, and other 
kinds in proportion. IIow low is it prac¬ 
tical to dig, having good drainage? Would 
a partition, if square and made of stone, 
be a good thing, so as to have less surface 
exposed in feeding. 
Ans.—I should build the silo square if 
it was to be placed in the 14 x 15 space. 
Make the sides strong, use plank for sides 
and plaster with Portland. Whether a 
partition would be best will depend upon 
the number of cows to be fed therefrom. 
It is practical with good drainage to dig 
six feet. Of course there must be no mis¬ 
take about drainage, and then I should 
want the wall plastered with Portland. 
_H. E. COOK. 
Fbr the land’s sake, use Bowker’s Fer¬ 
tilizers. They enrich the earth.— Adv. 
When you write advertisers mention The 
It. N.-Y. and you’ll get a quick reply and 
“a square deal.” See guarantee, page 8. 
Insures a full milk pail 
Pratts Cow Tonic. 
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Reseeding to Crimson Clover. 
E. R. T., Harpers Ferry, IF. Ya .—I would 
like your advice as to a piece of Crimson 
clover. It was seeded last Fall, and grazed 
closely all Spring, so that after the hogs 
were removed from it a few weeks ago, it 
bloomed close to the ground. There is a 
good stand and abundant bloom. I would 
like this crop to reseed itself; would it he 
best to follow the land when the seed is 
ripe or simply to leave it as it is? It was 
well ton-dressed with stable manure in the 
Winter, and I have thought that this might 
provide sufficient covering for the seed with¬ 
out plowing. 
Ans. —We doubt If you will obtain a 
good seeding from the Crimson clover, 
unless the bloom was well developed. We 
have not been very successful in reseed¬ 
ing from such small plants, where the 
crop was pastured off. We should not 
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Poison for Striped Melon Bugs. 
E. IF. 8., E. Radford, Fa.—Can you tell 
me if arsenate of lead will kill the Striped 
melon bugs? Will it burn the leaves? IIow 
about Paris-green, four ounces, and eight 
ounces of lime to 50 gallons of water? Do 
you think this strong enough to kill the 
bugs and not burn the foliage? 
Ans. —I do not know if the arsenate of 
lead will kill the Striped melon beetle, 
but if any poison will kill them, this is 
surely the best and safest one to use. 
This poison can be used very strongly 
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