422 
TIIK RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
May 19, 
sandy land of southern New Jersey, in Delaware and 
Maryland the seed grown in southern Colorado and 
southern Kansas ought to do well. For two or three 
years there has not been enough Alfalfa seed grown 
in the United States to supply the demand, and eastern 
seedsmen have imported considerable from Europe. One 
year I sowed 20 acres to Alfalfa—19 acres with Utah- 
grown seed and one acre with imported seed; both kinds 
showed a germination of over 98 per cent, and the 
growth of the young Alfalfa was good from both lots 
of seed all through the season, with no difference that 
could be detected. The next Spring there was a good 
stand all over the 19 acres seeded with Utah seed, and 
not a single live plant on the acre seeded with the import¬ 
ed seed. I have seen several trials with imported Alfalfa 
seed, and have never yet seen a good crop harvested 
from it. Uusually after passing through the first Win¬ 
ter there is from one-fourth to one-half a stand, the 
plants make a weak growth and if allowed to remain 
most of them die out in two or three years. Descrip¬ 
tions of the puny growth in reports of failures of this 
crop, given by eastern growers, make one think that 
probably imported seed had been sown. No intelligent 
farmer would take corn grown in the warm soil and 
climate and long season of southern Kansas and expect 
to grow a good crop in New York on heavy soil with 
short seasons. It is even more difficult to succeed with 
so great a change in growing Alfalfa, as it has to with¬ 
stand the long severe Winter, as well as the change in 
Summer conditions. No one should sow Alfalfa with¬ 
out knowing where and under what conditions it was 
grown. 
THE SEED BED.'—Young Alfalfa is the weakest 
plant that is grown on the farm. Any slight unfavor¬ 
able conditions will check its growth. It is a weak 
feeder, and the soil must yield up its food easily, or the 
young plants will starve, and it has little strength to 
fight against weeds. When a year old Alfalfa is as 
strong and rugged as any farm plant, and keeps growing 
stronger until at three years of age it reaches full vigor. 
For these reasons it pays to make thorough prepara¬ 
tions before seeding. If the land is weedy it should be 
planted with some crop like corn or potatoes, and culti¬ 
vated to get it clean. With land that is very foul it 
sometimes takes more than one season to do this. 
Alfalfa seed is expensive, and it docs not pay to waste 
it fighting weeds. The soil should be brought up to the 
condition of fertility needed for a good crop of corn, 
and must not be acid. When the subsoil is tough it is 
a good plan to grow clover for two years before seeding 
to Alfalfa. The roots of clover are stronger than those 
of young Alfalfa, and will bore much deeper into a hard 
subsoil. Where clover has been raised before seeding 
to Alfalfa the young Alfalfa roots have easy work grow¬ 
ing until they reach the full depth opened by the clover. 
By this time the Alfalfa has become so strong that its 
roots can go on down without trouble two or three 
times as deep as clover. After the land has been cleaned 
of weeds and put in good condition for growing Alfalfa, 
and seeding time comes, make the best possible seed 
bed. It should be deep, mellow, fine on the surface as 
for a garden and firm and well settled below; the kind 
of a seed bed that will produce the best yield of wheat. 
When the land has been plowed deep it should be thor¬ 
oughly fined and then allowed to settle. This settling 
is best accomplished by good rains and repeated work¬ 
ings. After the rains the surface soil should be finely 
pulverized as for a garden, and the seed sown. 
H. M. COTTRELL. 
VISIT TO A SUCCESSFUL MILK DAIRY. 
What Mr. Martin is Doing. 
I know of one person, and I think he is only one of 
many, who would he much interested in a more extensive 
description of Mr. Martin's farm and methods. We would 
like a pen picture of the farm, the kind of soil and the meth¬ 
ods which keep 70 head of cattle on 100 acres of land, 
without evep a silo to help. Would like the Summer man¬ 
agement, and whether it is all dairy or is there some money 
crop in addition? w. e. m. 
A DAIRY DISTRICT.—It is quite evident from the 
above, and many other letters received, that the public 
is interested in a man who can turn out of his barn a 
whole row of 30 cows that are averaging 20 quarts of 
milk a day. Come with me on a fine April day and we 
will take another look at Mr. Martin’s dairy. Turn to 
Fig. 169 and you can take a look at Mr. Martin’s face 
as shown by a camera. Some sections of Orange 
County, N. Y., have as fine dairy farms as can be seen 
anywhere. As we drive out of Middletown, N. Y., on 
the new State road towards Goshen, we pass through 
one of these sections. In the old days when Orange 
County butter made the count}'’ famous, this section was 
called Dolsontown. Every one of the fine farms has 
now passed out of the hands of the Dolson family. 
The fine farms now owned by William P. Uptegrove, 
John I. Bradley, Henry S. Pound, J. S. Dunning and 
others are models to stir the ambition of any young 
aspirant after a farm home. At the Dunning farm we 
leave the State road, and drive west about a mile, in a 
broad valley that is minus any stream of considerable 
size, till we reach the old homestead of Egbert Arnott. 
Here Mr. Arnott made a notable success as a farmer 
during a long and honorable life, and here George E. 
Martin is starting in his career as a farmer. The buik 
of the farm lies in this broad valley, a few fields 
running up the moderate hillsides on either hand. The 
fine set of buildings are on our right as we drive to¬ 
ward the west, and are well protected from north and 
west winds by higher ground just back of the buildings. 
About the only stones in sight on the farm are in the 
stone walls which divide it into fields of 10 to 25 acres 
each for the most part. I am not an expert on soils, 
but judge most of this to be what is called a clay loam. 
Mr. Martin says it is inclined to be wet, too wet to 
drive upon with manure until quite late in Spring. On 
one field of 10 acres sown to wheat last Fall, on the 
hill back of the house, the wheat is winter-killed quite 
badly in spots. The Timothy seed sown last Fall, how¬ 
ever, looks promising, and the Timothy and clover seed 
sown liberally this Spring, together with fully 400 loads 
of stable manure applied during the Fall and Winter, 
will doubtless insure a good sod, which is of more ac¬ 
count in Mr. Martin’s eyes than the wheat. The soil 
on much of the flat land in the lower portions of the 
farm is nearly black on top, with clay very close below. 
White clover grows luxuriantly in this soil where pas¬ 
tured, and on the mowing fields the sod consists largely 
of Red-top and Timothy. Frequent top-dressings with 
stable manure during Mr. Arnott’s lifetime, and since, 
have formed a fine sod, which is sure to give a good 
yield of hay with favorable rains. 
FARMING THAT PAYS.—The high price of the 
farm ($12,500) and the oft-repeated assertion that 
“farming don't pay” did not daunt the purchaser. There 
GEO. E. MARTIN, A SUCCESSFUL DAIRYMAN. Fig. 169. 
was money enough to buy the stock and make a small 
payment on the farm, leaving a big mortgage. The 
first three years has enabled Mr. Martin to reduce this 
by $3,000 from the profits of the farm, and he hopes to 
wipe out the whole thing before gray hairs are much 
in evidence. The mess of milk is not quite as big as 
when we saw the farm last, just three months ago, but 
the cows look even more sleek and fat. There are 55 
now in milk, and the product is 1,600 pounds a day, an 
average of 29 pounds per cow. The cows are still con¬ 
fined to the barn, though the weather is decidedly 
Spring-like, while the young stock was basking in the 
sun in the yard. The cow stable is light and airy, with 
an 11-foot ceiling. What Mr. Martin is doing other 
young men can do. Right across the fields in plain sight 
lives another young man, hardly more than a boy, T. J. 
Denton, who is making 17 cans of milk a day from 42 
cows. What is the secret of their success? I believe 
that part of it lies in good-sized farms and herds, and 
an ability profitably to direct the labor of other men. 
Place the same men with the same kind of cows in 
smaller herds, where only their own labor is available, 
and I doubt if they could make much headway against 
a mortgage. Part of it also doubtless lies in liberal 
and intelligent feeding. There are certain possibilities 
within every life, either of plant or animal. Given the 
proper conditions, and that possibly will be attained. 
Mr. Clark feeds his grass plants liberally and intelli¬ 
gently all the time, and is showing what the possibilities 
of plant life are by securing big crops year after year 
from the same plants. 
FEEDING FOR MILK.—Any healthy cow will give 
a good flow of milk for a short time after her calf is 
born if she has good flesh on her body to draw from. 
In this she differs from the hen, who will stop egg pro¬ 
duction on short notice if the food supply fails, flesh 
or no flesh. A cow whose food supply contains all the 
elements needed in digestible form, without clogging 
up the system with a lot of surplus nutrients, will give 
a good flow of milk right along until her next calf be¬ 
gins to call loudly for nourishment. It is said that a 
good cow will put her flesh into the pail. The same 
cow will do better work if you do not force her to do 
this, but supply just what she needs in the food. Mr. 
Martin’s supply of feed purchased last Summer by the 
carload is just exhausted, and he is to try a new mixture 
of gluten feed and dry beet pulp, keeping up, I presume, 
the cotton-seed meal as a relish. We shall await the 
result with interest. The cornstalks were fed whole, 
just as they came from the field, though he thinks it 
might pay to cut and dampen before feeding. The cows 
are nearly all Winter milkers, and in Summer a few 
of the dry ones and some of the young stock is “boarded 
out” on a neighboring farm for a time. Forty-two dol¬ 
lars w'as paid out last Summer for such board. Those 
at home are pastured day and night, and the milkers 
get some grain feed every day, according to the abund¬ 
ance of pasture available. 
COWS VS. HENS.—As we drive home in the after¬ 
noon sunshine, knowing that while we have been away 
the liens have been cackling, and that full nests await 
me, I fall to wondering whether the hen will ever rival 
the cow as a mortgage-lifter. If the key to success and 
failure with Winter eggs which I have laid aside for 
future use fails to be the right one, let us hope that 
some one will soon find one that will work every time. 
o. w. MAPES. 
NOTES ON MELON CULTURE. 
Melons are grown under glass about the same as we 
cultivate cucumbers, and I have never thought it profit¬ 
able to force cither of these crops during the Winter 
months; I therefore plant the seed about the first of 
March, either in pots or on the greenhouse bench; the 
best results are usually obtained by planting them in 
the soil on the table, giving them a more even temper¬ 
ature, for I find the seed will not germinate freely below 
60 degrees, and the young plants are very sensitive to 
sudden changes. After the character leaves begin to 
form they should be grown in a very steady temper¬ 
ature at about 55 degrees night, with an increase of 20 
degrees during the day. Care should be taken to avoid 
a rapid change of temperature or a long exposure to 
sudden chills by draughts in ventilating. I have some¬ 
times found young plants, when exposed to these sudden 
changes, to damp off and be entirely worthless in 24 
hours, but when grown in a moderate temperature as 
above described they will make strong, sturdy plants in 
six weeks from time of planting the seed. They can 
then be transferred to the cold frame or the greenhouse, 
where no artificial heat will be required. In trans¬ 
planting the young plants it is very important not to set 
them too deep in the soil, for this will have almost the 
same effect as when exposed to a sudden change of 
temperature. 
I am here reminded of my first and costly experience 
in grQwing cucumbers under glass. The seeds were 
planted in pots, and grown in a very high temperature, 
and in consequence the plants were long and rather 
soft. When we transferred them I thought I would 
like to make a neat job of the undertaking, so I set the 
plants about three inches deep. This gave them the 
appearance of short, stocky plants, and they certainly 
did look fine ’ when the work was completed. In 48 
hours, however, I had cause to change my opinion. 
Almost every plant had damped or rotted off at the sur¬ 
face of the ground. This was one of those useful les¬ 
sons where we can profit by our mistakes. If 1 remem¬ 
ber correctly this was about 20 years ago. I have grown 
cucumbers every year since, and while I may have made 
many mistakes, I have successfully avoided this one. 
After the plants are set and well established in their 
permanent beds they will demand some attention. The 
sun will be moving north, and on clear days it will be 
very w'arm in greenhouses. If the house is not prop¬ 
erly ventilated and the soil kept moist the grower may 
experience some difficulty. At the beginning of a warm 
day the house should be aired quite early, thus allowing 
a gentle air to circulate through the vines, watering them 
copiously at the same time. The temperature will rise 
gradually, and the conditions will be perfectly natural. 
There should be some provisions made for training the 
vines; a trellis of some sort should be provided, but 
this is always arranged according to the construction 
of the house. It is also quite important to place a hive 
of bees where they can work on the blossoms to good 
advantage. The fruit will be more uniform in shape 
and have a finer finish than those that are allowed to 
mature without the use of the bees to pollenize the 
blossoms. Where melons are to be grown outside or 
in the open ground the crop can be made to come in 
earlier by planting the seed on pieces of inverted sod 
in hotbeds or the greenhouse. Care should be taken to 
make the transfer from the frame to the open ground on 
moist cloudy days. The cultivation should be the same 
as when planted in the open ground. Of late years, 
however, we have met a serious foe in melon culture 
in the open ground. Of all the pests and insects that 
invade the garden there is none so destructive as this 
