1906. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
663 
VIRGINIA FARM PROBLEMS . 
What is the most practical method of keeping up fertility 
of any average southern farm? Can it be done without 
keeping live stock in large numbers? What green crops 
and chemicals do you consider most sensible and effective 
for the general farmer? 
Deep plowing for aeration and to increase the water¬ 
holding capacity of the land, and thorough' tillage to 
aid root development and evaporation. Fertility can 
be maintained without keeping live stock in large num¬ 
bers, though it is advisable to carry sufficient stock to 
consume all roughage grown and return it to the land 
in the shape of manure. This will not only lessen the 
fertility, bill, but pay in beef, pork or butter. Cow peas 
and Crimson clover are desirable. Both are sure crop¬ 
pers, quick growers and heavy nitrogen gatherers, and 
when turned under give a large quantity of organic 
matter readily convertible into humus, which most Vir¬ 
ginia land needs. Except for truck, no nitrogen should 
be bought. Phosphoric acid and potash should be used 
in proportion to the known demands of the crops grown, 
and lime should be applied in moderate amounts every 
few years. Will add then, in my judgment, the price 
for which much of the land in this State may be bought 
offers a favorable investment for energetic, intelligent 
farmers. C. m. gravatt. 
Virginia. 
One of the essential things to do is the keeping of 
live stock. In this way we can make our lands produce 
the manure, with phosphoric acid in some form, either 
from pure raw bone; or acid phosphate. Following with 
clover. Alfalfa and peas, we can make our lands pro¬ 
duce abundantly, and improving all the time. 
t. o. SANDY. 
Although only having taken personal charge of my 
1,500-acre plantation since January, 1905, I am now 
satisfied that old Virginia lands are very far from worn 
out, as they will grandly and promptly respond to mod¬ 
ern methods and modern machinery, intelligently used. 
I lived 16 years in California. The lands are (or can 
be made) first-class when considering our rail and water 
transportation facilities and the fact that our 
cereals bring spot cash at Chicago quotations, and 
freight from that point to tidewater. This is no 
inconsiderable item when basing yield in bushels 
per acre, and primarily cheapness of lands per 
acre against western. It is safe to say 33J/j per 
cent on the dollar. I am working along the fol¬ 
lowing: Deep plowing, three-mule plows, using 
a subsoiler, following with four mules and a 
12 x 20-inch disk harrow when necessary. Thor¬ 
ough harrowing (half lapping) twice or three 
times if possible, planting and finally rolling with 
modern machinery. This depends upon the crop 
planted. Discarding old methods in garnering 
crops aim to make two or three mules and one 
man and a modern machine do the work of 20 
negroes, as under the old regime. The commer¬ 
cial fertilizer proposition is a hard one. The use 
of a cheap fertilizer is costing our farmers mil¬ 
lions every year. It is only good for the crop, and if 
not used understandingly will burn the ground. I ad¬ 
vocate when necessary about a $25 per ton grade pot¬ 
ash. acid phosphate, etc., for starting new fields of Al¬ 
falfa, now grazing hay fields. My rotation is corn, cow 
peas, and wheat or oats, resting the field one season if 
possible, and Winter-fallowing the weed humus—if 
necessary. I believe the farmer should raise all of the 
livestock he can outside of his work stock ; cattle, 
hogs, sheep, as the conditions of the situation 
require; then if he has a hay cutter, he can 
utilize it as well as his cornstalks with shucks, 
blade and top, fodder left after feeding in a cor¬ 
ral (even when not properly tramped). By turn¬ 
ing the hogs in and feeding them their corn on 
the cob ration twice (even once) daily—on top of 
this undecayed humus and manure and used when 
ripe and needed, with the assistance of manure 
spreader, I find works wonders in crop returns. 
I have experimented with Alfalfa, which pessim¬ 
ists said could not be raised successfully in this 
section of the country. The field of V/> acre is now 
three years old. I cut it six times last year and 
averaged three tons at a cutting, and am doing 
even better this year; put my third cutting in the 
barn July 21, over three tons. I am thrashing 
wheat, on one rotation (as above) and showing 
25 bushels per acre on one rotation, when it only 
showed three to six bushels under the tenant sys¬ 
tem in 1904. H. B. SMITH, JR. 
LIFTING WATER BY AIR PRESSURE. 
There have been several articles in The It. N.-Y. about 
using compressed air for elevating water but they seem to 
apply the air to the water in the storage tank and not 
to use it for forcing the water from the well. Our well is 
208 feet deep with 40 feet of water. We use a three-way 
force pump aDd power windmill for pumping and it is 
hard on the pump and on the pump-jack. If it is practical 
to do so would like to pump with compressed air and do 
away with the trouble of pulling that string of pipe over 
170 feet out of the well in the middle of the Winter mere¬ 
ly because the pumprod became unjointed, as wc had to 
do last Winter. Of course we would have to use an air 
compressor which we could belt to shafting of power wind¬ 
mill. What size of pipe should we use for airpipe and 
what size for water pipe? How far below water level 
should they be connected? Will it -make any difference if 
the water should rise higher than usual? IIow much 
air pressure would be required to start the water? 
e. st. 
Wc regard it doubtful whether your correspondent 
STARTING OFF-SET PACK. Fig. 277. 
could economically use compressed air in pumping 
water from his well. A method has been applied, not 
with a satisfactory degree of success, in some cases 
where a considerable volume of water was required 
and where the water in the well has a considerable 
depth, the well at the same time having a capacity 
greater than the demand for water. The method of 
THREE-TIER, FOUR-TIER AND OFF-SET PACKS 
lifting water with compressed air for such cases con¬ 
sists in forcing air through an air pipe reaching from 
the air compressor to near the bottom of the well, as 
far below the surface as practicable, forcing the air 
into the water rapidly and expecting it to mix with the 
water, filling the well casing with a mechanical mix¬ 
ture of air bubbles and water, and depending upon the 
rapid escape of the air from the well casing to force 
FOUR AND 414-TIER BOXES. Fig. 279. 
the water mechanically out of the well with it. If the 
well were drilled all or most of the way in rock, par¬ 
ticularly if the portion above water is porous, the 
method would hardly be practicable even with a strong 
air compressor throwing a large volume of air, as the 
water would waste laterally through the walls of the 
well. The only method of using compressed air in such 
a case as that of your correspondent, where the supply 
is onlyj for house and stock purposes of an ordinary 
farmstead, which seems at all promising, is that of 
carrying an air tube down through the discharge pipe 
in place of the piston rod and arranging the lower end 
of it in such a manner that the compressed air would be 
discharged upward from the bottom of the well into 
the water pipe with sufficient force so as to be able to 
drive the water in the lower end of the discharge pipe 
upward, while at the same time it created a suction 
strong enough to carry a continuous supply of water 
into the discharge pipe from the well at the bottom. So 
far as I know this idea lias never been put to a prac¬ 
tical test and I would not recommend it to a farmer. 
Its successful operation, where a windmill is the motive 
power, would necessitate a compressed air reservoir of 
some size, depending upon the amount of water used, 
which could be maintained charged to a sufficient pres¬ 
sure so that when water was desired it would only be 
necessary to open a valve to bring the compressed air 
into operation in lifting the water. It is probable that 
a half-inch pipe would be large enough to convey the 
compressed air, and this could advantageously be placed 
on the inside of the discharge pipe if that pipe is not 
smaller than one and one-fourth inch inside diameter, 
and the volume of water desired is not very large. As 
the well is 208 feet deep the direct pressure of such a 
column of water, if continuous, would be some 90 
pounds to the square inch, but as there is only 40 
feet of water in the well a pressure much less than 
this would start the water in motion and, as the column 
of water with air mixed with it would weigh less than 
a solid column of water a less pressure than 90 pounds 
to the square inch would force water from the well. 
Indeed we anticipate that 45 pounds would be sufficient. 
Both the water and air pipes should be carried as near 
the bottom of the well as possible, because the longer 
the column of water in the discharge pipe the better 
does the air pressure work in lifting the water and, this 
being true, any higher rise of water in the well would 
only improve conditions. The chief danger would be 
that the well itself could not supply water fast enough 
to prevent the surface of water in the well low¬ 
ering too much to permit effective operation. 
_______ F. H. KING. 
THE HIRED MAN QUESTION. 
An Ex-Printer as Hired Man. 
We have had the statements in regard to farm 
help by the farmer, the farmer’s son. the farmer’s 
daughter, the hired man and the city man, but 
may we not have the experience of a printer who 
made a fool of himself (?) by leaving a lucrative 
position as a printer in the city and going on 
the farm as a farm hand? ‘Way back in the n:ne- 
ties, when the typesetting machines were just 
coming into prominence, I held a position that 
would enable me to buy a farm in a few more 
years, but I was in a hurry to see farm life, so in 
.the Fall of 1896 I left and came out here, where 
I have worked on various farms in New York, 
New Jersey and Pennsylvania. On each farm that I 
have worked I have had the same treatment, and I will 
say that the statement by “A. S.” is far too absurd 
to be truthful. I have worked in his locality, and I have 
a brother in New Jersey now, and he says he never 
gets such treatment as described by "A. S.” Neither 
do we get the treatment described by “A Farmer’s Son.” 
Some farm hands must think their employer is going 
to treat them as the Sultan of Morocco treats his 
slaves. The farmer will do more for the farm 
hand than our city brothers get from their em¬ 
ployer. In the city the employers want to get 
what their money is worth. So do the farmers, 
but they do not ask much more of their hired 
help than our city fathers do. We do not have 
to go to our employer and beg on bended knees 
for a leave of absence for half an hour. If a 
farm hand is not treated right it is because he is 
too filthy to be among decent people. I do not 
know of a single farm hand that has no thirst for 
rum. Almost all of them are around the 
grogshop on Saturday nights. 
Not long ago a farm hand in this immediate 
vicinity secured his wages, including two months’ 
back pay, amounting to about $40, so I am told. 
On Saturday night he left the farm at seven to 
go to town. He returned about 12 o’clock sing¬ 
ing gloriously. He must have wanted more, from 
the fact that the folks at the house tell me that 
for nearly three hours he kept singing these 
words: “Take me way down, down, down, where 
the Wurzburger flows.” Next morning he was 
discharged. With his wages of $15 to $20 a month 
why cannot a farm hand keep himself decent? When I 
first went to work on a farm I had to live in a dirty 
house, though the farmer was wealthy. The food was 
poor and all ate at the same table. But I stayed there 
seven years because the farmer is kind hearted, and will¬ 
ing to help the hired man. We get up at five.^and work 
and supper are over by six. 
many years yet. 
Orange Co., N. Y. 
I shall remain a farmer for 
A FORMER PRINTER.” 
