1907 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
4oi 
A FOOLISH FERTILIZER FORMULA. 
It is hard to say that one fraud is worse than an¬ 
other, but the fertilizer fraud comes near the head! 
The Gardner Nursery Co., of Osage, Iowa, offered to 
send for one dollar a very valuable fertilizer formula. 
We sent the dollar and this is what we got: 
$100 FERTILIZER FORMULA. 
Dissolve the following in 12 gallons of water : four pounds 
saltpeter, two pounds sal soda, four pounds crude potash 
(lye), two pounds ammonia sulphate, two pounds blue stone 
(blue vitriol). 
Spread 200 pounds clean stable manure under dry shed 
and sprinkle with two gallons of above solution. 
To this add : 50 pounds wood ashes, 16 pounds lime, five 
pounds kainit (German potash salt), 16 pounds common salt, 
eight pounds phosphoric acid. 
Mix thoroughly through the entire pile and let stand 10 
days before using. 
We are told that 150 to 200 pounds of this mixture 
is sufficient for an acre—we must not use too much 
and burn the crops! 
This benevolent concern says that it may be hard to 
buy some of these ingredients near home, so they figure 
it all out as follows: 
INGREDIENTS REQUIRED FOR A TON OF FERTILIZER 
AND COST. 
Mix together as instructed in formula. 
•i lbs. saltpeter . @ 8 cts.$ .32 
2 lbs. sal soda. m 10 cts.20 
4 lbs. crude potash .@ 10 cts.40 
2 lbs. ammonia sulphate ....(& 7 cts.14 
2 lbs. blue vitriol . (if 9 cts.18 
1200 lbs. clean stable manure. (You can doubtless secure 
this without cost). 
300 lbs. wood ashes. We find people glad to have us haul 
them away. 
96 lbs. lime in 200 lb. lots. (a) 55 cts per 100 lbs.$ .54 
•96 lbs. salt .@ y 2 ct.48 
48 lbs. phosphate acid, in 500 lb. lots..@ 1 5 cts per 
100 lbs.36 
30 lbs. kainit in 500 lb. lots.@ 80 cts. per 
100 lbs.24 
Now, it is too bad to apply cold facts to this “$100 
formula,” but it has to be done. This is what your 
ton would contain: 
Nitrogen Acid Potash 
4 pounds saltpeter. 
1.8 
2 pounds sal soda . 
0 
0 
4 "pounds potash . 
2.5 
2 pounds sulphate of ammonia. 
.40 
2 pounds blue vitriol . 
. 0 
0 
0 
1200 pounds stable manure . 
.6. 
4. 
8. 
300 pounds wood ashes . 
. 0 
4.5 
15. 
96 pounds lime . 
. 0 
0 
0 
96 pounds salt . 
. 0 
0 
0 
48 pounds “phosphate” . 
. 0 
7 
0 
30 pounds kainit . 
. 0 
0 
4 
Total . 
.6.90 
15.5 
31.3 
They figure that this costs 
$2.80 aside 
from 
the 
manure and wood ashes. These in our county would 
cost at least $1.50 more. The salt, sal soda and blue 
vitriol have no direct value as plant food, and it is 
worse than nonsense to buy little dabs of lye and salt¬ 
peter. Fifty pounds of nitrate of soda gives eight 
pounds of nitrogen; 100 pounds of basic slag give 
18 of phosphoric acid and 50 of lime, while 70 pounds 
muriate of potash give 35 pounds of potash, or more 
plant food than this entire ton contains. Nor can the 
promoters of such a humbug sneak out of responsi¬ 
bility by saying that the chemicals make the manure 
more valuable. We have given credit for all the mix¬ 
ture contains. The lime would be likely to drive some 
ammonia away and the salt will act to prevent fer¬ 
mentation. Did you ever hear of a greater folly than 
advising farmers not to use over 200 pounds per, acre 
of such a mixture? If western farmers want to im¬ 
prove their stable manure let them use 40 pounds of 
acid phosphate and 25 of muriate of potash with each 
ton, but do not spend money on such monumental 
rot as this so-called “formula.” To ask a man to pay 
a dollar for such “information” is the next thing to 
holding him up with a gun and robbing him. These 
chemicals add less than one pound of nitrogen to the 
mixture and the lime and wood ashes mixed with the 
manure will probably drive a good share of the nitro¬ 
gen away. Five dead cats or one sheep-killing dog 
will give more nitrogen than the $3 worth of chemicals. 
“$100 formula!” Go tell it to the marines! 
EVENTS OF THE WEEK. 
DOMESTIC.—The New York State Senate April 24 
passed an important amendment to the Recording Mortgage 
Tax law of last session. This measure allows holders of 
old mortgages (he optional privileges of coming under the 
new law, and. by payment of the required fee. to obtain the 
advantages thereof. It also regulates the question of prior 
advance mortgages by fixing the date of July 1, 1906, as the 
date when the law affects these blanket mortgages. . . . 
Western Montana experienced a blizzard April 24. On the 
Flathead Indian reservation the snow was six inches deep. 
. . . . Harry W. Henderson, one of the persons in¬ 
dicted by the Federal grand jury at Mobile, Ala., in con¬ 
nection with the Honduras lottery, appeared April 24, and 
entered a plea of guilty. Mr. Henderson came to Mobile 
from Los Angeles to answer the indictment. . . . Fire 
In the Navy Yard at Kittery, Me., April 24, destroyed the 
pattern shop, and caused a loss of $150,000. . . . Presi¬ 
dent Roosevelt formally opened the Jamestown Exposition 
April 27. . . . One hundred and twelve buildings at 
Lake Pleasant, Mass., were burned April 25. causing a loss 
estimated at $115,000. The burned buildings included a 
hotel, several stores, post office, dancing pavilion, the head¬ 
quarters of the New England Spiritualist Camp Meeting 
Association, and about one hundred cottages. . . . •, 
\V. L. Claiborne, a member of the Industrial Workers of the 
World, testified at the trial of Preston and Smith, leaders 
of that organization, at Hawthorne, Nev., April 24, that a 
man named Johnson offered $250 lo any one who would kill 
“Diamond Field Jack” Davis, the Goldfield mine owner. 
Claiburne swore that Johnson asked Smith, one of the 
prisoners, why Silva had not been killed. Silva was mur¬ 
dered next day. Johnson is under indictment for murder, 
and he was a leader in the recent Goldfields strike. Silva 
was a restaurant keeper of Goldfield, and was killed, it is 
alleged, by members of the Industrial Workers of the World 
for employing men who were not members of that organiza¬ 
tion. ... A conspiracy on the part of members of the Electri¬ 
cal Workers’ Union of San Francisco to kidnap and murder 
P. II. McCarthy, president of the Building Trades Council, 
was revealed at the meeting of the council April 25. Sev¬ 
eral of the conspirators are in jail. The charge is based on 
the affidavit of II. Snuckley, a member of the Electrical 
Workers’ Union, who refused to sanction the murder. The 
matter was placed in the hands of the jiolice and several 
of the accused men were locked up. The plot to murder 
McCarthy had its origin in the war between the Electrical 
Workers’ Union and the Building Trades Council, which 
resulted in the expulsion of the electrical workers. Mc¬ 
Carthy was blamed by the electrical workers. 
Revelations of the most revolting and inhuman treatment 
of insane inmates of Illinois County almshouses are made in 
a report just submitted to Governor Deneen by the State 
Board of Charities. The astounding conditions described 
in the 130,000-word report are made the basis for an em¬ 
phatic recommendation that the State assume conplete con¬ 
trol of the insane. In 27 counties the care of the alms¬ 
house population is let by contract, on the basis of the 
lowest bid, “a system which leaves human misery at the 
mercy of human greed.” In some counties the cost of 
the almhouse occupants is approximately $1 per week per 
capita, for which they are supposed to receive food, cloth¬ 
ing and all care. Numerous almshouses exist where steel 
handcuffs,, barred cells, steel cages and padlocks are in 
service to restrain the insane. A girl of 20 was kept in a 
steel cage in Stark County. Many of the almshouses are 
filthy to an indescribably disgusting degree and are overrun 
with vermin. In the Clinton County almshouse the patients 
have not bathed for 16 years. . . . After deliberation 
for twenty-one hours the jury in the case of former Repre¬ 
sentative Binger Hermann of Oregon, former Commissioner 
of the General Land Office, brought in a verdict of acquittal, 
April 27. Mr. Hermann was charged with destroying thirty- 
five letter press copybooks which the Government claimed 
were official records of the Land Office. Ills trial lasted 
12 weeks. Hermann is stiff under indictment in Oregon 
for conspiracy in connection with frauds in the Blue Moun¬ 
tain forest reserve, and will probably be placed on trial 
in Oregon soon. . . . The big packing shod of the 
I’ratt Oil Company, a Standard Oil plant at the foot of 
North Twelfth street, Williamsburg, was destroyed by 
fire April 27. The adjoining pier at which the British 
steamship Rocklight was loading case oil for South American 
ports was also burned and the firemen, assisted by three 
fireboats and six Standard Oil tugs, had hard work keeping 
the flames from spreading to the refining plant near by and 
to the works of the Brooklyn Union Gas Company across 
the street. The loss was nearly $200,000. ... A 
tornado swept over north Texas April 27, doing its worst 
damage in Cook county. Valley View and Hemming were 
practically destroyed. Six persons are known to be dead. 
At Valley View the farmhouses of C. J. McCollum, E. M. 
Moss, A. R. Leach, W. J. Maddox, It. D. Nichols and W. C. 
Nichols were destroyed. At Celeste, the cotton mill was 
damaged $25,000. From Gainesville in a southeast course 
to Celeste, a distance of about 100 miles, many farms and 
fruit orchards were devastated. . . . Chicago was in 
the grip of a second April blizzard April 25. Snow fell all 
day, followed by ice and freezing temperature. Snow in 
northern Kansas and northern Missouri and freezing weather 
extending from the Nebraska-Iowa line south into Texas 
were reported the same date. Three inches of snow fell at 
Dresden, Kan., and half an inch at Marysville, Mo. In 
Chicago on April 25 last year the thermometer registered 
80 degrees at noon, the lowest point being 74 at 6 o’clock 
in the morning. This year the highest point reached was 
44 at midnight, and it was near freezing at noon. A rain 
and sleet storm at Milwaukee April 30 developed into a 
fall of six inches of snow, most of which remained on the 
ground, the weather being cold enough to prevent melting. 
The storm was principally confined to the lake section. 
The same date snow covered the entire State of Iowa for 
a depth of from three to eight inches. In Des Moines 
and central Iowa it was eight inches, according to Govern¬ 
ment report. Interviews with leading horticulturists in¬ 
dicated that all the small fruit is irretrievably killed. The 
snow will do much good to grain and pastures, but the damage 
to fruits and some of the truck gardening is inestimable. 
. . . Dennis Kearney, the labor agitator who achieved 
notoriety late in the seventies when the so-called “Sandlot 
riots” took place, died of old age at his home in Alameda, 
Cal., April 25. Dennis Kearney once came pretty near being 
the political boss of San Francisco. He it was who, at 
the time of the “Sandlot riots,” led a mob of workingmen 
to burn the homes of wealthy San Franciscans on Nob Hill. 
For many years he was a power in San Francisco politics 
and his word was law with thousands of workingmen. Kear¬ 
ney was born in County Cork, Ireland, and came to New 
Y’ork when he was only 11 years old. At an early age he 
went to sea and displayed such a talent for commanding 
men that when he was only 19 years old he found himself 
master of one of the largest sailing vessels that plied be¬ 
tween the East Indies and Great Britain. Later on he 
sailed between China and San Francisco, and the year 
1875 found him at work as a drayman in San Francisco. 
Labor disputes followed, and in the turbulence that followed 
Kearney made a particular point of the Chinese agitation, 
declaring that the foreigners ought to be driven out of 
the country because they took the bread out of the mouths 
of American workingmen. . . . Fire destroyed the moat 
packing plant of the William Zeller Company at Pittsburg, 
Pa., April 25. The loss is estimated at $400,000, which 
was only partly covered by insurance. Crossed electric 
wires are supposed to have started the fire. . . . Snow 
in northern Kansas, northern Missouri and Colorado and 
freezing weather extending from the Nebraska-Iowa State 
lines into the Panhandle of Texas was reported April 25. 
There was a fall of between two and three inches of snow 
at Dresden, in the northwestern corner of Kansas; a light 
fall at Concordia, Kansas, 150 miles northwest of Kansas 
City, and half an inch at Maryville, in northwestern Miss¬ 
ouri. '1'lie temperature at Kansas City dropped to 39 degrees 
In Denver and throughout the northeastern portion of 
Colorado the temperature fell to 22 degrees. At Grand 
.Tunclion, in the western part of the State, the lowest tem¬ 
perature was 46. It is said 20 per cent of the fruit in that 
district has been damaged. 
OBITUARY.—S. T. K. Prime, who for twenty-five years 
was stationed at Dwight. Ill., gathering statistics on crops, 
died April 26 in the Chicago Home for Incurables. He 
was stricken with paralysis two years ago. Prime’s Crop 
Reports made the publishers known throughout the country. 
Farmers regarded his figures and opinions as infallible. 
Even after the Government broadened its field in this work. 
Mr. Prime was considered by many an authority where views 
of experts conflicted. He was 75 years old. a native of 
Connecticut, and the son of Samuel Irenius Prime, minister, 
author and for many years editor of the Newark Observer. 
FRUIT PROSPECTS. 
Phis is a new section, improving rapidly. Spring is 
early this season; sweet peas in bloom April 16 from Fall- 
sown seed. Fruit prospects good; apples and Alfalfa are 
main crops. Pears will also be an important crop soon, 
as Parker Earle says there is no trace of blight on them 
here. Climate is very beneficial to consumptives and 
asthmatics here in Pecos Valley. e. s. g. 
Lake Arthur. N. M. 
Alfalfa is looking fine. We shall sow four acres more 
with beardless barley as a nurse crop; will give the patch 
a heavy coat of stable manure made partly by stock fed 
upon Alfalfa hay. This will assist in inoculation, I thmk. 
I have 15 acres that will make very light crop of clover hay. 
Should the ground be plowed as soon as hay is cut, prepared 
at once and kept harrowed till about August 15 with a rea¬ 
sonable chance of securing a crop next year? j. d. p. 
Ohio. 
„ A cold wave unprecedented for this season visited the 
North Fork (of the Gunnison River) Valley April 19-22. 
Mercury dropped to 21 degrees. Apples, peaches, cherries 
and apricots are practically all killed; not enough left for 
home use. I congratulate you on the splendid paper you 
are giving your readers, and especially your exposure of 
various schemes and their promoters who fatten off the 
gullibility of us soil workers. 
Hotchkiss, Col. 
Fruit in this part of the country is all killed by frost. 
Ten miles north of here some orchards show half or a 
quarter crop of peaches ; on extra high land they are reported 
as not killed. Early strawberries are completely killed, and 
a large proportion of the late ones. If it continues frosty 
very few will be left. A sharp north wind is blowing to¬ 
day (April 27) and if it clears off frost may be expected 
to-night. Letters from Oklahoma received here report both 
wheat and oats killed by frost. j. b. 
Union Co., Ill. 
The weather here has been down to 15 and 20 degrees 
above zero of and on, and ;not until yesterday could I do 
anything on the land. Ground frozen about three-fourths 
of an inch every night. The last two days the weather has 
been favorable and sowing oats and some vegetable seeds 
will start to-morrow. The season here according to my 
books Is 10 days later than last season. Last season we 
had killing frost May 25, which we may not have this 
year, which would help some. 
Milwaukee, Wis. _ 
FRUIT IN WESTERN NEW YORK.—The outlook for 
peaches along the lake shore in Niagara and Orleans coun¬ 
ties, N. 15, is good, and there is promise of a very heavy 
blossom of apples; even some Baldwin orchards that were 
full last year are showing considerable quantities of blossom 
buds. This is something unusual, and I have had several 
apple growers call my attention to it. b. d. v. b. 
COAL TAR AND SHINGLES.—With regard to W. I. IL’s 
advice on page 342, I would add do not on any account tar 
new shinyles after they are on the roof. With an old 
roof that is nearly done for tar may be of some service, 
but with a new roof an application of coal tar is positively 
injurious. I speak from an experience of over 30 years. 
Dipping the shingles in tar before laying them may be 
good—I have never tried it—but if you put a coating of 
coal tar on a new roof, you only cover the exposed parts 
of the shingles: the rain beats in underneath, the roof 
cannot dry, and the shingles decay. If two roofs are 
laid at the same, time, and one is then tarred and the other 
left alone, the latter will be doing good service when the 
former is entirely done for. This is no theory, but the 
result of a great deal of experience. As Tennyson says: 
“And others’ follies teach us not 
Nor much their wisdom teaches, 
And most of sterling worth is what 
Our own experience preaches.” 
Coal tar has its uses, but putting it on a good shingle 
roof Is not one of them. w. e. money. 
Virginia. 
WOULD USE LEAD PIPE.—As I live in the land of 
hills and plenty of springs I can hardly agree with the 
advice given to G. L. K. by G. D., page 349. For the past 
25 years I have watched the work of conveying and piping 
water from springs, and in every instance where iron pipe 
has been used, it has been replaced by lead pipe. I know 
of parties putting down iron pipe of 1-inch capacity a 
few years ago, and it is getting so filled with rust, that 
they are going to take it up this Spring and put in lead, 
and just think of the fact, that there is a fall of 80 feet. 
1 have a half-inch lead pipe from spring to the barn 
(23 rods) ; the outlet is five feet lower than the spring, 
and it takes just eight seconds to catch a quart of water 
at the barn, which would amount to 84 barrels every 24 
hours. My advice to G. I,. K. would be to get one-half-inch 
lead pipe, grade D, which will weigh about 13 pounds to 
the rod, and cost 8Vi to nine cents per pound; lay the pipe 
this Spring, or early Summer, so the ground will get well 
settled before Fall, and if he keeps a strainer on the pipe 
at the spring, he will have something that will last him 
for 25 years. I know of lead pipe that has been down for 
46 years, and there never has been a stoppage of the water 
running in all that time. e. e. s. 
Delaware County, N. Y. 
SEEDLESS ArPLE AGAIN.—Your editorial on page 330, 
showing the latest trick of Hie Seedless apple agents, sur¬ 
prised me. It seems you can’t hit them too hard and so 
will have to hoist the black flag. The enclosed article in 
our town paper shows how to give that company a good 
blow in each State, and I send it for what it is worth. 
That company worked here. They expected an order for 
200 trees from a neighbor. I loaned him some copies of 
The R. N.-Y., and saved him enough to pay for the paper 
for years, but could not get him to subscribe. We have a 
good' country here, great for fruit and Alfalfa. e. s. g. 
New Mexico. 
R. N.-Y T .—Here is the article referred to : “Prof. L. R. 
Taft, horticulturist of the State Agricultural college, pro¬ 
nounces the so-called Spencer Seedless apple a fake, pure 
and simple, and warns the farmers to let it severely alone. 
The claims made in its behalf are not sustained, says 
Prof. Taft, as to size, color, texture of freedom from the 
Codling moth. Don’t part with any of your good money 
for stock that will hear this seedless apple, is the advice 
of Prof. Taft. He also calls attention to the State law 
requiring agents for nursery stock and nurseries to take 
out a State license to sell that kind of stock. He calls 
upon prosecuting attorneys to enforce this law against 
agents for the Seedless apple fake.—Hastings Banner.” 
FARMS IN VERMONT.—This is rather a hard matter 
to answer intelligently your western inquirers, for if they 
do not know personally something of the eastern farm and 
farmers,- valid reasons for the low prices for some eastern 
farms, would not appeal to them, for it is a fact that 
here in New England we frequently have farms that sell 
for less than it would cost to erect duplicates of the 
buildings on the premises. Such farms come on the market 
from various causes; in most cases I think it is due to 
poor management, and lack of ability on the part of the 
occupant. The soil is robbed of all its fertility, and when 
it fails to produce the farm is thrown on the market to 
be sold for what it will bring, or surrendered on a mortgage, 
with the same results. Sometimes such farms come on the 
market through death of the owner, and are sold at auction 
to settle the estate; in fact the same causes contribute to 
these conditions as obtain in all sorts of occupations. Now 
you ask “if these farms are suitable for farming.” I say 
yes, emphatically yes; in very many instances they are 
naturally just as good farms as tliose adjoining valued 
at from four to ten times as much, often in a good loca¬ 
tion, with telephone service, rural delivery of mail, cash 
for everything you have to sell, and that at your own door. 
I traveled for 19 years in New Hampshire. Vermont, and 
a portion of Massachusetts, and I have yet to see a farm 
that, in my opinion, is not capable of paying a profit to 
the man who would give it intelligent care and cultivation, 
we eastern farmers know of just such instances, under 
our observation where so-called “abandoned farms” have 
been bought for small sums and are to-day among the most 
profitable farms in the community. It is all in the man 
behind the farm, just as it is in any other vocation. 
Newport, Vt. w, e. R. 
