882 
was put in by a firm in New Haven, my farm being 
three miles distant from that city. This firm guar¬ 
anteed that we would have all the heat we wanted 
in zero weather. We have kept the house warm 
and comfortable. Now with regard to some of the 
advantages of hot-water heat. I am thoroughly con¬ 
vinced that it is the most healthful of any. The 
temperature is so equable and pleasant through the 
house. When we want the heat we can have it; 
when we do not need it we are not obliged to have 
it. In mild weather a smouldering fire will keep 
the house warm. Should the weather grow sud¬ 
denly cold, as is liable to be the case, in our New 
England climate, open the drafts and the water will 
soon get warmer. Sometimes during the Spring or 
Fall months we start a wood fire in the heater. 
We have run the heater with a wood fire several 
days in succession, but do not make this a common 
practice, as it is more trouble. We do not often 
have the heat turned off from any of the rooms. 
Sometimes we turn or partly turn off the heat in a 
sleeping room. This is easily regulated. It is less 
trouble to take care of a hot water heater than to 
take care of any stove I have ever seen; a few 
minutes morning and evening. In extremely cold 
weather it might be well to attend to it at noon. 
In mild weather once a day will often suffice. With 
regard to freezing of the pipes, farmhouses arc us¬ 
ually occupied during the Winter. If the house is 
abandoned draw off the water. My complete outfit 
cost $265. j. P. F. 
West Haven, Conn. 
STEEL HAY TRACKS AND LIGHTNING. 
T have never known or heard of a case where a 
steel hay track caused a barn to be struck by lightning. 
Nor do I think it would add to the danger. But if 
the barn was already provided with rods it would be 
a very easy matter to connect each end of the track 
by a wire cable made of three or four No. 12 wires, 
twisted together out through a hole to the rod, being 
careful to twist the wires each separately and closely 
about the main rods, so as to come in close contact 
with the clean surface. While copper wire would be 
very much the best for this purpose, galvanized wire 
would answer all requirements. Lightning sometimes 
plays queer pranks. Three years ago it struck a barn 
in this county in a peculiar manner. A load of hay 
had just been drawn into the barn when a bolt of 
lightning came down through the roof near the mid- 
file and directly over the hay, went straight down 
through the hay and floor beneath, cutting a hole 
about as large as a nail keg, setting the hay on fire, 
shocking the boy on the load, but not so badly but 
what he called to the men on the floor to open the 
other door of barn and drove the wagon out, and 
drove so as to tip the hay off, and saved the wagon. 
Of course this required quick work and level heads, 
but it saved barn and wagon and shows what can be 
done. This man has since put rods on his barn. 
Niagara Co., N. Y. j. s. woodward. 
ALFALFA IN TENNESSEE. 
Cow peas and Crimson clover are both valuable an¬ 
nual legumes. The Southern farmer could scarcely 
do well without either. The time was when we 
thought we would fail totally without them. Possibly 
Prof. W. F. Massey was thinking of that time 
when he said, “cow peas for Summer hay, Crimson 
clover for a Winter cover as soil improvers could not 
be beaten even by Alfalfa,” page 804. I am sorry to 
see this, coming from Prof. Massey. Possibly more 
Southern farmers will accept it than from any other 
source, so well and favorably known is he. The writer 
has grown stock peas and Soy beans as well as almost 
all the annual legumes. The continued plowing, pre¬ 
paring seed beds, sowing the same field twice each 12 
months, took too much time, cost too much, and worse 
still, on our rolling side-hill soils, soil erosion was 
increased to a fearful extent. Cow peas leave the top 
soil so loose and thoroughly fined that before wheat 
or any catch crop could prevent soil was washed un¬ 
less the field was level. This all led us on Crown 
Farm to try to grow Alfalfa. We failed the first 
attempt. Did we give up? Not a bit of it. No, in¬ 
deed, we came again, for we had learned how. We 
had two or three loads of hard wood ashes that we 
scattered on a portion of our first Alfalfa. Here we 
had a fine stand that lived. Then the second time 
we had lime, and success followed. Now it would 
seem that every farmer in the Southern States, and 
all over, for that matter, should know how to grow 
Alfalfa successfully, so much has been said about Al¬ 
falfa and lime in The R. N.-Y. for the last few 
years. We are looking for better days; they have 
already come. The Alfalfa has given us four tons 
per acre, with three cuttings and a fourth growth 
now, September 8, 12 to 18 inches high. We have 
six acres now four years old. Then the Red clover 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
on a 1414-acre field surely does look good. No gul- 
leys, no bare eroded spots to catch and hold our at¬ 
tention, possibly causing a shiver to creep up our 
backs, for we had worked hard that we might grow 
both Alfalfa and clover, hoping they would do exactly 
what they have done so nobly, namely, stop this con¬ 
tinued plowing and sowing each year, with soil wash 
unchecked. No annual legume will do for us any 
more. We have learned there are better things for 
us, and we have good neighbors traveling the same 
road beside us; chatting, smiling happily, we are 
marching along, gathering recruits from all sides. 
Tennessee. _ o. p. r. fox. 
QUESTIONS ABOUT THE WONDERBERRY. 
It seems to me that, in justice to John Lewis Childs, 
you ought to answer the following questions in public 
print: 
3. How did the berries from the sample plant he 
sent you taste? 
2. Did any of the 20 people who tasted them like 
them ? 
3. Was the plant apparently any different from 
Solatium nigrum ? 
4. Do you honestly believe that you or John Lewis 
Childs or any one else could take the seeds of 
Solanum nigrum and raise from them a plant very 
like the one he sent you called Wonderberry? 
Are you willing to try it? 
This seems to me to be a very reasonable test. Will 
your case stand such a test? As a subscriber to your 
paper, ] respectfully ask you to print these questions 
and answer them in The R. N.-Y. burton coon. 
Red Hook, N. Y. 
R. N.-Y.—We cheerfully print these questions and 
reply to them. The berries were thoroughly tested 
here. No one of our people liked them. Several re¬ 
ported that they tasted “like a potato ball.” The gen¬ 
eral comment which went with the first taste was 
“better than I expected.” In practically every case, 
however, after eating several of the berries, there 
was reported a burning or choking feeling at the 
throat. These berries were eaten raw. They were 
not cooked. No one here would call for such berries 
when other fruit could be obtained. The plant was 
large and vigorous. It did not grow' as pictured in 
Mr. Childs’ advertisement, but had a sprawling habit 
-—the berries being evidently carried in the dust or 
mud. Mr. Childs pictured an upright bush like goose¬ 
berry, loaded with fruit and not bending down in the 
least. As compared with the wild nightshade the plant 
was larger and apparently better fed. We should 
think Dr. Bedell’s statement on page 831 very fair. 
The plant was taken to a photographer’s. As it lay 
before the camera, one of the workmen, a former 
farm boy, came by. He did not know what it was, 
but on looking at it, said at once—“What have you 
got here—black nightshade?” We are not dealing in 
beliefs or dreams, and do not know what nightshade 
will come to under cultivation. We know that at the 
Massachusetts Horticultural Society’s show the culti¬ 
vated Solanum nigrum was taken from the Harvard 
botanical gardens and put side by side with Wonder¬ 
berry from Childs’ seeds. They were pronounced 
exactly the same in general appearance. We would be 
perfectly willing to try it—in fact, it has been tried. 
Will Mr. Coon tell us, however, why we should be 
expected to go any further in the matter? It is Mr. 
Burbank’s move, as we look at it. We have proved 
that seeds sold by Mr. Childs as Wonderberry de¬ 
veloped into plants which are identified as black 
nightshade. As neither Mr. Burbank nor Mr. Childs 
can deny this, why should Mr. Coon expect us to 
offer further proof? 
THE COLORADO BEETLE AT HOME. 
Is it true that the Potato beetles have been worse 
than usual in Colorado this year? If that is so, why? 
The Potato beetle is known as the Colorado Potato 
beetle, and is native in the Greeley district, and, in 
fact, all along the east slope of the Rocky Mountains. 
It has been in the potato fields since Greeley began 
to grow potatoes, and there have been times when it 
has done considerable damage. Ordinarily, however, 
the principle that an animal or insect in its own na¬ 
tive habitat, is not apt to become numerous enough 
to do damage, because of its natural enemies, keeps 
these troublesome pests in control. Ordinarily we find 
a considerable number of the old beetles in the Spring, 
but it is not common to find any great numbers of 
the young larvaj. There arc several parasitic insects 
that work on the eggs and larvae and keep them from 
multiplying. This year, however, the parasites seem 
to be off duty. I have never seen the Potato beetle 
worse, even in Michigan or Connecticut, than it has 
been in some of our fields this Summer. In fact, a 
few days ago I saw something that T had never seen 
before and hope never to see again. In a field of some 
30 or 50 acres of potatoes the beetle had been pretty 
October 9, 
bad, particularly on one side. The third brood of 
adults had just emerged from the ground, and had 
trimmed the foliage from several acres on one side 
of the field, and were then migrating, as army worms 
sometimes migrate, across the field. There was a strip 
along the side of the field from six to 10 feet wide 
where it would have been difficult to place a silver 
dollar on the ground without covering two or three 
of the old beetles. This migration of the insect is 
something new to me, although I have heard the old- 
timers in Michigan tell of the insects doing this thing 
when they first struck that country many years ago. 
Our mountain valleys, and particularly the western 
slope, do not know the Potato beetle at all. In fact, 
the insect seems to have no tendency to move west¬ 
ward. We have a very excellent crop on the west 
slope this season. e. p. bennett. 
SHEEP’S FOOT AS FARM ROLLER. 
We have had arguments in favor of using the farm 
roller in new seeding to grass. The chief advantage 
seems to be that the seed is pressed down into the 
soil so that it makes a deeper root growth and a bet¬ 
ter start. The Government is trying to revive the 
stock ranges in the West. They have been grazed too 
closely, and efforts are made to reseed these ranges 
with mountain bunch-grass (Festuca viridula). At 
the beginning of this work three methods were used: 
“Upon one area the seed was allowed to drop to the 
ground without treatment. The seed was brushed in 
with a brush drag or harrow on the second tract, and 
upon the third a band of sheep was passed over the 
area in a compact body twice. This Summer it has 
been found that the area not treated has the lightest 
stand of seedlings, while the resulting seedling stand 
on the other two areas showed but little variation in 
density, but later, during the period of drought the 
seedlings on the area brushed over died out badly, 
while on the area upon which the sheep harrowed in 
the seed there was very little loss. Closer examina¬ 
tion developed the fact that the root systems of the 
seed which had been tramped in were one-half to one 
inch deeper in the soil than the root systems of the 
seed which had been brushed in, this condition being 
due to the fact that the seed was ground into the soil 
more deeply by the sheep than by the brush harrow.” 
A FARMER’S SHARE OF BREAD MONEY. 
The article on page 756 is wrong. No mill ever 
made a barrel of flour from four bushels of wheat. 
I very much doubt if any ever did out of 4 V± bushels 
on a thousand-bushel run; those, if any, claiming that 
yield having made it on a small lot of choice grain, 
with everything arranged for the test, and more than 
a probability that the total product weighed more after 
it was ground than it did before. There are certainly 
more mills using more than 4 Yu bushels than are using 
less, and this is for the flour of all grades, a con¬ 
siderable proportion of which is a very low grade 
known as “red dog,” unfit for bread, and used but 
very little except for feed, in this country. A much 
larger proportion is the so-called baker’s flour, and 
sells for about $1 per barrel less than the fancy 
patent flour bought by your people for about $ 8 , so 
that the miller really gets at least $1 per barrel less 
than your figures, less his freight. His wheat, in¬ 
stead of costing him $3 per bushel, costs him not less 
than $3.50 at the time this flour was ground, and the 
same grade of wheat was selling $3.35 per bushel at 
Minneapolis within the past two weeks. Your taking 
spot quotations for a lower grade of grain, and using 
quotations for flour made from wheat costing 50 per 
cent more is certainly anything but fair to the miller, 
and as to the baker, I have seen none of them making 
any money in our smaller towns and villages. 
A NEW YORK MILLER. 
R. N.-Y.—We are glad to have any wrong state¬ 
ments corrected. Our information regarding the 
amount of wheat required to make a barrel of flour 
came from the Department of Agriculture. We were 
not discussing the miller’s profit, but comparing what 
the farmer receives for the raw wheat and what the 
consumer pays for flour and bread. We know that 
the figures given for these goods were correct, be¬ 
cause we pay these prices for our own food. We 
realize the necessity of making accurate statements, 
and that is why we took items from our own expense 
account. We are paying $8 for a barrel of flour, and 
seven cents a loaf for bread. Our friend the miller 
does not deny that 255 loaves are made from a barrel 
of flour. If farmers get more than $3 for their wheat, 
or if it takes more than 4 1 /4 bushels to make a barrel 
of flour, we want to know about it. If so-called 
baker’s flour sells for less than the best, and is used 
in our bread, we pay full price for it. The R. N.-Y. 
would not deny a fair profit to the miller, the baker 
or any other necessary handler, but we do object 
when these various handlers get twice as much of 
the consumer’s dollar as the producer does. 
