1908. 
SUCCESS WITH A MULCHED ORCHARD. 
McIntosh and Ben Davis. 
, Knowing that you are interested in the mulch 
method of growing fruit I thought you might be 
interested in mine. Having been quite successful in 
raising fruit in a small way, and having a love for 
the business, I had quite a desire to set a certain field 
to fruit, but the work entailed to cultivate thoroughly 
and care for the trees deterred me for some time. 
After reading several articles on mulching I decided 
to try it. In the Spring of 1902 a small portion of the 
field was heavily manured, plowed and planted in 
corn. Here, again, our friend, the crow, got in his 
work, entirely destroying the corn. It was sown with 
millet and a fair crop harvested. In the Spring of 
1903 it was sown with oats, seeded with clover and 
Timothy, and planted with one-year-old apple trees 
20 feet apart, 65 trees in all. As soon as the oats 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
soil and convert it into any other substance. But we 
do know that somewhere in the plant laboratory, either 
in the leaves or in some other of the plant tissues 
above the roots, or in both, the plant has the power 
to take the elements of plant food and combine them 
with the elements of air and water in different propor¬ 
tions, and thus give us an almost endless variety of 
fruits and flavors. Just so it is with the sorrel plant. 
It does not feed upon humic acid in the soil and 
change it into oxalic acid. 
I have a small plot of ground which was formerly 
used for a berry patch. Before it was put in berries 
it failed to show any evidence of acidity when chemi¬ 
cally tested. It received an application of over 200 
bushels of slaked lime per acre. About two years 
later it was set in berries, and I have never seen a 
worse sorrel infested piece of land anywhere. Now* 
to argue that this piece of land was sour simply be¬ 
cause of the growth of sorrel would be ridiculous, 
were headed they were cut and placed around the After the sorrel remained about two years it disap- 
trees. This same season the remainder of the field 
was prepared, but a dry season gave a light corn crop. 
In 1904 340 trees were planted and the hay and oats 
were placed around all the trees set. The following 
Winter was severe, and we lost about 150 trees, 
mostly R. I. Greenings. We were 
then advised by The R. N.-Y. to 
remove the mulch in Autumn or 
early Winter and replace in 
Spring. We have done this since, 
giving the trees a light hoeing 
each season, and have lost very 
few since. In 1905 the remainder 
of the field was planted, giving us 
about 700 trees in all. I think the 
Hope Farm man sold his hay 
when it was high and attempted 
to replace it with something else. 
Not so here. We plan to take 
nothing from this orchard but 
fruit. The grass crop has been 
heavy, and the growth of the trees 
good. In Fig. 377 we show a 
row of McIntosh apples planted in 
1904. On many of these trees 
there is two feet of growth this 
season, and on one we measured 
31 inches. These were one-year- 
old trees when planted, mere 
whips. They now measure fully 
11 feet high, and many of them 
are bearing fruit this season. Fig. 
376 shows a row of Ben Davis. 
These are as tall as and more 
spreading than the McIntosh and 
all hang full of fruit. In another 
part of the orchard are some two- 
year-old Greenings planted in 1904, 
that are bearing apples this year. 
Our first sale from these trees was 
one barrel of Ben Davis and one 
box of Wealthy last Autumn. 
There is much more fruit this 
season. d. w. southard. 
Schoharie Co., N. Y. 
peared, and in its place came voluntarily a rank 
growth of clover, which they tell us is proof of a 
sweet soil. To argue that the land was sweet before 
liming; sour, during the growth of the sorrel; and 
sweet during the growth of the clover, would be too 
FOUR-YEAR-OLD BEN DAVIS APPLE TREES IN SOD. Fig. 376 
SORREL AND A SOUR SOIL. 
On page 696 you make this 
statement: "A growth of sorrel 
is usually accepted as evidence of 
a sour soil.” That the growth of 
sorrel and a few other plants is 
generally accepted as positive 
proof of a sour soil perhaps is 
true. But is there any good rea¬ 
son for such belief? To me, the 
growth of sorrel or any other plant is no proof, or 
evidence, or even an indication of a sour soil. By a 
sour soil I mean one with too much humic acid, not 
one run down in production by an improper method 
of tillage or management. Such a soil will not grow 
the legumes successfully. But all soils that will not 
grow clover or other legumes successfully are not 
necessarily sour. The acid which makes a soil sour 
is humic acid or some compound with humic acid 
as a base. The acid of the sorrel is oxalic acid, with 
an entirely different composition. This same oxalic 
acid is found in the rhubarb plant, and yet no one 
ever heard the argument produced that the growth of 
rhubarb in our gardens was a proof that our garden 
soils were all sour. Yet that argument would bd 
just as reasonable as the one that the growth of the 
sour sorrel proves an acid soil, because both plants 
contain exactly the same acid. It would also be as 
reasonable to argue that one apple tree produces sour 
apples because it grew in sour soil, and another tree 
produces sweet apples because it grew in a sweet soil. 
No one has ever discovered that any plant has the 
power to feed on humic acid or any other acid in the 
803 
some ranker growing plant to outgrow it and smother 
it out. So Bam thoroughly convinced that you cannot 
tell a sour soil by what grows on it, or by what does 
not grow on it. The fact is that more sorrel grows 
on sweet soil in this locality than grows on sour soil. 
If you suspect that your soil is sour, do not trust to 
the growth or failure of any plant for your proof. 
Get a few strips of blue litmus paper from your drug 
store. Bury these strips at different places on your 
field, pressing the damp soil firmly against them. After 
a while take them up and examine them. If the blue 
paper has turned to a light red or pink color your 
soul is sour. If the paper still remains blue, or has 
changed to a purple, the soil is not sour, notwith¬ 
standing what grew on it or what did not grow on it. 
This test is easily made by anyone and is thoroughly 
reliable. If this test shows a sour soil an application 
of lime will correct the acidity. But if the test shows 
a sweet soil you may still need to lime for other pur¬ 
poses, because lime does many other things besides 
correcting acidity. g. b. w. 
HEN NOTES BY COSGROVE. 
Sheep in Partnership with Poultry. 
Readers of The R. N.-Y. are inquiring for details in 
regard to sheep keeping lice away 
from chicks. Here is all I know 
about it: Mr. Storrs—son, I think, 
of the donor of the land on which 
Storrs Agricultural College 
stands—lias a large building on 
his farm at Spring Hill in which 
he keeps sheep and poultry, let¬ 
ting them run together the year 
around. Fie makes the statement 
that he is never troubled with hen 
lice, and that his sheep are not 
bothered with ticks, as the poul¬ 
try keep the ticks from getting 
numerous. Any kind of oil or 
grease is fatal to lice, and as 
sheep are about the greasiest ani¬ 
mals we. have, probably there is 
the reason of hen lice being scarce 
where sheep are kept. Sheep like 
to have the chicks about them, for 
the chicks keep away flies, and at 
Storrs one can see the chicks 
walking all over the sheep when 
they are lying down. In The R. 
N.-Y., page 730, in the article 
which you headed “Cosgrove’s Re¬ 
markable Hen Notes,” I gave a 
recipe to kill lice on hens. It was 
25 pounds plaster of Paris, one 
quart of gasoline, one quart of 
crude carbolic acid. I find that is 
too much carbolic acid; half that 
quantity, or even less, is sufficient, 
as it is the smell of the acid that 
is wanted, and it is liable to take 
the skin off if too strong. The 
very capable young man who is at 
present caring for the poultry at 
Storrs, told me that he used it full 
strength of the recipe, and nearly 
lost the skin from his hands. 
GEO. A. COSGROVE. 
FOUR-YEAR-OLD McINTOSH APPLES MULCHED. Fig. 377. 
contradictory to talk about. Then only why did the 
sorrel grow on this sweet soil at that particular time? 
Simply because the conditions were such that it was 
favorable to the growth of that plant, and it grew. 
Many times on my own farm have I seen sorrel and 
clover growing side by side and their roots inter¬ 
twining and feeding from exactly the same soil. Now, 
if clover will not grow in a sour soil, how could the 
growth of sorrel in the same soil be an evidence of a 
sour soil? I have seen these same plants growing 
right together in many localities of Pennsylvania, and 
have heard others say they had observed this. 
It has also been said that lime will kill sorrel by 
acting as a poison. I have seen sorrel growing around 
the edge of an old lime kiln where the lime was more 
than two inches thick. Now, if lime is a poison to 
sorrel, how could it grow right in the lime? I have 
attended farmers’ institutes in more than half the 
counties of this State, and talking on lime, I have 
known more than a score of people to say they had 
also seen sorrel growing right in the the lime. Lime 
may cause the disappearance of sorrel, but does so 
not because it poisons the plant, but because it causes 
THE SELF-BOILED LIME 
AND SULPHUR. 
Bordeaux Mixture is generally 
recognized as the best fungicide 
for use on fruit trees. This mix¬ 
ture of lime and copper has been 
used for many years, but re¬ 
cently much complaint has been made about in¬ 
jury to fruit and foliage. The leaves are blasted 
and apples are left with a peculiar russet color dif¬ 
ferent from apple scab but quite as objectionable. 
This trouble was traced to the use of Bordeaux, and 
the scientists have been at work hunting for a sub¬ 
stitute that will protect the fruit from disease without 
marking it. They have hit upon the self-boiled lime 
and sulphur mixture as the most promising substitute. 
“Self-boiled” means that the heat of the lime in 
slaking is used for cooking the sulphur. The lime 
and sulphur are put together in a barrel and cold 
water added. As soon as the violent boiling ceases 
more cold water is added. Then the mixture is 
strained and is ready for use. It was found that 
when the lime and sulphur were thoroughly cooked 
or even when hot water was used in mixing, the 
spray injured the foliage and fruit. When “self- 
boiled” with cold water the mixture controlled apple 
scab but did not damage. The long boiling was 
necessary to give best results in fighting the scale, but 
this mixture proved too caustic for Summer spraying. 
Arsenic can be used with the self-boiled mixture. 
We believe this will prove to be one of the most im¬ 
portant discoveries that the fruit experts have given 
us in years. _ In most fruit growing districts some 
sort of fungicide is absolutely necessary, and many 
growers are afraid to use Bordeaux. 
