164 
high on the high side. They are built with runners, 
so as to be easily moved. Each has one large win¬ 
dow and a door. Each one is equipped with a self- 
feeder and other necessary feed bins. The feed is 
distributed to them once a week, the supply being 
hauled about with a horse. These colony houses are 
covered on sides and roofs with heavy roofing paper. 
The hatching period has been a very successful fea¬ 
ture each year, and the past season something over 
a,000 chicks were raised. The males all go for broil¬ 
ers except the few that are needed for breeding pur¬ 
poses. The writer was at Willow Wall Farm for six 
weeks last Fall, and this orchard with the colony 
houses and the hundreds of snow-white birds wa% a 
most interesting sight. In October the nearly full- 
grown young pullets are transferred from the colony 
houses to their Winter home in the large henhouse, 
and they are not let out of doors any more till warm 
weather in the Spring. They commence laying in 
November, and everything is done for them to keep 
them busy turning out eggs from then on. The old 
hens that are not to be kept for breeding are disposed 
of mostly to other poultrymen for breeding stock. 
This year there were calls for over a thousand more 
than they could supply. In constructing the buildings 
of this plant most of the lumber was cut and sawed 
on the farm. The roof is covered with galvanized 
iron. In fact, most of the buildings down in that sec¬ 
tion are roofed with galvanized iron. Everything 
about this plant is built substantially and well. Mr. 
McNeill tells me the cost of the outfit was around 
$5,000. He installed an air pressure water system, 
and he has about the best equipped water system that 
it has ever been my fortune to see on a farm. There 
is over a mile of pipe in use in the water system of 
the farm and poultry plant. The pressure tanks are 
located in the cellar of the house, and the power is 
furnished by a three horse-power gasoline engine. 
The cost of operating the system is about 2J/2 cents a 
day for fuel. 
The hens turn out a gross income of $3.30 per 
head per year, and the cost of feed is around $1.10 
per head. The sales from poultry bring the total net 
proceeds above $3,000 per year. The poultry plant 
is under the direction of Mr. McNeill's youngest son, 
Brown McNeill. He is a thorough-going poultry 
specialist. It takes about all of his time to care for 
the poultry and eggs. In the busy times he has some 
help, but at other times lie helps about other work. 
Most of the eggs are marketed in Washington, D. C., 
to private customers at very good prices. Mr. Mc¬ 
Neill is devoting most of his own time to orcharding, 
and has 85 acres in fruit, mostly apples. He set 50 
acres of orchard last Spring on new ground located 
on a high chestnut ridge. Apple trees are being set 
out by the tens of thousands on the hills .of West 
Virginia and Maryland. Their orchards there that 
have come into bearing are giving a good account of 
themselves, and it is likely that in a few years apples 
will cast a silvery shadow over the poultry at Willow 
Wall Farm. Another son has charge of the general 
farming operations, and as there are 800 acres in the 
farm he manages to find plenty to do. Grass and 
corn are the two principal crops in that section. They 
have excellent corn land. They erected a reinforced 
all-concrete silo last year, and will use it for feeding 
beef cattle and sheep to take care of the roughage 
raised on the farm. 
In conclusion I would say that while they have had 
very gratifying success with poultry at the Willow 
Wall Farm, and that the venture has proved profit¬ 
able, it is not because it came easy. It came through 
steady hard work and good management and uncom¬ 
monly good planning and building, and then thor¬ 
oughly good stock well cared for. R. c. angevine. 
THE MULGOBA MANGO. 
I am sending you one dozen Mulgoba mangos, 
which is an East Indian variety imported into this 
country by the U. S. Department of Agriculture. It is 
now fast being placed under cultivation for Amer¬ 
ican markets in Dade County, Fla. Up to the present 
time there are less than 200 trees of this variety in 
bearing here, and we have sold in all about 250 boxes 
of this fruit to the best trade in the large cities, at 
$2, $2.50, and $3 per dozen at Miami, Fla. We have 
never handled a fruit that was more appreciated than 
this, which we consider the most delicious of all 
dessert fruits. Figs. 52 and 53 show the fruit in 
natural size. 
In considering this fruit, one should eliminate from 
the mind any and all impressions previously formed 
by direct or indirect contact with the fruit generally 
known by the name of mango in countless numbers of 
varieties of mongrel seedlings that have spread 
throughout all tropical countries from their native 
country, the East Indies. These fruit we do not 
consider at all from a commercial standpoint. The 
cultivation of the commercial varieties of this fruit 
has previously been defeated by difficulties in propa- 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
gating true to variety. Prior to my discoveries in 
the beginning of the present century there had been 
no way to accomplish this except by the slow and 
expensive method of inarching, as is still practiced 
by the Hindoos and all others except myself, other 
than a few trees, largely accidents in extensive experi¬ 
ments of budding. The methods we apply are sim¬ 
ilar in results to those applied to all commercial fruits 
in civilized countries, except that some peculiar habits 
of the plant make it still more expensive, but fully 
as progressive. 
The Mulgoba mango was introduced into this coun¬ 
try in 1889 by the importation of an inarched tree 
from India, and up to the close of the year 1900 
there were less than one hundred inarched trees in 
South Florida of this variety, and about the same 
number of inarched trees of this and other fine vari¬ 
eties from the East Indies, growing in government 
gardens and botanical collections on the Western 
hemisphere. Since that time and now growing in 
orchard places, there are less than 500 trees of this 
variety except those produced in our operations. 
The Mulgoba we consider the only standard com¬ 
mercial variety of mango tested in this country, and 
there are several thousand trees now planted here in 
commercial orchards. There were only about 200 of 
these of bearing age and producing fruit this season, 
which have given us sufficient fruit to establish in 
market in the largest cities, and only among a few 
of the fancy dealers. I find it the easiest fruit product 
to sell that I have ever offered to the fruit trade. 
We now consider ourselves over the pioneer days in 
this, the most promising industry of modern horticul¬ 
ture. geo. b. cellon. 
Dade Co., Fla. 
THE COST OF A CROP. 
Hunting Out Hunt’s Potato Figures. 
I wish to ask C. I. Hunt, page 9, if there are any 
farms for sale in his country, .his land of paradise— 
where the worm abideth not in the soil, where the 
lusty weed stealeth not the sustenance from its do¬ 
mestic cousin, but dieth without a murmur. Where 
the luxuriant potato groweth undisturbed by weeds, 
molested not by bugs or blight, strong and vigorous, 
on through the Autumn till the glistening white frost 
ripens them for harvest. Two hundred and ten 
bushels, large, smooth, shapely beauties for each acre, 
never a small, rough, misshapen one in the bunch; 
where young boys dig three-fifths of an acre each 
per day, and still find time to pick them up, 120 
bushels the while, sorting out the “dry rots” and 
placing them on the wagon before dark. Surely is 
this paradise, else were true the fairyland tales that 
enchanted my youth. 
If there are any acres lying loose, Mr. Hunt, that 
can be picked up at a reasonable figure, say a few 
thousand per acre, I would deem it a great personal 
favor if you would acquaint me of the fact at once, 
for I am anxious to invest my little all in your 
Garden of Eden. I have been plodding along in my 
slow and humble way, digging a livelihood from the 
stubborn soil for lo, these many years, and I cannot 
find it in my heart, Friend Hunt, nor yet in my ex¬ 
perience, to agree with all you say. For instance, 
you consider your farm your bank, its individual 
acres your capital stock. You loaned yourself four 
acres of that capital stock to grow a crop of po¬ 
tatoes and made no charge for it. Would you be as 
liberal to your neighbor who wanted to borrow of 
you four acres lor the same purpose? Have you an 
idea your banker would loan you a sum of money 
from his capital stock equal to the value of those four 
acres and not charge you interest? Have you an 
idea your tax gatherer will overlook that four-acre 
potato field? If he does he belongs to a different 
species than the one I am familiar with. “The end 
of the year is the time to figure the interest on the 
value of the whole farm.” Yes? What are you go¬ 
ing to charge the interest on the value of that four 
acres to? Your cows, your hens or your pigs be¬ 
cause they ate a few rotten potatoes? If those po¬ 
tatoes had any food value they should be charged 
to your animals as food, and a like amount credited 
to that four-acre potato crop. If each of your indi¬ 
vidual acres do not pay the interest.on its value, pay 
for taxes, seed, plant food, for every scrap of labor 
and expense connected with the yearly crop, then, 
where, in the name of justice, are you going to get it? 
If each of your animals does not pay for every 
particle of food, pay rent for shelter, pay interest on 
value and depreciation, pay for every scrap of la¬ 
bor and expense connected with their living and com¬ 
fort, then where are you going to get that? Do you 
consider your farming or any part of it a luxury to 
be paid for from some other income? “If properly 
used the farm will grow better year by year.” Let’s 
see about that. You added 100 pounds of phosphoric 
February li, 
acid and 80 pounds of potash, no nitrogen. You dug 
767 bushels sound, 75 bushels rotten potatoes, 842 
bushels in all. Now turn to The R. N.-Y., page 1184, 
under title “Making Good Loss of Plant Food.” You 
will find your 842 bushels of potatoes took approxi¬ 
mately 108 pounds of nitrogen from the soil, while 
none was added. Now in my country nitrogen is 
a very essential element for plant growth, and to 
buy it from a dealer, costs 20 cents a pound, or $21.60 
for that taken from your four acres. You added 80 
pounds of potash and took from the soil in that 
crop of potatoes 148 pounds, a loss of 68 pounds to 
the soil, representing a money value of $4.76. Be¬ 
sides this, you used a part of the organic matter, the 
vigor and push of your soil, and lowered its vitality, 
its physical condition, just that much. Will your 
soil overlook this little defect and keep on producing 
more vigorously than ever? Well, I have known 
farmers aplenty who thought so, and laid constantly 
diminishing crops to too much wet, too much dry, too 
much heat, too much cold, to poor seed, to bugs, 
worms, crows, to ill health, lack of help at the right 
time, to every cause but the real one, and their chil¬ 
dren, grown weary of the small and smaller harvests, 
the empty pocketbook, went to the cities, and farms 
that changed hands 30 years ago for $7,000 to $10,000 
are begging for buyers to-day for $700 to $1,000, 50 
to 100 acres are needed to produce what would readily 
grow on a 10-acre field 30 years ago. These farmers 
had been “producing the largest crops with the least 
work and expense and the maximum net profit.” 
“Land that is kept busy will not get wormy,” I 
agree. I have a field of seven acres thrown in as a 
chromo with a purchased wood lot that has been kept 
busy for 40 years and it isn’t wormy; you couldn’t 
find a worm with the aid of a spade and a micro¬ 
scope in a day’s hunt, for the simple reason there isn’t 
a scrap of anything for a worm to live on. Forty 
years ago this was a piece of virgin soil of unusual 
fertility for this section; it was purchased for $50 
an acre for agricultural purposes, and it was kept 
going. After 20 years it seemed to need a stimulant 
and small amounts of fertilizer were put in with the 
seed to start a strong and vigorous plant that would 
send its hungry, greedy roots deep and wide in the 
starving soil in search of food and drink. To-day 
that whole seven acres is not worth 50 cents; common 
barnyard weeds that ordinarily grow high as a man’s 
head will not get above six inches in the most fertile 
spots. But the worms have gone. Also the fertility 
has gone, the producing power, the flesh and blood 
has gone, and the wind blows the dust in clouds from 
its bare and sun-baked bones 
“The time to pull weeds is when they are small and 
you can pull them by the million with a good weeder.” 
Yes? Our weeders, however, have a trick of skipping 
a few hundred from each of those million weeds; these 
grow apace with the potatoes, and the wings on the 
cultivator will not cover them without also covering ’ 
the potatoes, and we have to go after those weeds 
with our hands. And it often happens that after the 
potatoes have been hilled and not a weed in sight 
another crop will grow when the potato vines are too 
large to admit of horse tillage, and these have to 
be pulled in late August, or form a mat at digging 
time, and furnish a fresh supply of weed seeds. 
“Land that will grow 190 bushels potatoes ought 
to grow 20 tons well-eared corn for the silo.” Per¬ 
haps, in Eden, but not always. I can show you acres 
aplenty that will grow 190 bushels potatoes that with 
equally good culture will not grow eight tons of 
silage per acre. “If seed shows scab it is ducked 
in formalin.” Yes? We never plant a scabby potato, 
and our seed has had a bath every year for a long 
time, first with corrosive sublimate and in later years 
with formalin. Yet we seldom fail to find a certain 
per cent of scabby potatoes at digging time. “No 
bugs or blight because of resistant varieties.” We 
have tried a number of them, so-called, yet the bugs 
like them, and while some of them will stand a week 
or two longer if blight is prevalent it gets them in 
the end. I would certainly like to hire some of 
those “young boys” to harvest my potato crop next 
Fall. I would treat them with as much consideration 
as I could treat the most favored visitor. 
Now, see here, Neighbor Hunt, you and T are 
farmers digging a livelihood from the soil. There 
are many hard and knotty problems confronting us. 
Also there is a big fight ahead that needs our undi¬ 
vided attention. Don’t you know there is’ a strong 
bitter feeling of resentment toward us farmers 
growing in the bosoms of the city wage-earners be¬ 
cause of the high cost of their daily food, a feeling that, 
has been planted and is being nourished and fostered 
by the handlers of food products to exonerate them¬ 
selves for the excessive tolls they take? Don’t you 
know we farmers are being systematically “trimmed” 
by those in higher control? Don’t you know that 
measures that would benefit alike the farmer and the 
laborer are being denied us? Don’t you know we 
are in need of facts and figures that will show up 
our industry in its true light? Don’t you know we 
have The R. N.-Y., the strongest, fairest, .most fear¬ 
less publication of the agricultural press, to help us 
gather those facts and figures? Then come out, 
Friend Hunt, and give us the real facts of that crop 
of potatoes. Figure the interest on the value of your 
land, add the depreciation, the taxes, the cost of 
added plant food, the cost of treating and cutting 
seed, of course, as you planted potatoes of your own 
growing and you never grow small ones you had to 
cut them in order to plant four acres with 40 bushels. 
Add every scrap of labor and expense from start to 
finish, even to repairing potato bins, if they needed 
repairs, or else make an extra charge for storing; 
also add the cost of marketing, and, when you sell 
your potatoes, tell us exactly how many you sold 
and just how much you received for them, and 
profit. j. B. w. 
