536 
AMERICAJST AGRICULTURIST. 
[November, 
The set for morning was marked with 8. M., for 
Sunday morning; M. M. for Monday morning, and 
LABEL FOR MILK PANS. 
so on. The red cards were marked in a similar 
manner; for night, N. was substituted for M. A 
small wire was run through two holes in the top 
of each card and bent over to form a hook. In the 
morning when the milk is strained, a white card 
is hooked on each pan, in the evening a redone. 
When the shelves are full, one has only to glance 
at the labels, to ascertain just the age of each 
pan of milk. It is but little trouble to remove the 
label when the milk is used, and hang it on a wire, 
stretched convenient to the table. 
Corner Shelves. 
In the old style of domestic architecture, the 
corner cupboard was quite common. Indeed, it 
was built into the house, and was a conspicuous 
feature, at least, of the drawing-room. Shelves, 
. or racks, made to fit the 
corner, may often be 
usefully introduced in 
houses in which they did 
not form a part of the 
original design. The en¬ 
graving gives the gen¬ 
eral idea of the arrange¬ 
ment of a set of such 
shelves, which in a house, 
lacking in closets, as 
many modern houses 
are, will be found most 
useful, whether in kitch¬ 
en, dining-room, or sit¬ 
ting-room. The essen¬ 
tials being provided, the 
sides and the triangular 
shelves, the affair may be 
perfectly plain, or high¬ 
ly ornamental, according 
to the use to which it is 
to be put. In the sit¬ 
ting-room, where it will, 
no doubt, serve as a 
“catch all,” the shelves 
may be made ornamental by edging them with 
some material that will cover the front and serve as 
lambrequins. Such shelves are useful in the shop. 
A Convenient Step-ladder. 
Mr. W. P. Hope, Kalamazoo County, Michigan, 
sends us a drawing of a step-ladder. The side 
pieces are six inches wide, any desired length. The 
top step is one foot wide and two feet long. The 
pieces nailed to the sides are six inches wide. The 
braces are two and a half inches wide, the length 
is proportionate to hight of ladder. The posts are 
two and a half inches wide and one and a half inch 
STEP-LADDER. 
thick, fastened to the upright with a pin. A brace, 
showing the notch to go on a pin in the posts is 
seen below in the engraving. This step-ladder, 
when not in use, can be quickly folded and 
hung up on a good strong nail out of the way. 
A Home-Made Flower Stand. 
A very pretty flower stand can be made out of a 
table, a bucket, and half a dozen old tin cans. 
Place the bucket in the centre of the table. Punch 
several holes in the bottom of each can, and screw 
them firmly to the table by screws in the holes. 
Arches of stout wire may be made across the top 
of the cans. For ferns planted in the cans, which 
require a great deal of water, cover the top of the 
table with a shallow pan to catch the drip. Other 
plants should only have the soil kept damp. Ge¬ 
raniums are fine -for winter blooming, as are also 
Coleus, Fuchsias, and Petunias. Some kind of a 
vine should be planted in each of the corner cans. 
Trailing plants produce a good effect. 
A Holder for Kindling-Wood. 
Two pieces of hard wood plank are cut for the 
sides, as shown in the engraving, and fastened on 
opposite ends of a block of wood. The small 
pieces of wood to be broken are placed in the 
notches, where they are struck in the middle with 
the axe. The slanting top of the middle-piece of 
the holder may receive one foot of the chopper. 
The holder may be used as a splitting-block. 
A Carpet Looper. 
Mr. H. Hudson, New Britain, Conn., sends us a 
sketch of a device for joining the ends of carpet 
rags. The blade, figure 1, is made of thin sheet 
steel, three inches long and three-fourths of an inch 
wide, ground sharp at the top. The slot is an inch 
and a half long and half an inch wide. The blade 
may be held firmly by inserting it in a block of 
wood. A piece of wrought iron, of same width 
as the blade, and a quarter inch thick, may be used 
as a holder. This is bent and rivetted to the blade, 
as shown in figure 2. The thumb-screw fastens 
the whole to the table. To use the looper, one end 
of a strip of cloth (1) is thrust over the blade. A 
second strip is put on with the short end in the op¬ 
posite direction, and the long end of the first strip 
(2) is put through the slot, after which the whole 
is lifted off and the knot pulled up tight. The 
operation of looping can be quickly and easily done. 
CraHj-Wrasis In tlie Lawn.-We have 
received inquiries from friends in many different States; 
concerning crab-grass in their lawns, and asking 
how they shall get rid of it. Crab-grass is an annual, 
and only appears about mid-summer. The first step 
should be to occupy the ground with perennial grasses,, 
and leave little or no room for the intruder. All thin 
places on the lawn should be scratched with a sharp 
rake, and an abundance of the seeds, of the kind used 
in making the lawn, should be sown, using the roller 
afterwards. If crab-grass appears, mow the lawn, and 
sweep up and burn the clippings, to prevent any of the- 
seeds from ripening. With proper care, this pest 
of the lawn in autumn may be entirely subdued. 
A Travvois. —W. J. Rockburn, of Quebec, 
writes us of this implement used by his French neigh¬ 
bors for drawing fence rails, or any light timber which 
one horse can haul out from among fallen timber. It is 
made with two poles, about four inches in diameter, and 
twelve feet long. Four feet from the butt ends is bored 
a hole in each end about If inch, on which is fitted a 
cross-bar, made of some tough kind of wood. One foot 
back from this is a bunk, or cross-box, squared on the 
sides and bottom, and pinned on. The bunk is about 
four or five inches in diameter, made of some light 
timber, like spruce or cedar. On this the timber is 
placed, when hauled, being fastened with the chain that 
passes under the bunk and up over the top of the load, 
down the other side, and back under the bunk, and up 
over the cross-bar, and hooked into the whiffletree. 
This is a very useful article in the woods, as a horse can 
take a load over small logs. The ends of the rails or 
timber rise with the travvois. The end of the imple¬ 
ment not attached to the horse drags on the ground. 
Cut Worms. —Mr. J. M. Haight, Shelby, 
Mich., writes us that he is much troubled with worms, 
or grubs, eating the onions and nearly all other garden 
vegetables. These worms are probably the larvse of sev¬ 
eral species of night-flying moths of the genus Agrotis 
and related genera. They are all much alike in appear¬ 
ance and habits. The moths, seen in late summer, are of 
a sombre gray, or brown, with an expansion of wing of 
an inch and a half. When at rest the wings close flatly 
over the body, the upper ones having a circular and a 
kidney-shaped spot. These moths fly in cloudy days, 
and often enter the house at night, attracted by the light 
of the lamp. The eggs are deposited in late autumn 
upon plants near the surface of the earth. These soon 
hatch, and the grubs, or cutworms, enter the earth and 
feed upon the roots of various plants. As cold weather 
approaehes, the worms go deeper and remain in a torpid 
condition all winter. They return to the surface in the 
spring, and, with an appetite sharpened by a long fast, 
they voraciously eat any succulent plant. Cut worms 
feed by night, and hide in out-of-the-way places by day. 
They have a greasy appearance, being plump, smooth, 
and of some shade, green, gray, or brown, variously 
marked. When disturbed they coil into a ball. The 
full-grown worm descends into the soil and forms an. 
earthen cocoon and becomes a chrysalid. In late sum¬ 
mer the moth comes forth, and the cycle of transforma¬ 
tions is complete. There are several natural enemies of 
the cut worm. Ichneumon and other flies deposit their 
eggs within She worms, and thus destroy them. The 
cannibal beetles and some spiders feed upon them. Birds 
and chickens are fond of the fat, greasy cut worms, and 
will pick them up greedily on plowed ground. One of 
the best methods of ridding an infested soil of this pest, 
is to plow it late in the autumn. This turns up the 
sluggish worms from their winter quarters, and either 
kills them by exposure or furnishes a food for the ehick- 
ens and birds. Other insects are destroyed the same way. 
Experiments with Wheat.—Prof. J. 
W. Sanborn lias tested many varieties of wlieat upon the 
farm of the Missouri Agricultural College, and from the 
results he constructs the following table: 
Wheats Per Acre. 
White, 20 varieties; average for 3 years, 34.5 bushels. 
Red, 20 '• " “ 3 “ 27.1 
Amber, 7 “1 to 3 “ 27.2 
The Amber wheats were mostly grown in 1882, and the 
number of varieties is small, so that these results do not 
fully prove that White wheats are the most productive in 
that soil and locality. More experiment* are- needed. 
