1912. 
103 
A “ BACK TO THE LAND ” EXPERIENCE. 
True Tale of a Farm Trial. 
PART II. 
Much has been said about the pleasure 
of picking your own fresh vegetables 
from your own garden. I have a recol¬ 
lection of hearing remarks on the bur¬ 
den of going out in the broiling sun to 
gather vegetables, compared with the 
ease of ordering them from the corner 
grocery in the city. One plot of about 
a half acre I started to plow myself. 
It was my first experience at plowing, 
and the same for the horse. We started 
out pretty well, but the horse soon got 
the notion that he must go at top speed 
to keep from getting stuck. This would 
pull the plow out of the ground and we 
would have to go back and try again. 
The soil was a rather heavy clay, and I 
suppose it was a good deal to expect o-f 
the horse. He soon developed another 
trick of going diagonally across the 
field. He persisted in that, and finally 
brought our efforts to an end after go¬ 
ing five times around the field, i hired 
the rest of it plowed. In cultivating 
the horse developed a penchant for 
walking on one row with his front feet 
and on another row with his hind feet, 
which made it necessary to hire most 
of the cultivating done. After one of 
these strenuous days the horse would- 
sometimes have difficulty in rising the 
next morning, sometimes being down 
until noon, his hind legs appearing to 
be weak. 
I had ordered 2,000 strawberry 
plants, and received a letter from the 
nursery asking how I liked them. Not 
receiving the plants in a reasonable 
time, I notified the nursery. In time I 
received another note from the nursery 
stating that the original shipment had 
been returned to them by the express 
company in a spoiled condition, an<i 
that they had just shipped a fresh lot. 
They arrived in good condition, but 
the soil had become so dried out that 
nothing would grow. I waited two or 
three days hoping for a shower, and 
then planted them with water in each 
hole. About 300 survived. An order 
for 20 cherry trees was shipped by 
freight, and as this is a prepaid freight 
station, the shipment went to Kingston 
and I yvas notified to remit for the 
freight bill, and after they received the 
money the trees were sent to my sta¬ 
tion. All this time the trees, which 
were wrapped in burlap, were drying 
up. I let them stand in water half a 
day, but when planted they all died 
without a struggle. Probably in an or¬ 
dinary wet season they might have pull¬ 
ed through. A pair of pigs bought in 
the Spring for $6, sold in the Fall for 
$17. We had no cow, and had to buy 
grain to feed them, so cannot figure 
much profit on them. 
The orchard was started with the 
idea of mulching it after the Hitchings 
plan. On two lots, which are naturally 
moist, the plan seems to be all right. 
The trees, which are Baldwins, and 
number about 200, are thrifty and make 
a fair growth each year, no matter what 
the weather. Only one tree of this 
variety has borne yet, although they 
are eight years old, quite different from 
the results obtained by Mr. Hitchings 
by the same method. Another lot of 
trees bought for Spy had puzzled me 
until this Summer. There are about 
150 of them, but they are not very 
thrifty, although having as good care as 
any. Last year a few bore and they 
were identified as Belmont, a good 
apple, but not red, and not well known, 
and a rather delicate tree. I am not 
sure that they are all Belmont, as some 
of them have a very straggling growth, 
while the Belmont has an upright form. 
1 hey none of them have the Spy 
characteristics. They comprised half 
°f an order from a prominent nursery. 
! he other half seems to be true to 
name. Of 400 Rome Beauty trees from 
another nursery, seven years planted, 
irom one-year-old whips, nearly all 
nave borne from one to eighteen apples, 
and all true to name. Of 150 Wagener 
trees, those which have fruited are 
true, and the others have the same 
character of growth. Of 300 Baldwins 
only one has fruited, and that came 
true, and the others resemble it in 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
shape. In fact, of the 1,600 trees, only 
the Spy have come untrue. I have 
only bought of two nurseries to any 
extent, and half the trees were wrong 
from one, and all were true from the 
other, and he is out of business now. 
The Rome Beauty trees were culti¬ 
vated this Summer by having three fur¬ 
rows turned toward them each side of 
the row, and harrowed two or three 
times. I hey showed a distinct improve¬ 
ment over other years when they had 
a scant mulching. In mulching they 
got all the grass there was in the or¬ 
chard, but that was very little. In the 
orchard where I attempted to raise 
corn and potatoes, the trees look ex¬ 
ceptionally good, while those in the 
same lot, uncultivated, although mulch¬ 
ed fairly well, barely pulled through. 
I have therefore concluded that the 
trees must be cultivated on my farm, 
excepting the two moist lots mentioned 
before. I found many of the trees in 
a bad way from borers, especially those 
near stone fences and woods. They 
have killed a number of the trees, and 
it was fortunate that I was there this 
Summer to dig them out, as another 
year or two of neglect in this particu¬ 
lar might have been disastrous. Eleven 
borers were dug from one tree. I had 
seen the sawdust indications of them 
on my short vacation visits before, but 
had not realized the damage they were 
doing. We also had the 17-year locusts 
in swarms, seaming the branches of the 
trees in two or three parallel lines fre¬ 
quently, and extending into three and 
four-year-oid wood. They killed five 
or six trees that were not very thrifty, 
but did not noticeably check the thrifty 
trees. 
Altogether it is a very good thing 
for the orchard that 1 was on the 
ground, and I am very hopeful of re¬ 
sults in time, but as for regular farm¬ 
ing, I am afraid it is too much for me. 
I spent nearly all my money, but by 
selling the horse, pigs and chickens, 
had enough to bring us back to the 
city. Our furniture is still on the farm, 
and we have our farm tools, and the 
orchard on the whole is in a flourishing 
condition. I have gained a better idea 
of the needs of the orchard. 
In two or three years we expect to be 
in a position to try it again, but on a 
different plan, which is to throw all 
our energy into developing the orchard, 
with chickens as a side line and all 
the small fruits we can properly care 
for. A kitchen garden, of course, is 
included. The neighboring farmers 
predict that in four or five years the 
orchard will pay commercially, and that 
is some encouragement, as it was a 
joke when started. To sum up the 
Summer’s adventure, we left our money 
and household goods, and I about 15 
pounds avoirdupois on the farm, and 
brought back hope for the future of 
our orchard, a lame back that lasted for 
two months, and knees that still creak 
a little. R. a. y. 
New York. 
FLORIDA FACTS AND PRICES. 
I am not planting any potatoes this year. 
I was intending to plant nothing this year 
at all on account of the uncertainty of the 
weather. We did not have our usual high 
water last Fall here, although on December 
30 I planted one acre of beans and January 
4 one-half acre of cucumbers. This is all 
I shall plant this year. We grow Bliss 
Red Triumph altogether down here at pres¬ 
ent. I use (and nearly all do) five bags 
per acre (160 pound bag), some use as high 
as eight bags. My neighbor says he uses 
3,000 pounds of fertilizer per acre and eight 
bags of potatoes, although he only uses a 
part of the time five bags and 2,000 pounds. 
Potatoes usually cost $4 to $4.50 per bag. 
Fertilizer costs $35 to $40 and $42, some 
even higher; we usually use about $38 or 
$39 fertilizer, although the $35 kind is used 
a great deal. Land rents at $5 to $10 per 
acre. I get usually $8 for mine; have 
rented some for $10 and some for $6 per 
acre. It costs from $2 to $5 per acre to 
clear the laud, $3.50 to plow, about $5 to 
prepare ground and plant. We do very lit¬ 
tle work on them after planting, usually 
plow them in just as they come through 
and again with shovel plow a little later, 
and that is about all we do. If heavy rains 
then we cultivate more. I ship in crates 
altogether, so do nearly all, although some 
use barrels. Crates cost 14 cents each 
standing up; hauling five cents per crate. 
Digging varies according to ground and 
quantity, but usually costs from six to ID 
cents a crate. This seems high. This is 
for fair to good potatoes; sometimes they 
pay 15 cents per crate for digging and 
picking up and nailing on cover. Here the 
yield varies very largely on account of 
blight; many crops are a failure from this 
cause, drought and poor seed; hence it 
runs all the way from failure or a little of 
nothing to 300 crates to the acre. They 
usually sell at $1.75 per crate for No. 1. 
Potatoes are the main crop here this year 
right around us; one man has 29 acres, 
another 20, one 17, one about 18 or 20, and 
others smaller lots. The general planting 
is light, hence this year a very few toma¬ 
toes, which, has always been the main crop 
here. The potato crops are looking fine 
now, and if they do not blight the next 30 
days they will yield well. 200 to 300 crates 
per acre, but they will more or less blight. 
Florida. p. s. p. 
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