1912. 
THE BtUBi AL, NEW-YORKEK 
041 
MUSKMELON BLIGHT. 
I came to New Jersey the Spring of 
1900; during the Summer of that year 
I had my first experience with melon 
blight. I had grown muskmelons with 
good success in Pennsylvania for years, 
also four years in Tennessee, but had 
never before encountered anything in 
connection with my melon growing more 
serious than the small striped beetle, 
which every melon grower knows so 
well, and how to deal with him. The 
blight was a new proposition to me, 
and one that seemed beyond the possi¬ 
bility of solving. Naturally I set about 
trying to learn the cause of melon blight 
and how to prevent it if such a thing 
was possible. Accordingly during the 
season of 1901 my experiments began. 
At first 1 was inclined to believe, on 
account of the vines blighting within a 
few days after the first melons ripened, 
that lack of sufficient available plant 
food at that period caused a rapid weak¬ 
ening of the vines’ vitality, and it 
thereby became a good subject for the 
blight fungus to pounce upon and de¬ 
stroy. I watched for the first signs of 
ripening melons, and immediately began 
feeding the vines daily with chemical 
fertilizers in solution. Preparations had 
been made for this method of feeding 
at time hills were made by sinking a 
six-inch flower pot in the center of each 
hill. The seeds were planted around 
the pot two to three inches away, three 
lo four plants allowed to remain for 
fruiting. I think the feeding helped some, 
but the blight got in its work just the 
same and destroyed the greater part of 
the crop. The feeding experiment hav¬ 
ing practically failed, I concluded there 
must be some other cause for the pro¬ 
pagation and growth of the blight 
fungus other than lack of plant food. 
I then turned my attention to atmos¬ 
pheric conditions. 
During the Summer of 1902 I ob¬ 
served that at the beginning of the 
i ipening season the humidity was very 
great, and heavy fogs almost every 
morning. About nine or 10 o’clock the 
fog would clear away and the blazing 
hot sun would almost cook the dew¬ 
laden plants of every kind. After a 
few days of these conditions blight ap¬ 
peared in the melon patch and destroyed 
the whole crop inside of 48 hours. This 
set me to thinking hard; the longer I 
pondered the matter the more I was 
inclined to the belief that the damp 
leaves of the melon vines, being sud¬ 
denly exposed to the hot rays of the 
sun, probably parboiled the inner lin¬ 
ing or membrane of the more exposed 
leaves, which in a short time, through 
fermentation and decay, would make a 
natural breeding ground for blight fun¬ 
gus. I believed that if the vines were 
afforded partial shade by some tall- 
growing plants, such as sweet corn, 
melon blight might be partially if not 
altogether prevented. 
I went to Pennsylvania, Spring of 
1903, and remained there two years. As 
melon blight was not prevalent in the 
section where I was located, 1 had no 
opportunity to prove my theory until my 
return to New Jersey, Spring of 1905, 
when I proceeded to carry out ideas 
formed nearly three years before, i. e., 
the planting of sweet corn among my 
melons. In preparing for the melon 
crop that Spring 1 gave the ground a 
liberal coat of well-rotted stable manure 
which was turned under. After the soil 
was pulverized and leveled, the plot was 
lined off in rows 4^ feet apart; hills 
were made six feet apart in the row, 
the whole plot being laid out with 
melons and corn alternately; both were 
planted the same day, and at final thin- 
ing three stalks of corn and four melon 
plants respectively allowed to remain 
and cultivated well four times. Corn 
and melons made a splendid growth. 
The melons ripened their entire crop, 
which were good size and excellent 
flavor, and not a trace of blight ap¬ 
peared at any time during the ripening 
period, notwithstanding weather condi¬ 
tions seemed most favorable for its 
propagation. The sweet corn also ma¬ 
tured a good crop. I thereby secured a 
good crop of two of the best things 
grown in the garden, grown together on 
the same ground and at about the same 
expediture of labor that would be re¬ 
quired to grow either one separately. I 
will not make the positive claim that 
this method of growing muskmelons is 
a sure and never-failing preventive for 
blight. I will say, however, that I have 
had no blight in my melons in the seven 
years I have grown them in this way. 
Gardeners and farmers living in locali¬ 
ties where blight is prevalent will make 
no mistake in giving this method a 
trial. If the melons should fail, a good* 
corn crop is almost a certainty, thus 
avoiding the entire loss of land and 
labor that sometimes results when 
melons alone are planted. This method 
applies equally well to the growing of 
cucumbers. Whether blight is prevalent 
or not, it is a good practice to follow 
in the growing of melons or cucumbers, 
as the corn is almost all clear gain. I 
have always planted a semi-dwarf va¬ 
riety of corn among my melons, such as 
Early Metropolitan, as the extra early 
dwarf sorts would not afford enough 
shade. j. a. k. 
New Jersey. 
WINTER INJURY OF FRUIT TREES. 
Winter injury of fruit trees, as I have ob¬ 
served it during the past 10 years in Con¬ 
necticut, is of four different types, namely : 
(1) injury of buds; (2) injury of roots; 
(3) injury of wood; (4) injury of bark and 
cambium. 
1. Injury to the buds is largely con¬ 
fined to the fruit buds, and occurs in years 
in which we have very severe Winters, or 
when late Spring frosts occur about the 
time the buds open. This year in Connecti¬ 
cut the weather in December was rather 
warm, favoring a slight development of the 
buds, while the following January was de¬ 
cidedly cold, and the result of this combina¬ 
tion was that the fruit buds of the peach 
in certain sections of the State, especially 
at some distance from the Sound, have 
been very largely killed. 
2. Injury to the roots. Winter injury 
to the roots is perhaps not so common as 
the other forms of injury. It occurs fre¬ 
quently, however, when the trees are in 
damp soil and water has accumulated there, 
and in places where there is no mulch cov¬ 
ering the ground in the form of vegetation 
or snow. Frequently we find this trouble 
in exposed parts of the orchard on the hill¬ 
side, where the snow covering has been 
blown off by the wind. Trees so injured 
often leaf out in the Spring and try to 
develop their foliage, but not being able to 
supply sufficient mosture as warmer 
weather approaches, the foliage gradually 
dies. 
3. Winter injury of the wood occurs 
more or less every year, and it is some¬ 
times difficult to distinguish this from the 
normal ripening of the sapwood into heart- 
wood, since Winter injury causes a darken¬ 
ing of the wood. This is likely to occur in 
very severe Winters, or in Winters with an 
open Fall followed by a sudden cold spell, 
which causes severe injury to the immature 
wood. Trouble of this kind was noticed in 
the Winters of 1902-3 and 1903-4, and was 
especially conspicuous on nursery stock. 
Examination of the wood showed all the 
sapwood darkened, clear up to the cambium. 
Such trees can sometimes be saved by cut¬ 
ting them back to the snow line, where the 
wood is apt to be more normal. To prevent 
this injury, nitrogenous fertilizers should 
never be applied late in the season, and cul¬ 
tivation should stop usually about the mid¬ 
dle of July, thus allowing the wood to ma¬ 
ture gradually. Another form of injury oc¬ 
curs in very cold weather when there is 
more or less water in the trees, which 
freezes and by its expansion causes the trees 
to crack open. There was some of this in¬ 
jury, especially on peach trees, in Connecti¬ 
cut this year. 
4. Injury to the bark. This is apt to 
take the nature of a so-called “sunscald,” 
appearing on the south and southwest sides 
of the trunks of the trees, and also in 
areas at the base of the trees or on certain 
of the larger branches. Severe drought in 
Summer is apt to put trees in bad condi¬ 
tion. so that they suffer from this form of 
injury the following Winter, but ordinarily 
it is supposed to be caused largely by warm 
spells in Winter starting the sap into activ¬ 
ity on the exposed south and southwest 
sides of the trees, and followed by sudden 
cold, causing injury which results in the 
death of the bark. Some growers protect 
their peach trees at the base each Fall by 
piling up a small mound of earth, which is 
removed the next Spring. All young trees, 
especially, should have the earth pressed 
down around their base, as any space there 
may allow water to enter, and injury to the 
trees is likely to result. g. p. cu.nton. 
Conn. Exp. Station. 
SEEDING TO GRASS. 
On page 580 F. W. .T. asks about seeding 
to grass a piece of land that has been 
worked for several years but never heavily 
fertilized, and is advised to take off a crop 
of oats and peas and then seed it down. 
It looks to me as if there had been enough 
taken off his land already, and if he wishes 
any good permanent meadow he must have 
humus in his land to hold moisture. If he 
can have patience to wait a year and will 
sow his land to buckwheat and plow or 
disk it when it is in full bloom, and then 
lime and work it he ean seed to Timothy, 
etc., knowing that he will have grass. 
Perhaps the oats and peas are better than 
the buckwheat for this purpose. I have 
not tried them and do not know, but I 
know buckwheat breaks up the ground and 
makes a mellow seed bed. We are taking 
off too much when we seed to grass in this 
part of the country and are not stuffing 
the ground with humus as we should. We 
are land robbers. There is a brass mill in 
his town where F. W. .T. can buy good 
wood ashes; if he cannot obtain lime at a 
fair price perhaps he will do well to use 
some of these ashes. Should he come near 
here I should like to show him a piece of 
Timothy seeded after buckwheat was 
disked in. w. w. C. 
Woodville, Conn. 
R. N.-Y.—Our understanding was that F. 
W. J. would like a crop of fodder this 
year. The oats and peas can be put in 
very early. The peas belong to the class of 
plants which take nitrogen from the air. 
It would be possible to plow under the 
oats and peas in late .Tune and then sow 
buckwheat. This in turn could be plowed 
under in September, the soil well limed 
and then seeded to grass. This would cer¬ 
tainly fill the soil with humus and give the 
grass a good start. 
What is “Good” Motor Car Service? 
Whether or not your car gives good 
service depends entirely upon what your 
standard of good service is. 
If you are contented with using your 
car only about six or eight months of the 
year—and only over the best roads you 
can find—then probably you would be 
satisfied with most any car on the 
market today. 
But if you want a car that is always 
ready for you—in winter and summer— 
a car that you can drive anywhere you 
may have a desire to go—then you will 
have to be mighty careful in the car you 
choose. 
Getting right down to brass tacks— a 
car must stand three things to be capable 
of giving good service. These are sand, 
mud and hills. 
First your car must have the minimum 
waste power. The more complicated the 
construction the more waste power 
always. Your car must be simple and 
strongly made to stand the strain that is 
sure to come. 
Of course, you can readily see that a 
car which has these features will be more 
efficient on good roads. 
TheCartercar has practically no waste 
power. This is because of the Patented 
Friction Transmission, which has only 
two unit parts. This is also the simplest 
transmission possible. There is abso¬ 
lutely nothing about it to cause trouble. 
This transmission affords you any 
number of speeds. At the lowest speed 
the ratio is so great that the Cartercar 
will easily climb a 50% grade. This 
same power will take the car through 
very bad sand and mud. 
And it is remarkably easy to operate, 
too. You have this unlimited number 
of speeds with a one lever control. There 
are also three independent systems of 
brakes. The Cartercar is adapted for 
use on both crowded city streets and 
country roads—giving perfect service 
wherever you wish to drive. 
Five splendid models, ranging in price 
from 81,200 to $2,100. This includes 
complete equipment, self-starter, top, top- 
cover, windshield, speedometer, gas 
tank, five lamps, robe rail, trunk rack, 
tonneau mat, demountable rims, tools, 
tire repair outfit, etc. 
If you want a car for service—real 
service—then you will be interested in 
the Cartercar, the car without gears. 
i Write me personally and I will send 
you valuable information concerning 
motor cars. 
Harry R. Radford, Sales Manager 
CARTERCAR COMPANY 
Pontiac, Michigan 
Branches: New York, Detroit, Chicago and Kansas City 
Sherwin-Williams 
Paints £ Varnishes 
FOR THE FARM 
Sherwin-Williams Paint (Prepared)(S W P), is made 
for painting buildings outside and inside. S W P is 
made of pure lead, pure zinc, pure linseed oil and the 
necessary coloring pigment and driers, thoroughly 
mixed and ground by special machinery and put up 
in sealed cans, full U. S. Standard measure. S W P 
will cover the greatest possible amount of surface and 
will last for the longest time. There is economy in 
using good paint. 
Sold by dealers everywhere. Ask for color cards 
Address all Inquiries to The Sherwin-Williams Co., 635Canal Road, N. W., Cleveland, Ohio 
Farmers Thresh Your Own Grain 
ELLIS CHAMPION 
THRESHERS 
Save enough to own the thresher. Be independent. 
get ready. 
Suit everyone. Both the profes¬ 
sional thresherinan or the farmer 
who wants a home outfit will find the 
Champion rightly named. The picture 
shows ELLIS CHAMPION NO 2. It is complete . 
with stacker, tailings, elevator and grain hag 
ger. Connect it with steam, gasolene, tread or any 
other power, put in the grain and the Champion does 
the rest. No straw clogging. Any size. 
Wo h)mo mnko tread and sweep horse-power, druir or circular saws 
ensilage rut ten, corn libellers, etc. ___ 
Our catalog tell* the whole story. ELLIS KEYSTONE AGRICULTURAL WORKS, Pettztown, Pa. 
mn 
NS 
Why 
buy lumber for 
your farm when the 
price of one carload will 
pay for an “American” Saw 
Mill with which you can cut 
a earload a day from your own 
grove? Be independent; increase 
your farm income. Make your 
own lumber; use what you need 
— sell what is left. And saw 
your neighbor’s timber for him, 
too, at good profit. “Mak-t 
ing Money Off the Wood Lot' 
is a book which tells the 
whole story. Let us send 
you a copy. Write 
to our nearest 
_ office. 
AMERICAN SAW MILL MACHINERY CO. 
IZV Hope Street, Hackettstown, N. J. 
*1582 T«nnin&l Bldg., H. Y, Chicago, Bavannah,Now Oxlcuu* 
/ This portable machine 
cuts 2,500 feet per day 
| with 6 H.P. 
