03 
1910. 
the skinner system of irrigation. 
The so-called “Skinner system of irriga¬ 
tion” is the name applied to a scheme for 
watering crops, either in greenhouses or in 
field, by the use of pipes distributed either 
upon the surface of the ground or overhead, 
in which small nozzles are placed at stated 
intervals so as to distribute a very small 
quantity of water over a large area. The 
Skinner patents, as I understand it. cover 
n peculiar union which is provided with a 
strainer, and which enables the pipe to he 
rotated, together with several types of ori¬ 
fices or nozzles which are threaded and can 
Pc set into ordinary gas pipe by drilling and 
threading the pipe at proper intervals. In 
greenhouses where the open or bunch type 
of lettuce is grown this system of watering 
is quite universally employed. It is also 
used to a considerable extent by market 
gardeners along the South Atlantic coast, 
where a suitable water supply under pres¬ 
sure can be had. The system is simply a 
sprinkler system which allows a very small 
quantity of water to be sprayed upon the 
plants through a long interval of time, the 
idea , being that very much greater benefit 
is obtained from this system than from 
heavy. irrigation. Those who have used it 
have found it quite advantageous. In green¬ 
house work with crops which can be sprin¬ 
kled in this way, it is a very great labor 
L. C. COBBETT. 
MORE ABOUT THOSE DYING CHICKS. 
Mr. Mapes’s reply to my article on _pre- 
vention of chick mortality is based entirely 
on a misquotation from that article. He 
quotes: “The mortality of the Mapes chicks 
was entirely proven table by placing only 50 
chicks in one compartment.” while what I 
did say was: “Yards should be spaded twice 
yearly and seeded to rape, well limed with 
each spading,” and later, “If Mr. Mapes 
will try creocide, more heat in his brood¬ 
ers, not over 50 in a flock, plenty of feed, 
with grit, shell and green feed. I think, 
etc.” If he was familiar with recent ex¬ 
periments in white diarrhoea prevention 
and still tried his, he must be in the class 
with the small boy who “liked to hit his 
thumb with a hammer,” because it felt so 
good when it was getting better. If he 
calls the house his hen with 20 chicks was 
in in August a good house, and it is the 
same one he described in his article, I 
disagree with him. The Western large house, 
with central heater, is but an enlargement 
of the old Cyphers indoor brooder, and has 
no more to do with existing conditions 
among poultry raisers than has Hall's Mam¬ 
moth incubator. As a matter of fact, it 
is less trouble to care for 1,000 chicks in 
20 pens in a properly built brooder house 
than it would be in such a house. Prob¬ 
ably his friend, Mr. Mabee, will agree with 
him that the new house and land with a 
proper nursery . brooder and incubator cel¬ 
lar had much to do with his success, but 
if Mr. Mabee had not been able to build 
new, he could have accomplished the same 
results by making the old as good as the 
new by following the advice given in my 
article, and many It. N.-Y. readers who 
cannot build new buildings can make the 
present ones perfectly sanitary by follow¬ 
ing the plan outlined. 
Two recent results are interesting in this 
connection. On August 12 and 22 I hatched 
515 chicks from sterilized machines that 
had been run not over 103% until the 
eighteenth day, and had been aired from 
30 minutes to an hour daily after the first 
week. These chicks were placed in a sec¬ 
tion of the brooder house that had had 
three early hatches run through it, but 
had been cleaned, disinfected with creocide 
and two inches of clean sand placed on 
the floor; the yards had been well limed, 
raked over and seeded to grass, which was 
just coming up. The pipes in brooders were 
run at 120 to 140, not much care being 
given to this as long as the heater stayed 
above 120. The windows of brooder house 
were open all the time until October. The 
pens are large and piping continuous, so 
chicks could work out from under flannel 
curtains from either side. The mortality 
to date has been 20 dead during first 10 
days: of these six were killed as defective, 
and 20 more have been killed from time to 
time, as not developing properly; the re¬ 
sult of poor ancestry. The remainder have 
gone to market as prime broilers, with the 
exception of the last 100. that will go next 
week. I never have seen a healthier, evener 
lot of chicks. The trouble usually in rais¬ 
ing Summer chicks is that they do not get 
heat enough, whereas they need it more 
than in colder weather, the extreme range 
from the excessive heat of the middle of 
tlie day to the cool night being much more 
dangerous than the even cold of Spring, 
which affects the attendant and calls for 
more heat. 
The second result illustrates clearly the 
effect of chill. A neighbor, while I was 
away. Thanksgiving time, brought hero nine 
chicks that a hen had hatched, and the 
boys placed them under a hover in brooder 
house, where most of the pipes were cut 
Off. the temperature under hover not 
being aver 80 degrees at its warmest place. 
They were there for three days, and then 
I gave them to a Silky hen to hover; five 
of them will pull through, the other four 
had marked indigestion, “stuck up behind.” 
with drooping wings. Three I killed and 
found no evidence of white diarrhoea, but 
only an inflamed intestinal tract. Here was 
a clear case, of chilling, and a careful in¬ 
vestigation will show that this “black di- 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
arrhcea,” or intestinal indigestion, due to 
cold, is fully as fatal and prevalent as the 
“white” or germ diarrhoea, and is entirely 
preventable by warmth and proper food. 
Referring to Mr. Mapes’s four chicks 
hatched by hen and placed in infected brooder 
■when two weeks old. he will have to show 
that they are not dying by lice before their 
demise can be laid to “germ” infection. 
Poultry raising is far from its infancy, 
but the. experiment stations and the farm 
journals are giving to the beginners and 
inexperienced who are willing to profit by 
it, the methods employed by those who are 
successful, and are reducing to a scientific 
basis the old rule-of-thumb methods of suc¬ 
cessful poultry men, who have made a suc¬ 
cess of the business by not being the same 
kind of a fool twice, and the old secret 
methods of success have been tried, im¬ 
proved upon and given to the public. 
BUCHANAN BURR. 
PRODUCTS, PRICES AND TRADE. 
Empty Packages. —A reader asks what 
becomes of the empty packages in which 
fruit, vegetables, etc., are shipped to New 
Y'ork. There are two general classes of 
packages, those that are strongly made and 
intended to l>e returned and those that go 
with the goods. In the first class are some 
berry, asparagus and tomato crates, many 
of them painted and marked with name of 
owner, usually a nearby shipper, or one 
who uses the Hudson River or Jersey shore 
boats. These packages are closely watched 
and a good proportion of them returned. 
Of the other class of packages barrels are 
high priced and not nearly so many are de¬ 
stroyed as formerly. Many retail grocers 
and" peddlers return, barrels to the com¬ 
mission men and get a rebate for them. 
In some cases commission men will send 
barrels to a shipper whose goods they spe¬ 
cially .want it he is short of packages. The 
common custom for farmers within wagon 
haul bf New York is t6 take back a load of 
empties. This applies mainly to barrels and 
tomato- boxes, most receivers of tomatoes 
having a stock of these empties for their 
customers. Most of the cheaper crates are 
thrown out and picked up for firewood by 
women and children from the tenement 
houses. The matter may be summed up 
thus; where railroads or boats are willing 
to return packages free or for a nominal 
charge, it pays the shipper to use return¬ 
able packages, provided his commission man 
does not lose too many. The gift package 
has the advantage of being new and hence 
looks better; a point of merit with products 
where appearance is of much importance. 
There is one form of package that might 
well be used more extensively, viz.: the 
basket shaped like an inverted hell. This 
is well known in the 14 and Itl-quart peach 
basket sizes, but there are others from the 
half-barrel down to scant bushel size that 
are excellent for the lighter-weight vegeta¬ 
bles and fruits, beans, peas, lettuce, apples, 
sweet potatoes, etc. These baskets are easily 
handled and, when opened, the contents, if 
of good quality, make a fine display. Some 
strongly braced baskets, of this type are 
made in the large sizes. They cost a trifle 
more but are less likely to be smashed with 
rough handling. 
Divided Shipments. —There is a differ¬ 
ence of opinion among shippers with regard 
to this matter. Some claim that they can 
stir up a commission man to do better for 
them by sending part of their goods to 
some one else and letting him know it. 
They say that this makes a wholesome form 
of competition. But there is real danger, of 
the shipper putting himself into competition 
with his own goods, as a case just noted 
will show. A grower of fine mushrooms 
sent his product to one commission house 
with a first class trade in goods of that 
sort. Then he sent part of his shipments 
to another house in the same market and 
his troubles commenced. To make a good 
showing the second house returned him 10 
per cent more than the other. This was 
giving him the commission but the account 
sales was made out as though the sale had 
been made at 10 per cent more than the 
other dealer was getting. This naturally 
stirred up the shipper, and he gave the 
first commission man a dressing down for 
selling his goods for less than they were 
worth. On the next lot the second house 
fell down in price, and the buyers who 
found that the goods were divided played 
tag with the two commission men with the 
result that now these goods are selling for 
less than though one man was handling 
them, and the grower is his own competitor. 
It reminds me of an auction where a man 
and his wife, widely separated in the crowd, 
were bidding against each other on an 
article of furniture. The auctioneer saw 
the point and “sicked” them on. The man 
knew that his wife specially wanted the 
article, and she thought it was being sold 
to some one else. A contrast to this is this 
Winter's experience of a well known hot¬ 
house tomato growers’ association. They 
have sent all their output to one dealer, 
and with excellent judgment he has kept 
the price at a higher level than in previous 
years, though not so high as to be prohibi¬ 
tive. Of course these two instances refer 
to goods that are specialties sold to a 
rather high-class trade. The argument for 
undivided shipments would not have equal 
force with potatoes or similar staples, yet 
the writer believes it a mistake to try to 
whip a produce commission man into line 
by competitive methods. An honest and 
progressive man does not need such treat¬ 
ment. He may occasionally sell at a lower 
figure than others, but, as many shippers 
know, the record of five years’ results will 
be in favor of sticking to a square man 
who knows his business. w. w. H. 
$50 $300 SAVED 
FROM 2 TO 22- 
HORSE-POWER 
OH A GASOLINE ENGINE 
Buy from a real engine factory. Save dealer, jobber and 
catalogue house profit. No such offer as I make on the class 
of engine I sell has ever been made before in all Gasoline 
Engine history. Here is the secret and reason: I turn 
them out all alike by the thousands in my enormous mod¬ 
ern factory, equipped with automatic machinery. I sell 
them direct to you for less money than some factories can 
make them at actual shop cost. All you pay me for is 
actual raw material, labor and one small profit. 
My engine is made so good in the factory that I will send 
ft out anywhere in the U. S. without an expert to any inex¬ 
perienced user, on 30 days’ free trial, to test against any en¬ 
gine made, of similar horsepower, that sells for twice as 
much, and let him be the judge. 
Write today for my new 50-page Engine Book, full of 
valuable information, showing how I make them and how 
you can make more money with a Galloway on the farm. 
Soil your poorest horse and buy m 5-H-P. Callo¬ 
way— Only $119.50. 
WM. CALLOWAY CO. 
665 Calloway Station*, 
Siickney GasolineEngines 
ARE THE BEST 
Why? Because they have the best igniter, 
the best cooling system, the best valve mo¬ 
tion and the best governor. Thousands of 
engines now in successful operation a£- 
^ter our years of experience in building 
v only the best prove all these points. 
tSovon sixes, 1%to1 GH.R. 
I Send for Free Catalog and our fifty- 
' seven reasons why S tick n oy 
Engines are the best* 
J Agents everywhere. 
Charles A.Stichney Company 
MAIN OFFICE & FACTORY ST. PAUL. MINN. 
EASTERN OFFICE. EMPIRE BLOGPITTSBURG. PA. 
AGRICULTURE 
Our Tile 
Last Forever 
Are thoroughly 
hard burnt. Made 
of best Ohio Olay, 
manufacturers of 
Sold 
in car-load lots. Also 
HOLLOW BUILDING BLOCK AND SEWER PIPE 
Place orders now for early spring delivery and avoid delay 
H. B. CAMP COMPANY, 
FULTON BUILDING, PITTSBURG, PA 
Tremendous Capacity 
2 1-2 Tons and Up 
Do not think of buying any kind of a 
wagon for any purpose until you send 
us your name for our Astonishingly 
Low Prices and Big F ree Color-Illus¬ 
trated Catalog, showing our Full Lino 
of Breco All-Steel Wagons, 
The Breese Brosa Co m 
Wagon Dept. 214, Cincinnati, Ohio 
Us miSlko I Please Cut or Tear Out This Fi*e^| 
m I Coupon, or use Postal or Letter and 
lrUff : Send Your Name Tor Prices 
1 Uif " "" S+wTm | and Our Big FREE BOOK j 
—Freight Prepaid clnelnn „,„ hlo I 
W p ARP tL, oil ctool npnnin TSIo ntliAr* * Please quote me prices direct from the factory, freight prepaid, on 
hi AKJii the all-steel-wagon people. iNO other B your Breco line of All-Steel Wagons, and send, me your big free catalog. _ 
wagon concern m the world has ever had a line ■ 
of wagons that they dared to sell direct to the I Name. 
•user on such a liberal, freight-prepaid-free-trial selling I Address.'.. 
plan, and long-time, five-year guarantee. 
You can see at a glance through this advertisement I Town.State. 
that we take all the risk of satisfying you in every way hHH ■ wmammmm m i 
that Breco All-Steel Wagons are exactly as represented. 
We cannot begin to tell you the whole story here—space is proposition on wagons ever made to the farmers of this 
too limited. country. We want you, now, before you think of buy- 
So, whether you read every word here or not—whatever else ing any kind of a wagon for any purpose—made by 
you do, do not think of laying down this paper or turning over anybody—to just send us your name and investigate the 
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Breco All-Steel Wagon, big color-illustrated catalog and direct- for the most practical uses in every kind of work that 
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Breco Wagons 
Sold Direct—30-Day Free Trial—5- Year Guarantee 
We display our selling plan strong here, so you can see it at a glance. or punched by special machinery, which insures perfect, inter- 
All we ask is that you, as a practical man, investigate Breco All-Steel changeable and duplicate parts. Every gear is aligned and tested 
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and materials, made of all steel, perfect in every particular, for the same or axles are pressed into shape cold. 
lower prices than you can get in anywhere near this value in old-style wagons. In fact, every part of the Breco All-Steel Wagon is made just as 
Breco All-Steel Wagons are much lighter draft than wooden wagons. perfect as human ingenuity and the highest-grade steel and work- 
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