1132 
THE RURAL, NEW-YORKER 
September 10, 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE nr SIXES S FAUX Eft'S PAPER 
^ National Weekly Journal for Country mill Suburban Ilomc« 
Established iszo 
Published weekly by tho Knml rithlishlnc Company, a.'iil Wait 30th Street, New Vorlt 
Hkrbkiit W. Com.ingwood, President and Editor. 
John J. Dili,on, Treasurer and General Manager. 
Wm. F. Dillon, Secretary. Mas. E. T. Roy Lit, Associate Editor. 
SUBSCRIPTION : ONL DOLLAR A VKAI1 
To foreign countries In tlie Universal Postal Union, $2.01. equal to 8s. (id., or 
Xij marks, or Hi 1 * * I'ratios. Remit in money order, express 
order," personal cheek or bank draft. 
Entered at New York Post Ofllcc as Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates. 7S cents per agate line—7 words. References required for 
advertisers unknown to us ; and cash must accompany transient orders. 
“A SQUARE DEAL” 
Wo believe that every advertisement in this paper te backed by a respon¬ 
sible person. We use every possible precaution and admit the advertising of 
reliable houses only. But to make doubly sure, wo will make good any loss 
to paid subscribers sustained by trusting any deliberate swindler, irrespon¬ 
sible adver tisers or misleading advertisements in our columns, and any 
such swindler will lie publicly exposed. Wo are also often called upon 
to adjust (i if fere aces or mistakes between our subscribers and honest, 
responsible bouses, whether advertisers or not. We willingly use our good 
offices to this end, but such cases should not lie confused with dishonest 
transactions. We protect subseriliers against rogues, but we will not bo 
responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the courts, 
Notice of the complaint must be sent to us within one month of the time of 
the transaction, and to identify it, you should mention The Rural Nkw- 
Yorkkk when writing the advertiser. 
I N all this talk about cover crops we have tried to 
make it clear that vetch and Crimson clover must 
be seeded early if we expect them to pay. Some 
of our readers north of Now York are even now get¬ 
ting ready to seed these crops. They are too late. 
Our advice is to use rye alone at this late season. 
Rape and turnips may, even now, make a profitable 
growth before Winter, but the sure crop now is rye. 
We regret to see people try vetch and Crimson clover 
so late in the season and then condemn them for 
failure. 
* 
T HERE is no question about the bad mix-up in 
many lots of potatoes supiiosed to be Irish Cob¬ 
bler. This popular variety is often so badly 
adulterated that when the true Cobblers are ready 
to dig, there is a good proportion of late varieties 
left in the field unripe and unprofitable. Another 
variety badly mixed is Rural New-Yorker. This has 
been mixed with Green Mountain so that it is diffi¬ 
cult to find the pure seed. Growers do not want 
to abandon these fine varieties, hut they will lie 
forced to do so unless some one can guarantee pure 
seed and live up to the guarantee. 
* 
T HERE were 2,200 automobiles in one day on the 
State Fair grounds at Syracuse. This indicates 
New York farmers’ prosperity, and that the 
machine is becoming a necessity in rural life. It 
was thought that the parking space would be sufli- 
cieut to cure for the machines, hut on Grange day 
the overflow was sert to f he infield at the race track. 
The larger part of these machines belonged to farm¬ 
ers who came distances ranging from few to many 
miles. These machines placed the State Fair 
grounds in the limits of a pleasant drive, whereas 
with the family horse and carriage even the trip 
to the railroad would have been more irksome. 
Every machine owner is also a booster for better 
New York roads. 
* 
A S we have stated already, the U. S. Pomologist 
at Washington will identify fruit varieties if 
samples are sent him. Growers in New Jersey 
may send fruit samples to the State Experiment 
Station, where they will he identified free of charge. 
Address Prof. M. A. Blake, New Brunswick, N. J. 
It Is very important to have varieties properly 
named. Peach varieties in particular are badly 
mixed up. In one trial orchard, planted by the New 
Jersey Experiment Station, six so-called distinct va¬ 
rieties are all alike. Evidently these are “misfits”— 
six different labels fitted to the same kind of a tree! 
This work of identification is very important. It 
costs nothing hut a little time. 
* 
O UR readers are making good use of their educa¬ 
tion in advertising. One of those concerns of¬ 
fering “humus” for sale, sent their confiden¬ 
tial circulars to one of our people. This is part of 
what they got hack: 
Your favor to hand inclosing printed form letter and 
catalogue, offering us .'>5% discount on cash orders. 
Before taking up with same desire to know what is the 
analysis of your fertilizer, how much available plant 
food it contains, also as to the class of periodicals car¬ 
rying your advertisements, as thus far they have not 
been brought to my attention in the farm papers we 
take. 
Those people charge $20 for a ton of “humus”— 
probably dried swamp muck worth about $2.50 per 
ton. This farmer lias a swamp on his farm, lime 
within easy reach and acres of rye to he plowed 
under. Think of offering an intelligent man with 
such an outfit, “humus” at $20 a ton and the chance 
to fake his neighbors by taking a commission of $7! 
But this farmer wants to be shown the class of pub¬ 
lications which print sucli offers! That is getting 
to be the final acid test, for any paper that will 
print such advertisements is either a bluff, a stuff 
or a pure fake! Neither one is a safe adviser. 
M OST farmers are poor speculators. Unless they 
are unusually keen or have some inside in¬ 
formation they rarely make much money by 
holding their crops. If requires good judgment to 
know just when to sell. When a man buys a lot 
of goods he knows what they cost, and knowing how 
the selling price compares with that cost, he can 
use his judgment about selling. When a farmer pro¬ 
duces the goods it is as necessary to know what they 
cost as it is when he buys thorn. Knowing that he 
can sell when price enables him to get this cost back 
with a fair profit. The trouble is that most of us have 
little idea what our crops cost per bushel or pound, 
and therefore we do not know whether the selling 
price gives us a profit or not. Thus tlie very first 
principle of good farm management is to know what 
our crops cost. We cannot always figure it out to 
a dollar, but we ought to know at least whether we 
can pay ourselves fair wages at the price offered 
for our produce. 
* 
W E shall be obliged to repeat the sermon on 
“Take herd how ye hear!" Now we have 
tlie following note: 
“l T ou have told several times how such crops as 
turnips and ragweed take potash out of the air. If 
this is so why worry about tlie German potash 
situation?” s. J. r. 
We never said any such thing. There is no pot¬ 
ash “in tlie air” and of course plants could not take 
it out. We have said that certain pod-bearing 
plants like clover, Alfalfa, peas and beans are able 
to take nitrogen from the air by means of tiny forms 
of life called bacteria which live upon their roots. 
We also believe that certain cultivated plants like 
turnips and rape and certain weeds like ragweed 
are able to take large amounts of potash from the 
soil. You have mixed up the farts about the legumes 
or pod bearers with the belief about the potash 
gatherers. All soils contain more or less potash, but 
it is the available supply which we depend on for 
feeding our crops. There might be enough potash 
in an acre to produce 500 crops, yet in such a crude 
or insoluble form that an ordinary cultivated crop 
could not use it. Now the plants we have mentioned, 
and others seem to have some power of utilizing 
forms of potash which other plants do not have. 
We are sure from our own experience that a crop of 
turnips or rape plowed into the ground add avail¬ 
able potash to the crops which follow. They seem 
to do this by utilizing crude forms of potash and 
then as they decay giving this potash up to other 
plants which do not have the same power of using 
the unavailable forms in the soil. In much the same 
way we think such plants as buckwheat or the com¬ 
mon smart-weed have power to use phosphoric acid 
in the soil and make it more available. We can¬ 
not yet expect to depend on such plants for our 
supplies of fertilizer, but they will all help, and at 
this time of potash scarcity they give an additional 
argument for cover crops. But do not think there 
is potash in the air, or that we ever advised going 
there for it. 
* . 
A MONG other things this European war is starting 
a new boom in baek-to-tlie-lauding. Here is a 
typical letter from a young man who thinks of 
renting a farm for about $50 a month:— 
It seems to me that on account of this war, farming 
is going to be very profitable in the next few years. If 
so, and this is where 1 want your opinion, I will make 
every effort to get (lie farm and run it myself. If wheat 
and corn continue high, with advances in all other lines 
which would naturally follow, I think 1 could make a 
good living on it and possibly make enough to make a 
payment toward buying the place. 
This man now has a good position at a cash salary 
and is doing well. Like many others he seems to 
think that in some way this war is to make farm¬ 
ing very prosperous. There will be a rush to buy or 
rent farms and put all available land into grain. 
We can offer little encouragement to such people. 
Farming is a business requiring experience and good 
judgment. You cannot rush out into the country, 
take any land and plant wheat, rye or corn and ex¬ 
pect a great yield in the first crop. It will require 
several years to lit such land as you could rent so it 
will produce profitable yields of grain. The chances 
now are that prices for grain and meat will 
rule high for a year or two, or until tlie war is over 
and Europe can once more adjust its business. It 
will not be all profit, however, for there cannot be 
such an enormous destruction of life and property 
in one part of the world without having something of 
the loss felt in all other parts. We think the farmers 
who know their business and are wise enough to 
cultivate their present acres better rather than to 
lush new land into cultivation are surely coining to 
a time of prosperity. It is no time, however, for the 
city man to rush in without experience or capital 
and expect to make a fortune on a farm. 
W E have seen letters from seedsmen who say 
that owing to tlie European War prices of 
Timothy seed have greatly advanced! The 
farmers who get such letters are not “hayseeds” by 
a good margin, and they want to know what the 
European War can have to do with Timothy seed. 
There has been no reply. Some of the war reasons 
for advancing prices are certainly the limit. They 
remind us of the storekeeper in Colorado years ago 
who charged 25 cents for an old-fashioned watch 
key. When asked why, his excuse was, “Freight 
rates are very high.” The freight on a watch key 
is about as good an excuse as the European War 
for high-priced Timothy seed. We suggest the read¬ 
ing of verse 5, chapter 2, of the Second Epistle to 
Timothy: 
"And, if a man also strive for mastery, yet is ho 
not crowned except he strive law fully!" 
* 
P RICES for Hairy vetch and Crimson clover seed 
have jumped since tlie European War started. 
In most cases prices have doubled, and at the 
present figures it is doubtful whether buying these 
seeds will pay. It is too late to sow them anyway 
except in the South. The Agricultural Department 
makes what we consider a good suggestion: 
Under such conditions they point out that it will be 
better practice to sow rye this Fall and use the differ¬ 
ence in price in adding nitrogen to the soil in the form 
of nitrate of soda or some other highly nitrogenous fer¬ 
tilizer. The rye will afford a Winter cover preventing 
washing and leaching, and can be plowed under in the 
Spring to add humus to the soil. 
We have, for years, advocated the use of rye as 
a cover crop. It has slowly changed our own farm 
from a tough brick-like mass to a mellow soil. We 
think the above advice is good, and we urge farm¬ 
ers to follow it wherever cover crops will pay. No 
one will claim that rye fully takes the place of 
clover; some nitrogen must he added to give equal 
results, but at any rate our advice for the Fall is 
sow rye on all the bare yround . 
* 
Y OIIIt editorial on page 004 exactly voices my opin¬ 
ion in regard to the trouble with agricultural col¬ 
lege students as farm laborers. I have had stu¬ 
dents working for me here on tho ranch, and have 
observed much of their work in other places, and their 
general attitude in the matter, and there is no doubt 
that the worst trouble with them is an exaggerated 
sense of their own importance. Many of them are city 
bred, without a particle of practical experience, but 
after a year or two at the college, imagine they are 
capable farm managers. You will do ok splendid ser¬ 
vice by hammering away at our college authorities on 
this point. w. k. newell. 
Oregon. 
We have received many letters like the above. 
Most of them are kindly and written in good spirit 
representing wliat we call constructive criticism. 
The writer worked out as a college boy years ago, 
and cannot therefore l»e accused of prejudice or of 
not knowing the subject from both ends. The trouble 
is that some of these college boys think they can 
substitute book or class-room learning for that farm 
instinct which can only come through practical labor. 
We do not blame them particularly. The trouble 
comes from their teachers, who often give them too 
large an idea of the value of book knowledge. It 
is true that most of our wisdom is carried in books, 
but let our teachers remember that it was put there 
and must be taken out again for useful application 
through the hands. 
BREVITIES. 
Go-operation, like charity, should begin at home and 
make good growth. 
“Kill the grade hull” is the warlike proclamation 
printed at the head of a dairyman's letter. 
A block of commercial greenhouses recently pictured 
by the Florists’ Review included 24 houses, each 60x500 
feet. The cost of the range, complete, was estimated at 
$450,000. 
Some of the housewives argue that they will not 
put up preserves because the price of sugar is so high. 
But what about the low price of fruit? There never 
was a better time to make preserves. 
Tile European War has stopped the talk of feeding 
wheat to stock in place of corn or oats. The outlook 
now is for such prices for wheat as human food that 
the live stock will take what they can get. 
Corn in some districts of the Colorado plains had a 
hard time in August, with a temperature of 10N degrees 
and no rain for a month. Winter wheat and all Spring 
grain was said to be the best ever known on the Great 
Plains. 
The leading French horticultural paper, the Revue 
Horticole, recently announced that it would cease pub¬ 
lication for the present, as its whole staff, editors, cor¬ 
respondents, clerks and printers, had been called to the 
front. 
Saskatoon in Saskatchewan, recently celebrated “hog 
day” in an effort to make stock growing popular. West¬ 
ern Canada, like the Gulf States, has been buying its 
pork products from the outside when it is abundantly 
able to raise them all at home. 
It seems that South Africa has never been troubled 
with the warbles or grubs which infest the backs <>f 
cattle. The insect is brought in on imported cattle, but 
it is thought that tin.* reversal of the seasons—Summer 
in South Africa while Winter rages in the north—is 
unfavorable to the spread of the insect. 
