1914. 
1501 
Ruralisms 
ROSETTE IN PECAN TREES. 
T HE newspapers have stated in the 
last few years that Edison has said 
no one knows one billionth part of one 
per cent, about anything. The bulletin 
lately published on pecan rosette by the 
National Government proves it. After 
years of careful study and many elabor¬ 
ate tests the authors of this bulletin hon¬ 
estly admit that they do not know what 
causes it, nor what will cure or prevent 
it. I have had for my constant compan¬ 
ions for the last 36 years pecan trees, 
and while I am no bacteriologist nor 
entomologist, I have a little common 
sense, and can shed a little light on this 
subject. 
Six years ago I made the statement 
before the National Nut Growers’ con¬ 
vention that rosette was caused by some 
bacterial growth upon the roots of the 
tree. Prof. Gossard said that I was 
wrong. Upon my return home I at 
once began to study rosette, and after 
six years’ study I have proved beyond 
a shadow of a doubt that I was wrong 
and that Prof. Gossard was right. The 
most complete refutation of any theory 
is this. A physician lecturing before a 
popular audience said that every case of 
grippe originated from wet feet. A man 
in the audience interrupted him and said: 
“You are wrong, sir, for I have two 
wooden legs, and I have just got well 
from a very bad case of the grippe.” 
Now I have just as positive proof that 
rosette is not caused by any growth upon 
the roots of the tree. It is this. The 
common wild pecan of Louisiana never 
suffers from rosette. Yet when the 
Schley pecan is budded or grafted upon 
the wild roots they frequently die of 
rosette. 
There is one bold mis-statement of fact 
in the Government’s bulletin which I 
wish to correct; that swamp land is en¬ 
tirely exempt from rosette. My groves, 
which are situated upon swamp lands, 
have developed several cases of rosette. 
I have never known a case among my 
nursery trees. 
Now I wish to tell of a few things 
that I have found out about rosette. 
The disease is inherent in certain varie¬ 
ties of pecans, and is very similar to 
locomotor ataxia in the human species. 
It is not a germ disease at all. It is 
the lack of sufficient nutrition. Certain 
varieties have not strong enough diges¬ 
tive organs to assimilate the food under 
ordinary conditions. Here with me cer¬ 
tain varieties are very subject to rosette, 
and other varieties never have it at all. 
The Schley trees nearly all die of it, ex¬ 
cept under very high cultivation. Money¬ 
maker never shows any sign of it. Rus¬ 
sell often devolops it, while Carman nev¬ 
er does. The common wild pecan of 
Louisiana never shows a trace of it. 
Now notice this fact strongly. While 
the Schley nearly always dies when not 
properly cultivated, still when very high¬ 
ly cultivated it shows no sign of rosette, 
and I feel sure that when the scientists 
get at the bottom of the matter they will 
see as plainly as I do that rosette is a 
failure of the pecan to digest its food 
properly. Certain varieties are naturally 
dyspeptics. sam ir. james. 
Aphis and House Plants. 
T UTS is the season when the aphis is 
making its appearance on house 
plants and in flower and vegetable forc¬ 
ing establishments. There are many va¬ 
rieties of this very troublesome pest. In 
all cases no matter what variety, or on 
what plant it is found, the aphis can be 
overcome by tobacco, whether in the 
form of dust, smoke, or a decoction made 
by steeping the refuse tobacco stems from 
the cigar makers, using one pound of 
stems to five gallons of water. Just now, 
the pest has made its appearance the 
first time this season on the lettuce in 
the greenhouse. Our method of combat 
is to apply tobacco smoke about twice a 
week. We set a number of little earthen 
pots throughout the greenhouse, fill these 
with tobacco stems made damp with a 
little water. We then close up the house 
tight and light the damp tobacco stems. 
For the best results the smoke should be¬ 
come so dense that the plants cannot be 
seen through the glass. It is sometimes 
almost impossible to dislodge the aphis 
when it has once completely covered the 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
plants, and for this reason it is necessary 
to begin with the smoke before the pest 
has made its appearance. Plants grow¬ 
ing in the open that are affected by the 
aphis are best treated by tobacco dust 
applied freely after dew or rain. How¬ 
ever, in extreme eases, when the pest at¬ 
tacks also the under side of the loaves, it 
is necessary to apply tobacco in fluid 
form with a syringe. a. b. 
NOTES FROM A MARYLAND GARDEN. 
FATHER AND CROPS.—Down 
here in southeastern Maryland No¬ 
vember gave us but three cloudy days, al¬ 
most unbroken sunshine and little rain. 
December is making up for this, for we 
have just passed through a long north¬ 
easter storm with plenty of rain and a 
minimum temperature of 38. I have 
three lines of cold frames planted in let¬ 
tuce for Christmas heading. Two of 
these have the double-glazed sashes and 
one the single-glazed. Owing to the con¬ 
tinued mild temperature the single- 
glazed sashes have kept up very well 
with the double-glazed ones, but with the 
coming of cold weather the single glass 
will have to have a night cover, while the 
others will do without any, and thus 
save a great deal of labor. In this flat 
country, between bay and ocean, we have 
a great sweep of the high winds, and one 
advantage of the heavy double-glazed 
sashes is that they never blow off as the 
lighter sashes will sometimes, if not 
wedged down. Just now the spinach cut¬ 
ting is going on merrily, and I never had 
a finer growth, while the late-sown spin¬ 
ach that is intended for Spring cutting 
will soon be large enough to cut unless 
the weather turns colder and compels it 
to go dormant. 
Fertilizers. —Our Irish potato grow¬ 
ers are worried over the prospect of get¬ 
ting no potash, for it is very generally as¬ 
sumed that it is needed in our sandy soil 
especially for the crops of both Irish 
and sweet potatoes. Our growers very 
generally have been using a fertilizer con¬ 
taining 7 per cent, ammonia, 8 per cent, 
phosphoric acid and 5 per cent, potash. 
My own opinion is that they have been 
wasting money in buying so high a per¬ 
centage of nitrogen for the potato crop 
and paying $38 a ton for it. This 7 per 
cent, article gets its nitrogen from fish 
scrap and nitrate of soda and the pres¬ 
ence of the nitrate causes it to cake badly 
and makes it harder to apply with a me¬ 
chanical spreader. It makes an admir¬ 
able fertilizer for leaf crops like spinach, 
cabbages, etc., but for the root crops a 
much smaller amount of nitrogen would 
be needed. With the long-continued and 
heavy application of fertilizers contain¬ 
ing a considerable percentage of potash I 
am of the opinion that the soil has accu¬ 
mulated a very considerable residue of 
potash, for the soil will hold on to any 
unused potash and phosphoric acid while 
losing nitrates rapidly. I believe there¬ 
fore that by making a home mixture of 
cotton-seed meal and acid phosphate the 
potato growers can do without the pot¬ 
ash, since the cotton-seed meal will fur¬ 
nish some potash, while the fish scrap 
and nitrate of soda do not. A ton of 
fertilizer made of equal parts of cotton¬ 
seed meal and acid phosphate I believe 
will give better results on the Irish po¬ 
tato crop than the popular seven per 
cent goods. 
Stable Manure. —One potato grower 
in Aecomac County, Ya., writes that he 
is thinking of using the New York stable 
manure, which will cost him $3.30 per 
ton delivered at his station three miles 
away. Now I cannot see that he can 
that for some crops the clover would 
have to be plowed down when not more 
than half grown, but it has been proven 
that Crimson clover does the greater 
part of its nitrogen-fixing in the Fall, 
and it will pay to grow it as a Winter 
cover and humus-maker even where it 
has to be turned early. And for the 
sweet potato crop it would very profit¬ 
ably take the place of the rakings of the 
pine forests which are universally hauled 
out by the Eastern Shore Virginia grow¬ 
ers during the Winter to plow under for 
their sweet potato crop. They would 
have better organic matter and an abun¬ 
dance of niti’ogen for the crop while 
saving the loss of nitrates in their open 
soil in the Winter rains. 
Fall Growth. —Owing to the mild 
Autumn weather my onion sets, planted 
in September, have grown almost large 
enough to use already for green onions, 
and I hope thta they will winter well. 
Leeks are in their glory, and they make 
an excellent substitute for green onions 
in Winter, for here, where we have about 
as much open soil in Winter as hard 
frozen, it is seldom difficult to get the 
leeks for use or the parsnips, salsify or 
carrots, all of which we leave where 
they grew. My Fall-planted sweet peas 
are now a foot high on the wire trellis, 
and seem to be perfectly happy. I would 
have preferred to have had them make 
less growth, but hope they may come 
through. The Fall-sown sweet peas 
usually give us the best bloom, as they 
come in before the hot weather. In Jan¬ 
uary I expect to plant more. I dig a 
trench fully 15 inches deep and fill it 
half full of rotted manure, cover this 
with soil and plant and cover fully six 
inches deep, and from this sowing gen¬ 
erally get a good bloom, w. F. massey. 
Maryland. 
Spring Wheat. —We have a number 
of readers who insist that they want to 
sow Spring wheat in New York State. 
Our conviction is that Spring wheat 
is not over 60 per cent, as useful or 
efficient as Winter wheat. Yet we find 
people who refuse to accept such opinion. 
One of the best authorities we know of 
says this: 
“I agree with you that there is no 
place in New York State where farmers 
can sow Spring wheat_ as well as they 
can Winter wheat. We have tried out 
Spring wheat very thoroughly in West¬ 
ern New York and not one year out of 
five is it a success. Under the most fav¬ 
orable conditions, Spring wheat will not 
give over 10-15 bushels per acre when 
Winter wheat will produce 25-30. You 
are correct in your instructions that if 
these people insist upon sowing Spring 
wheat, the same preparation and method 
of sowing as oats is the proper one, they 
cannot get the wheat in too early in the 
Spring nor they cannot put it in too 
well or fertilize it too heavily. There 
are half a dozen kinds of Spring wheat 
that are grown in New York State but 
probably the Early Fyfe is as good as 
any, but none of them will do as well as 
M inter wheat sown on the same soil and 
properly put in.” 
“Have you found a customer for vour 
gramophone yet?” “Oh, yes—I played 
it for 12 hours on end. and all the neigh¬ 
bors clubbed together and bought it from 
me.”—London Opinion. 
“For the Land’s Sake, use Bowker’s 
Fertilizers; tliey enrich the earth and 
those who <•¥! it.”— Adv. 
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make it pay to use fresh manure at this 
price for the Irish potato crop and have so 
advised him. Our cantaloupe growers 
still use the New York manure at the 
advanced price, and are already putting 
it in the furrows to lie and rot till 
planting time. Even for these I believe 
that a better plan would be to compost 
the manure now with woods mold and 
prepare a compost that will be in better 
shape for using in the Spring than the 
raw manure will be lying in the fur¬ 
rows. In fact I very much doubt that 
for auy of our truck crops it pays to 
freight and haul the New York manure 
on the present high price. I believe that 
with a good growth of Crimson clover on 
the land to turn under for the canta¬ 
loupes and other crops they would have 
better and more economical results with 
good commercial fertilizers. It is true 
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