1915. 
SUCCESSFUL FIGHT WITH QUACK GRASS. 
Destroying It With Buckwheat. 
T HIS is how we kill quack arid raise a crop the 
same season. After trying for several years 
to get rid of quack by following the instruc¬ 
tions in the farm papers, and the vague suggestions 
at the institutes, the result was more failure than 
success. Hoping to find a plan that could, under 
ordinary weather conditions, be depended on to he 
all success and no failure we have boiled it down 
to the following practice, which has routed the 
quack for three years in succession. 
We select it field that has been cropped the pre¬ 
vious season to get rid of the sod. Hand can be 
plowed Fall or Spring, llun the spring-tooth bar- 
row its much .as is necessary to prevent the quack 
from showing much (if .any) above the ground. In 
case of a long wet spell in the Spring it may be ne¬ 
cessary to use the disk harrow, or even to plow it 
under. The object is to keep the stuff from grow¬ 
ing above the ground by keeping the surface worked. 
No matter if below the surface the ground is solid 
quack roots, as we have had it. We do not harrow 
to get them out. but should enough quack roots conn* 
to the surface to interfere with the har¬ 
rowing, it will be necessary to horse- 
rake them in windrows in the direction 
of the prevailing winds, then after 
drying two or three days with a good 
breeze, touch a match to them and they 
a re no more. 
Now, we assume that .Tune 1b has 
come, and that the harrowing has been 
a success. So far we have done the 
harrowing as far as possible at times 
not to interfere with other work. 
Some time during the next lo days a 
little extra fertility must be applied. 
If manure, about four loads per acre 
with manure spreader or a little more 
spread evenly by hand, just before 
lime for the next harrowing. Fertil¬ 
izer and ashes can be quickly applied 
from a wagon when the wind is blow¬ 
ing. but do not get on too much. The 
object is to get a quick, rank growth 
of buckwheat without lodging. l’»c- 
rween July 1 and July 4 broadcast 
about :>d quarts per acre of buckwheat. 
In places where the harrow cannot go. 
it may be necessary to use the hoe 
some, then add a little extra fertility 
and seed to these spots, and our ex¬ 
perience is that not a quack root, sur¬ 
vives, and the land is in the cleanest 
possible condition for Alfalfa or any 
other crop. I.oose stones must occa 
sionally be removed. 
(Mir work is now done, except har¬ 
vesting the crop. The growing crop 
will make fertilizer of the quack roots. 
The “Summer-fallow” man must keep 
on with the work during the hot 
weather and rush of other work, work¬ 
ing for nothing and losing the use of 
the land for the season. Last year a 
thunderstorm blew our crop as "fiat 
as a pancake." hut even then we har¬ 
vested about .'!<> bushels of buckwheat 
per acre, which with the straw for 
bedding makes the deal a long way 
ahead of no crop at all. I expect this 
year to apply the treatment to a piece 
of sod with no change except to 
use tin* disk harrow more than the 
THtC K U L NEW-VORKER 
would be a fierce storm of protest against any such 
change. If economy is needed why not cut out the 
fearful graft of the franking privilege under which 
Congressmen stuff flu* mails with private matter? 
Fig. 142 shows a stand of mail boxes mounted on 
wheels. This picture comes from Montana, and is 
a familiar sight along the country roads. A dis¬ 
carded buggy wheel answers well. This one is 
mounted on a stump, and the plan is popular with 
the rural carriers. 
HOGGING OFF CORN AND SOY BEANS. 
T 
IK scarcity of farm labor and the high price 
of bogs of late years have made it profitable 
to allow the bogs to harvest the corn by turn¬ 
ing them into the field about .the time the..corn 
hardens. The. yyork of tearing down the corn furn¬ 
ishes just enough exercise to keep the hogs in good 
health; however, to allow them to eat all the corn 
they want without feeding some higher protein food 
is not the most economical way. so usually some 
tankage or middlings should be fed to balance this 
full corn ration. Last season we concluded we 
might just as well save the money used in buying 
393 
all consumed. The rape, which on account of dry 
weather had not made a large growth, was all eaten. 
Usually there would be quite a growth left on the 
ground for a cover crop for Winter. As soon as 
feed began to be scarce the fat hogs were taken out 
and young stock hogs put in to act as gleaners. 
These 52 hogs were taken to market, having done all 
their own harvesting during the entire Summer, 
with the exception of a very light feed of old corn 
while running on clover, no purchased feeds being 
used, and the health and growth of the hogs and 
the profits from them being entirely satisfactory. 
This field will be continued in corn year after year, 
as everything goes back to the soil except what the 
hogs carry away in their bodies as they walk out of 
ilie field, and this loss will be made up by an appli¬ 
cation of commercial fertilizer each year. 
Ohio. iiOK.vno markley. 
DRINK 
A REMAP 
tions \v 
(’hancel 
war has 
IN THE 
AND “POTATO BREAD’ 
WAR. 
MAHKAIU.K speech on English war coiuli- 
as recently made by Lloyd Heorge, 
llor of the Rritish Exchequer. The 
reached a critical stage for both sides. Mr. 
Heorge says that this war will he won 
as it were in tin* workshops rather 
than by the men on the battlefield. 
What he means is. the equipment, such 
as weapons, clothing, tools and ammu¬ 
nition is more necessary than anything 
else. Food can he supplied by other 
nations, but the immediate need is for 
the equipment which English workmen 
must turn out. 
Mr. Heorge then goes on to say that 
the consumption of intoxicating liquor 
is doing more damage to England, and 
is more to be feared than all the Her¬ 
man submarines put together. This is 
because drink destroys or weakens the 
efficiency of the workingman. He says 
that Russia has prohibited the sale of 
vodka, which is the Russian whisky. 
The prohibition meant the loss of 
$2X0.000,000 in yearly revenue, yet this 
has proved its value again since it has 
increased the efficiency of Russian 
workmen from M0 to 50 per cent. Not 
only so. but it has given encourage¬ 
ment and hope to millions of women 
and children, the home-makers, and in 
this way has built up and strengthened 
the national feeling. 
Mr. Heorge says that the Russian 
Minister of Finance told him that any 
attempt to return to the sale and dis¬ 
tribution of this vodka would mean re¬ 
volution in Russia. France, too. saw tin* 
menace of strong drink. She could not 
defend her national life, and at the 
same time endure free use of liquor: 
consequently France has abolished the 
sale of absinthe by a vote of 10 to one. 
The English rulers in like manner real¬ 
ize the home danger from drink to be 
greater than the danger of a foreign 
foe. and they will take strong meas¬ 
ures to prevent the use of intoxicating 
liquor. Mr. Heorge made another 
significant statement. 
\ Package of Apple Trees 52 inches L mig: Weight. Packed, 
Parcel Post ('barge. 1200 Miles, 40 Cents. 
Emir Pounds; 
P ring-tooi h. 
Our piece for treatment this year has some live- 
for-ever. which we expect to dig out with potato 
hooks. Could some 1 chemical be found that when 
sprayed on the live-for-ever would burn the stalks, 
it would be an easy matter to kill that out too. For 
a garden or small patch where no crop is desired 
harrow a few times, make it rich and sow, two bush¬ 
els buckwheat per acre will do the job. 
New York. a. t„ hixes. 
RURAL MAIL CARRIERS AND WAYSIDE 
BOXES. 
S OME of our people are greatly troubled over a 
report that the rural mail carriers are to be 
discharged, and a system of carrying the mails 
by contract installed. Some such suggestion was 
made by the Postmaster-Oeneral. He claimed that 
it would save money for the government but Con¬ 
gress does not seem likely to consider the change. 
It would he most unpopular, for the rural mail car¬ 
riers rank with the teacher, the doctor and the min¬ 
ister in close relationship to the farmer. There 
these concentrates by growing a substitute for them, 
and wore so well pleased with the result as a labor- 
saving, money-making proposition that we feel like 
passing it on to other hog growers. We planted four 
acres of corn, drilling it in rows ML_. feet between 
the rows, and 12 inches between the stalks in the 
row. We mixed a pint of Medium Hreen Soy beans 
with each gallon of the seed corn, planting them 
together. This gave us about one-fourth as many 
bean stalks as corn plants. They grew nicely to¬ 
gether and ripened about right. With a corn crop 
of about 7<» bushels to the acre the beans grew 30 
inches in height and very full of pods, making a 
great deal of valuable forage. About the last of 
July we sowed Hwarf Essex rape between the rows, 
stirring the ground very lightly to cover the seed. 
Fifty-two hogs, weighing from 100 to 150 pounds, 
that had been running on clover during the Summer, 
were turned into this field and told that the matter 
of eating a balanced ration was up to them. The 
first few days, being somewhat hungry for corn, the 
hogs gave most of their attention to it. but after 
that all three feeds were eaten impartially The 
beans were all gone first. Ihe pods and leaves were 
Look at the way they make bread out 
of potatoes. That potato bread spirit is 
something more to dread than to mock 
at. I fear that more than I do Field 
Ilindenburg’s strategy, efficient though 
Marshal von 
that may be. 
What he meant was the fact that the German peo¬ 
ple were willing to make any sacrifice, go to any 
reasonable self-denial in a spirit of patriotism and 
of national feeling. 
It is one of the most difficult things in the world 
to change the feeding habits of a nation, and noth¬ 
ing but the direst necessity will force men to do that 
willingly. The fact that the Herman people, in or¬ 
der to preserve the Fatherland and help their coun¬ 
try in its hour of need, are willing to substitute po¬ 
tato bread even in part for bread made of grain 
Hour entirely shows a spirit which the English peo¬ 
ple have not yet been ready to adopt. That was 
what Mr. Heorge meant: that this willingness to 
change their eating habits in order to lie of service 
to their country, if need he. was the finest evidence 
of national spirit that has yet been shown. 
We speak of this for a double purpose, to show 
the nature of the Herman people, and the strength 
of their cause when supported by a strong national 
feeling, and also to point out the fact that in this 
country too. it becomes necessary at times for con- 
