1106 
for corn, spreading 15 to 18 loads of manure per 
acre. 
RYE IX 81LO.—In the early part of .Tune, the 
rye is cut just as it is heading out and placed in 
the silo. If the rye becomes very dry, we wet it 
down with a hose as it goes in; however, the bet¬ 
ter plan is to mow only as fast as it can be cleaned 
up behind the mower or reaper. The main value 
of rye is in its being (lie earliest green food in the 
Spring. The rye from this field furnishes a good 
crop of silage, but not as good as will be had later 
when the clover of this field will be placed in the 
Sanitary Milk House. Fig. 415. 
silo with the rye of the other fields. After cutting 
the rye, one can usually cut a fair crop of sown 
hay if the season has begun favorably. 
CONTINUING THE ROTATION—After the corn 
is harvested, the stubble is again sown to rye, leav¬ 
ing a good condition during the Winter. The next 
season another third of the portion originally sown 
to rye was seeded to clover, placing as before one- 
half ton of lime to the acre, then the fields are in 
good shape for the regular rotation. 
Field i.—First year corn; second year rye and 
clover; third year clover. Field 2.—Rye and clovei , 
clover; corn. Field 3.—Clover; corn; rye and clov¬ 
er. The one-third portion of land planted to clover 
one year will show up well the next Spring, if soil 
conditions are right for it. On this is usually put 
10 loads of manure per acre, with spreader; the last 
third of land is covered with 15 loads per acre, and 
put in fine shape for corn. A large silage corn is 
used, preferably Eureka. The land planted to 
clover should come on strong and produce at the 
rate of 10 tons of silage, or green clover, and the 
one-third portion planted to rye should produce the 
same as clover, or about 10 tons green rye per acre. 
I am putting both rye and clover in the silo. We 
find it better to put in two loads of rye to one of 
clover. 
THE HAY CROP.—A word regarding the hay 
land. The land reserved for growing hay is spread 
either during the Fall or Winter, 10 loads of ma¬ 
nure per acre. Early in April the teams go ovei' 
this grass with a cutaway harrow, set at a good 
angle to throw off some dirt through the sod. If 
the sod is a little thin, four to six quarts of Alfalfa 
seed is sown, scratching it in with a weeder and 
following with a roller. The lifting action of the 
cutaway harrow opens up the sod, permitting the 
manure to reach to the roots of the grass; besides 
new seed will germinate more readily with the ad¬ 
mission of air and sunlight. A splendid crop of 
hay is gathered each season under favorable weath¬ 
er conditions, which supplemented with silage makes 
a full feed the year around that goes farthest in 
pure milk production without excessive cost. 
New Jersey. maximillian fleischeb. 
Wheat Growing on the Small Farm in 
New York. 
Part I. 
ROSPECT8 FOR THE FUTURE.—The prospect 
of an increased demand for wheat the coming 
year, due to the European conflict, may be a tempta¬ 
tion to many to upset the crop rotation on the aver¬ 
age farm by abnormally increasing the wheat acre¬ 
age. In the matter of increase or decrease of crop 
acreage the farmer ought to be conservative. The 
future is fortunately hidden from our sight; un¬ 
favorable weather conditions, or unlooked-for change 
in supply and demand may upset our most studied 
and careful estimates. One does well “not to put 
all his eggs in one basket.” The opening of the 
Dardanelles, giving all-year outlet to Russian wheat, 
or the development of the present year’s outlook in 
the United States, may materially affect wheat 
prices. As early as June, the Department of Agri¬ 
culture at Washington predicted a six per cent, in¬ 
crease in wheat over last year, and ordinarily a 10 
per cent increase is expected to influence prices ma¬ 
terially. Up to the last of July nothing has ap¬ 
peared to change that estimate. At the outset of 
this article the writer wishes to urge the New 
THE RURAL NEW-VORKc.R 
York farmer, especially the general farmer who di¬ 
vides his acres between a number of crops, not to be 
too hasty to upset his rotation by too large increase 
of wheat, but to undertake to increase his wheat 
yield in the most profitable and safe way, that of 
better yield, instead of increased acreage. 
PLACE OF CROP IN ROTATION.—Besides fruit 
in our rotation, wheat, beans, and sometimes peas 
are the money crops; corn, oats and hay are grown 
in sufficient quantities for feed only. The conditions 
under which I grow wheat are not materially differ¬ 
ent from those prevalent all over New York State, 
except as rotations and fertilization requirements 
vary. We are located in Western New York in the 
great fruit belt on the lake plane. The soil for the 
most part is Dunkirk silt.loam, and Ontario loam. 
On 66 acres, including 14 acres of fruit, we grow on 
the average 15 acres of beans, and about the same 
amount of wheat, besides hay, corn, pasture and 
grain for four horses, three cows, three hogs and 25 
sheep, and a small flock of hens. Most of our wheat 
comes after beans in the rotation, and a small por¬ 
tion after Spring grain or peas. The Spring grain 
land is the only wheat ground we plow in the Fall. 
Pea ground is disked as soon as the crop is re¬ 
moved in July, and the bean ground is cultivated 
and harrowed to produce a fine seed bed. Our ro¬ 
tation takes two forms, owing to the lay of the 
land over a ridge down into low ground, namely an 
upland and a lowland rotation. On the former the 
rotation is clover, beans, wheat; on the latter, clo¬ 
ver, corn, oats, wheat. About half of our clover 
seeding is kept for pasture and hay, the remainder 
is plowed under for beans. The following table il¬ 
lustrates how the rotation works out on the upland: 
First 
Year 
'Second Year 
Third Year 
SPRING 
fall 
spring 
FALL 
SPRING FALL 
Wheat 
Glover 
Pastured 
Beans 
Hay 
Pasture 
Wheat 
Fall 
Pastui’e 
Wheat Clover 
Pastured 
Beans Wheat 
Beans 
Wheat 
Wheat 
• 
Clover 
Pastured 
Beans Wheat 
Hay Fall 
Pasture Pasture 
Hay and 
Pasture 
Fall 
Pasture 
Beans 
Wheat 
Wheat Clover 
Pastured 
PREPARATION OF THE SOIL.—The all-import- 
c point in the preparation of the soil for wheat 
^ a solid compact under soil and a finely pulver¬ 
ized surface soil, a dust mulch two inches deep. 
Whatever the preceding crop the aim of all prepara¬ 
tion should be the condition stated above. IIow 
one may produce these conditions from the various 
conditions of soil, weather, and preceding crop, is 
the problem of the wheat grower. In sections 
where beans are grown, wheat may follow that 
crop without plowing, and as plowing is the most 
costly operation in the production of a seed bed, 
quite a saving is effected. It will be readily seen 
that to follow beans with wheat in this way the 
former must be kept reasonably free from weeds. 
Bean ground gives the ideal condition for a seed bed 
for wheat. It is the next best thing to the old- 
fashioned Summer fallow for clearing the ground 
of noxious weeds. The Spring plowing with the 
subsequent cultivation gives a solid under soil and 
conserves moisture, while the harvesting of the 
beans with modern machinery leaves the soil in 
condition to easily produce the desired dust mulch. 
After bean harvest ordinarily one cultivation with 
a field cultivator equipped with thistle-cutting teeth, 
followed by a spring-tooth harrow and that by the 
smoothing harrow, is sufficient preparation for 
wheat after beans. Or if the field is somewhat 
weedy the cultivator is used twice over and then 
followed by the smoothing harrow. In sowing 
wheat after beans we find from careful records that 
the labor cost for men and teams varies from 
$1.50 to $1.75 per acre, which is considered less 
than the cost of plowing for wheat, to which must 
be added the cost of preparation following the 
plowing. 
DISKING AND PLOWING.—In preparing fox- 
wheat following peas we use a disk harrow, lapping 
it half way so as to leave the surface level and 
afterwards treat as a plowed field. However, the 
disking is much cheaper than plowing and it leaves 
a compact under soil and requires less labor than a 
plowed field. Peas being a legume invariably insure 
a good crop of wheat. This method applies only 
whex - e the peas are mowed and removed from the 
field. In this section hand picking has been done 
away with by the modern viner at the cannery. 
It sometimes happens one wishes to turn over mea¬ 
dow land for wheat. In that case the plowing 
should be done as soon as possible after the hay is 
removed. Six weeks’ time or at least four weeks’ 
ai'e required to get such land in condition for wheat. 
September 11, 1015. 
In addition to tillage it must have the compacting 
and settling effect of time and i-ains. 
SOIL CONDITIONS.—In the case of the field 
plowed after Spring gi’ain is harvested, the method 
of handling depends to a large extent on the me¬ 
chanical condition of the soil and the amount of 
rainfall. A liberal amount of rain reduces the cost 
of preparation considerably. If the land is well 
plowed one has scored one point for success. Poor 
plowing can never give maximum results. Plowing 
early is as important as plowing well. For produc¬ 
ing a dust mulch on a plowed field the spring-tooth 
harrow and land roller are in most cases best, the 
one cuts and brings the lumps to the surface and 
the other crushes them. Under ordinary conditions 
these operations once a week over a pei-iod of four 
or five weeks will give good i-esults. Wheat ground 
cannot be over-tilled..; and dry seasons and hard 
lumpy soil require more work than just stated. For 
these hard soils the disk harrow or a shai’es har¬ 
row can be substituted for the spring-tooth harrow 
to a good advantage. They have a tendency to cut 
and grind the lumps as well as to put them in a 
position where the roller can crush them. As the 
time approaches for sowing if any grass, Spring 
grain, peas, thistles, or other weeds appear we use 
the field cultivator to make a clean job of cutting 
them off. In using this tool on sod care must be 
exercised in working along back furrows and ditches 
or the sod will be torn up, giving a ragged appear- 
.ance and a cause of trouble when drilling if the 
surface happens to be damp. Sod ought to always 
be cultivated lengthwise of the furrows. We gen¬ 
erally precede the drill with a smoothing hari-ow if 
the surface is well pulverized and the dust mulch 
is not over two inches deep. If the surface is 
lumpy or if the drill is apt to put the grain in more 
than two inches deep we roll ahead of the drill to 
crush the lumps or to prevent too deep sowing as 
the case may be. We use a wooden log roller in 
preference to any other kind, because it is not so 
noisy on our stony soil, and it has the weight to 
make it effective. If you have a light-weight roller 
better weight it when you go on the wheat ground. 
Monroe Co., N. Y. e. b. iiolden. 
A Day’s Work hi a Maine Hayfield. 
S OME of these people who think the big farms 
are all out West, would be made very thought¬ 
ful by a trip through New England over some of the 
big hay and stock farms which are being developed. 
For example, what would they think of the follow¬ 
ing report from Maine? 
At Kendall’s big farm in Bowdoinham, Maine, 
Thursday, with a crew of nine double teams, four 
rakes and 37 men, there were hauled into two barns 
105 two-horse loads of hay, averaging 1,500 pounds 
each, or 75 tons, an average of a load each four minutes 
between 10 A. M. and 0 P. M. Nine machines in one 
field of over 200 acres mowed most of this 4,000 bunch¬ 
es the day before. This was not a “special” day’s work 
but one in their regular system in harvesting their 
crop of 600 tons, 150 tons of which will be fed to their 
1000 sheep and lambs. 
It would be interesting to have reports from some 
of the big Western farms where hay is grown on a 
large scale. Let us see how l-apidly they work in 
putting the hay under cover, and how much actual 
profit they find on a ton of hay at farm prices. They 
would find that when we consider the price of hay 
in New England, and the way the New England 
King Johanna Fayne 59823. Fig. 416. 
soil responds to the use of chemicals the Eastern 
hay crop is more profitable than that grown out 
West. This Kendall farm was, as we understand, 
a short time ago classed among the unoccupied or 
abandoned farms. It was a piece of land gone 
back to neglect, but it has beeix brought back by 
the liberal and skillful use of chemical fertilizers, 
and good farm management. Surely here is a day’s 
record in the hayfield which it will do to study. If 
anyone else can come forward with the record of a 
better day, or in which one was more accomplished, 
we would like to know where the day was put in. 
