When Not to Use Lime. 
Are Strawberries Injured by It ? 
Some weeks ago we had a note about certain crops 
which do not respond to lime or are injured by it— 
directly or indirectly. The note was in reply to a ques¬ 
tion about using lime with strawberries or potatoes. 
The point was that a farmer wanted to use clover or 
other legumes to provide humus and plant food for the 
strawberry crop. lie was afraid to use lime on those 
legumes, as he thought it might hurt the berries. We 
referred this matter to Dr. J. II. Wheeler, our bosc 
American authority on lime, and he makes this state¬ 
ment : 
I T is sometimes true that an application of lime, 
if made directly before Soy beans or cow peas 
are planted, may lessen the crop. This relates, how¬ 
ever, to slaked lime, and I doubt if ground limestone 
would have that effect, or if so it would not be as 
pronounced as it is when slaked lime is used. 
Wherever I have noticed such effects on the first 
crop following' the application of the lime beneficial 
results have usually been noticed in subsequent years 
< n both of those crops. 
I do not think it is wise to lime heavily with any 
kind of lime before strawberries, and I should by 
all means prefer the ground limestone to the slaked 
lime. It is quite possible that a ground limestone 
carrying a small percentage of magnesia would often 
be preferable to the pure limestone. 
As far as concerns potatoes, it is ordinarily pre¬ 
ferable to apply the lime following the potato crop 
in the rotation, although if a soil is excessively acid 
it is impossible to secure a satisfactory potato crop, 
and in such a case upon rare occasions I have ad¬ 
vised the application of lime even just before the 
crop is grown, but I have always insisted when do¬ 
ing so that the seed tubers be treated with corrosive 
sublimate solution*or with formalin (known to be 
pure and of good strength, 40%) before the potatoes 
are planted. I have made somewhere 
between 50 and 100 experiments on the 
effect of lime on the growth of pota¬ 
toes. and with but rare exceptions they 
have always shown a greatly increased 
yield of potatoes of large size, and in 
many cases the total yield of potatoes 
has been increased. Several illustra¬ 
tions showing this appear on pages 107, 
207. and 200 of my book “Manures and 
Fertilizers.” 
You are quite right in the idea that 
the Soy bean, vetch and cow pea will 
make a fair growth on many soils even 
without the use of lime. Alsike clover 
can perhaps be included in the cate¬ 
gory, although I should favor a little 
more liming with that than with any 
of the other crops mentioned. 
It is almost invariably true that 
ground limestone is better than slaked 
lime on sandy loams, gravelly loams 
and soils which are Inclined to become 
dry very quickly, and it is almost uni¬ 
versally better for use on those crops 
which need only a slight or moderate 
of lime. 
I think that your correspondent is wrong in con¬ 
sidering that the use of lime is fatal to the success¬ 
ful growth of strawberries. However, he and every¬ 
body else should be cautioned to keep the applica¬ 
tions of lime as low as is consistent with reasonable 
legume production on all land where strawberries 
are to be grown. lie seems to think also that lime 
is detrimental to all other berries, whereas currants, 
gooseberries and Cuthbert raspberries are often very 
much helped by lime. Blackcap raspberries, how¬ 
ever. are indifferent and may possibly be injured. 
The blackberry is also very indifferent, and if any¬ 
thing I believe it thrives better on a fairly acid soil 
than on one which lias been limed. My advice would 
be to have soil tested as to its probable acidity and 
not use enough lime to correct it entirely, and by 
doing so you can still grow Alsike clover, Crimson 
clover and many of the other legumes. 
II. J. WIIEELER. 
'THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
the fruit never came, the tonic was too strong. The 
following year they bore nice fruit. Since this time 
have tried the same method on plum trees, but drove in 
but two or three nails to a tree; this seemed to be 
about the right amount as the trees have borne fruit the 
following Summer. The above is an old method, but 
judging by some of the cracked pears I see this year 
it might be of interest to some if brought to their 
notice. wm. joiinsox. 
A 
CHEAT many so-called remedies or tonics for 
fruit trees often appear more or less success¬ 
ful, because of the way in which the material is ap¬ 
plied, and because of the climatic conditions of the 
following season. Mention is made of the fact that 
pears matured rough-skinned fruits that were badly 
cracked. This was a common occurrence with some 
of our old varieties previous to the application of 
modern spraying methods. The chief factor caus¬ 
ing the cracking of the pears is the disease known 
as apple or pear scab, which good fruit growers now 
control by a thorough application of fungicides. It 
is a well-known fact also that there are seasons in 
which the scab fails to develop except perhaps to 
a very limited extent, so that it would not be at all 
strange if one happened to secure much finer fruit 
in a certain season following some treatment of the 
tree when the treatment itself actually had no effect 
upon the trees. The slitting of the bark of an old 
pear tree with a knife, or the driving in of nails, 
could not possibly have any effect upon the pear 
scab. The season following the treatment was prob¬ 
ably one which was unfavorable to the development 
of the scab. 
The plum frequently fails to set fruit because of 
frosts or unfavorable weather conditions at bloom¬ 
ing time. Some varieties are self-sterile, and fail 
to set fruit when the weather is wet or cold, as the 
vitality of the pollen may be destroyed in the first 
case, and bees may fail to work in the latter in- 
tTnii 
I 
“ Tonic” for Pear Trees. 
Some years ago my father bought a small farm with 
s< veral kinds of fruit trees on place, two of which were 
of Winter pears, which were loaded with rough thick- 
skinned fruit, and so full of cracks, that by the time 
they were "pared nothing remained but the core. One 
of our neighbors, a very old lady, advised me to slit 
the trunk of the trees lengthwise with a strong butcher 
knife, and drive cut nails around trunk of tree near 
the ground. She said the trees needed a tonic and 
were bark-bound. I did her bidding, slitting as best 
1 could the rough bark of the two pear trees in four 
slits, one on each side of the trunk; then drove a dozen 
eight-penny cut nails around trees close to the ground. 
Next year our pears were smooth and free from cracks. 
We also had seven plum trees which looked as though 
each was racing with the other to reach old Sol. These 
trees had not borne fruit, so our neighbor said, for some 
time. I slit these on four sides lengthwise of the trunk, 
drove several cut shingle nails in trunks near to ground. 
Next Spring the trees blossomed out in good shape, but 
“Fancy” Tolman Sweets, exact size, in a barrel costing $4.75. Fig. 541 
application stance, so that unless one was careful to have un¬ 
treated trees to compare with those treated, one 
might apparently get results that should really be 
ascribed to weather conditions rather than to the 
special treatment. 
A case of insect control, reported by a fruit grow¬ 
er some years ago, illustrates another phase of 
investigational work. A fruit grower claimed that 
he had been able to destroy a colony of the red¬ 
humped caterpillars which sometimes feed upon ap¬ 
ple trees by sprinkling them with flour. lie in¬ 
sisted that this remedy was successful, since 
after sprinkling a colony of the worms with 
flour they disappeared after several days. It so 
happened that he told an entomologist of the test. 
A visit to the tree and an examination of the soil at 
(lie base revealed the fact that the caterpillars were 
all there in pupa form. After this insect becomes 
full grown it makes its way to the ground and en¬ 
ters the pupa stage. The grower had sprinkled the 
worms with flour at just about the time they in¬ 
tended to leave the tree to go into the ground. The 
evidence as he saw it. however, was to the effect 
that the flour had killed the worms, and nothing 
could shake his argument until the worms were dis¬ 
covered at the base of the tree. This is an illus¬ 
tration of how one may be led astray from the truth 
unless he is familiar with many of the details and 
principles of nature. m. a. brake. 
1429 
vegetables direct to the people. I bought a light 
auto truck last Spring, and it is a great help, for 
when I have too much of a load to dispose of in my 
home town, I can easily run 15 or 20 miles away to 
a larger market. It is necessary to have horses also 
in order to do the farm work, but the auto truck 
is a great help, as it beats the horses for speed and 
is always ready. Oftentimes a farmer must take 
his horses to haul his crops away when the same 
team ought to be at home at work on the land. 
I am trying cover crops as suggested in The R. 
N.-Y. Some of our mangels this year will weigh ”0 
pounds. As to feeding horses, I have always found 
that oats and hay seem to be good enough for the 
horses. I have plenty of hay, but I have to buy my 
oats, and they have always done well on that feed. 
Connecticut. w. e. w. 
Ii. N.-Y’.—We feed stalks and carrots as a matter 
ct economy. Hay is very high in our country, and 
we do not raise much of it, as the farm is very 
largely in fruit. We can raise corn in the young 
orchards. The fertilizing and cultivation of the corn 
takes good care of the trees, whereas hay would not 
c.o so well in the orchard. Loose hay sells at a high 
figure, and if we can find a substitute, the cash for 
the hay comes in well. We use a flint corn which 
gives a fine and slender stalk, and of course this 
method of feeding is intended for the Winter only 
when the horses are partly idle. We feed the stalks 
right in the bundle as they come from the field. If 
it were dent corn, we should run these stalks through 
a shredder, but the flint corn is eaten well without 
this shredding. We plan to give about a peck of 
carrots a day, in two feeds night and morning. It 
it not understood that the carrots and stalks alone 
make a full ration for the horse. It is simply a 
substitute for the hay. As grain we havf found 
nothing better than half and half 
oats and corn, either fed whole 
or crushed together. With the stalks 
we think that two-thirds of this 
combination and one-third of good 
wheat bran will make a good ration 
for a work horse. For a driving horse 
we have not found anything better 
than good oats, but there is no ques¬ 
tion about the fact that good clean, 
bright stalks and carrots will make a 
substitute for hay, and we find it as 
economical a roughage as we can feed. 
Many farmers make a mistake in feed¬ 
ing a poor, moldy quality of stalks to 
the horse. No self-respecting horse will 
eat such stuff, and then of course the 
feeder claims that this advice about 
feeding stalks is nonsense. The stalks 
must be bright and clean, and the horse 
should have a fair chance. While car¬ 
rots and stalks make a good combina¬ 
tion, if you can get 40 cents a bushel 
you would better sell them. We do not 
consider them worth that much for 
feeding, and the money received for them could be 
invested in grain or hay to better advantage. 
A Crop of Cow-horn Turnips. 
I 
Carrots and Stalks for Horses. 
SEE you speak of feeding carrots and stalks to 
horses. Tell us a little more about this. I had 
a big crop of carrots, and they sell here at 40 cents 
a bushel retail. Would they be worth more than 
t.iis as feed? J am a back-to-the-lander and have 
been here five years, and my business is selling fresh 
RECEIVED my copy of The R. N.-Y. in today’s 
mail; your picture of a Cow-horn turnip, on page 
1344, attracted my attention at once, for I sowed 
a 10-acre field of corn this Summer with Red clover, 
Alsike, together with one pound of Cow-horn turnip 
seed to the bushel of clover seed. I laid aside the 
paper and walked out to the cornfield, laid hold of 
(.ne, but after a reasonable effort returned to the 
barn for a spade (I am 82 years of age and had 
just dined on pork chops, finishing up with baked 
apples and concluded that wisdom was the better 
part of valor). This turnip measured 18 inches, 
solid turnip between crown and root, and there are 
many more larger, but what are they good for? 
Neither cows, pigs nor horses care for them. I 
sowed another smaller field with rutabaga in the 
same way. They made a fine crop, delicious eat¬ 
ing and I have stored away in my root cellar four 
cartloads. I might add that the clover in corn this 
season proved a grand success, for the season was 
very wet. Joseph h. brintox. 
Chester Co., Pa. 
It. N.-Y'.—We are having some great stories about 
these turnips—some of them so large that we have 
little to say about our own crop. What are they 
good for? We use them as a green manure. Their 
long, deep root works down and opens the soil, and 
as they decay they add considerable humus to the 
soil. Their growth does not interfere with clover 
or grass seeding. We also believe the turnips utilize 
forms of potash in the soil which are not available 
for other crops. 
