286 
JTAc RURAL NEW-YORKER 
February 24, 1917. 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
Ask Thkm.—I have had over .*^0 ques- 
tioijs much like the ff)l]()\ving: 
I have about l.'iO bushels of jiotatnes 
in a cellar under an unheated house, 
which I am kee))inf' foi- seed. During a 
recent cold snap the temperature went to 
two l)e]i)w zero on the outside, and a ther¬ 
mometer showed .‘50 degrees in the cellar. 
A dishj)an of water on the cellar floor 
froze one-half inch on top. lint so fai' as 
I can see. and I have examined them 
carefully inside and out. the potatoes are 
not frozen or frosted at all. Now some 
one advises me that the.se potatoes are not 
fit to plant, and will not germinate. Imv- 
ing been subjected to a freezing temiter- 
ature. even though they, apparently, show 
no signs of it. Is this a fact? .1. ii. n. 
Washington. D. C. 
I have some cow i)eas from last year. 
Will they grow just .as well this year? 
New S'ork. I.. S. 
Your scicmfiTic man may look wise at 
such questions, and the pr.actical man 
may give an opinion, hut the only one.s to 
give the true answer are the potatoes and 
the coAv iieas. Why not a.sk them? 
Select fair sami)les of the iiotatoes from 
dilVei'cnt ))arts of th<‘ h)t. Cut them as 
you would for seed, and leave them ex- 
jtosed to the sun in a warm room, or plant 
in pots or boxes. If the sju’outs are alive 
and .strong they will start and grow. If 
they have hven injured by frost tliey will 
either not start at all. or make a poor, 
feeble growth. You can tell by their ac¬ 
tual- behavior whether they ai'e fit for 
seed—and in no otln'r way. I think this 
seed is all right, hut the potatoes are not 
guided by thought—hut rather by “in¬ 
stinct” or habit. Ask them ! 
Miich the same is true of the cow i^eas. 
'I'hey may ho full of weevils; they may 
have been wet or damaged in some way. 
No guess will answer. Ask the peas! 
I'lant a few of them in boxes or pots, or 
|iut some of them in damp cloth and 
keep in a waian i>laee. If they sprout 
readily and make a good .start, go ahead 
and jdant them. If tlu'y are dead or 
sickly they will show it in tlu' test, and 
if the sjimjdes do not start properly—far 
better f<‘ed them jiiid try new seed. 
HkhA vion.—It is often hard for me to 
und(>rstand why )>eoplc seem to prefer a 
guess froiii some stranger to a simple 
ti'st of this sort. The (jue.stions run all 
through the list from bugs to boys. One 
woman says her baby has a cough— 
what medicine shall sin* give? ATho 
would care to take the responsibility of 
advising without seeing the baby and 
knowing about conditions? The local doc¬ 
tor or some good nurse should te.st the be¬ 
havior of the baby. There are many 
things about which a f.air opinion from 
some exi>erienced farun'r would help, yet 
then* an* more of them which could only 
lie settl(*<l by “asking the actor.” .lust 
now the hardest thing we have to do is 
to try to .show back-to-the-landers how im- 
l)ossible it is for us to tell them whether 
they can make good in the country or 
not I In one case a nnin came saying that 
he wanted to leave a good job and go to 
raising chickens. lie had never done it— 
knew nothing about poultry, but thought 
In* could do it. Sonn* benevolent friend 
offered to sell him a good outfit “cheap.” 
iind his mother-in-law had finally agreed 
to finance him, if I would say. in writing, 
that he would be likely to succeed. Five 
minutes’ talk convinced me that he would 
.sur(*ly fail, and I t(dd him so. That man 
will always beliew* that I entered into a 
consiiiracy with mother-in-law! It is 
reasonably safe to a.sk the potatoes or 
the hens, or the peas, but asking dollars 
which b(*long to some one else is risky 
business. 
T’kactk ai. Experience. —Now here is 
an extract from the letter of a profe.s- 
.sional nuin who thinks he would like to be 
a farmer: 
You see I have had virtually no prac¬ 
tical experience in working land on a 
largCi scab* on a commercial basis. Is 
such exja'rience necessary, or could I rea¬ 
sonably exi)(*ct to be able to work Ijind 
with the helj) of a hired man. county 
agents, and the State college experts, 
with what advice I could get from neigh¬ 
bors and the (Jrange on local conditions? 
Now suppose this man w^ere a doctor. 
AVhat would he say to one who wanted to 
enter the medical profession and thought 
he could make a success by reading medi¬ 
cal books and papers and asking other 
doctors? He would call the plan ridicu¬ 
lous from the first, yet he cannot see 
why practical farmers should smile at his 
idea of depending on the hii’ed man, the 
county agent, and the college profes.sors. 
I grant that there are many hired men 
la tter able to run a farm than the boss 
or the county agent, hut unless the boss 
knows, right through his own hands, what 
to do, promjitly and accurately, he will 
soon be bossed off his farm by nature and 
a mortgage. The only way for such a 
man to get his question answered is to 
ask the job. Let him work through the 
sea.son as hired man for some good farmer 
and he will find out. 
Askino Qt’ESTIons. —I have a letter 
from a man who has rented a farm near 
a good-sized city. He will bold on to his 
job in town and come and go from the 
farm, lie has worked an acre well and 
now will try l.'l acres. Here he comes: 
For a .$l>f)0 horse, what amount of oats 
shall I have to feed if he has plenty of 
jtasture in Summer and hay in Winter, 
also what el.se, if anything? I have asked 
different iieople with hor.ses and they none 
of them agree. You will probably think 
this a vei'y ignorant question, but am 
delightfully ignorant of farm affairs, but 
luckily not afraid to ask questions and 
learn, in which I have no doubt I shall 
be much assi.sted by studying The R 
N.-Y. R. E. 
d'his horse is to carry the man back 
and forth and do some cultivating I 
should feed him about six quarts of oats 
per day and a little dry hay in addition. 
I think a ivorking horse should have some 
dry fodder. This man has the right idea 
The R. N.-Y. can a.ssist. but it cannot 
dictate or .settle things. 
IIoxiE Rioiits. —f'ince we have advo¬ 
cated the interests of the sheep as against 
the cur dog several dog men have been 
growling at us. Among others Mr. .lohn 
Gormly, of Pennsylvania, has no use for 
a sheep. lie says the dogs are worth far 
more than the sheep. Here is a sample of 
his argument: 
MHiy should the whole State be incon¬ 
venienced because sheep people are lazy? 
It takes no sage to understand that the 
country dog saves projierty every year 
for each farmer of nuiny times the value 
of all the sheep in the State. To police 
each farm as well as the dog does the 
work could not be done b.v two men— 
one for night and one for day duty at a 
total cost of .$<} per day for each farm, or 
$1,800 per year per farm. What safety 
has any farm but in its faithful dog? 
Really to be fair, the State should pay for 
the police work the farm dog does. 
He says if the dog tax goes up yon 
cannot buy poultry or eggs because 
thieves will take all the poultry. In our 
counti’y dogs kill and steal chickens and 
eat eggs when they can find them. Now 
we have three dogs on the farm and I 
claim they luive rights which the public 
should respect. I also claim that the 
dog’s rights are home rights. He has no 
business off his owner’s farm. Our dogs 
stay at home. They hunt woodchucks and 
vermin on our own farm and seem to 
know our boundaries and more than pay 
their way in service. I grant that some 
dogs do police duty, but that is a home 
joh, and if a dog attends to it he never 
will kill sheep. The dogs which roam at 
night and do damage on my farm are not 
at police duty, and have no business on 
my property. I am taxed heavily every 
year to pay for damage and loss done hv 
people who get drunk or by thieves and 
other criminals. As for the State paying 
for dog protection—that is a new one. I 
know a man who keeps six useless dogs 
which are .seldom fed at home. The 
State ought to pay this man about as 
much !is it pays the Governor! I shall 
not argue any such proposition as the 
claim that dogs are worth in to society 
than sheej). I am not a dog hater. The 
dog has his rights, hut they are home 
rights. I think the roaming dog is a 
menace, and I think a strong dog law will 
cut out the curs and keep the honest dogs 
at home—where they belong. ii. w. c. 
That Skunk Dog 
Father asked me to write this note in 
partial answer to the question about a 
dog for catching skunks, on page .ol. 
His brother at one time raised shepherd 
dogs. By accident there was a litter of 
pups of the cross mentioned in this ques¬ 
tion, part foxhound and part shepherd. 
Two of the pups were so ugly it was not 
even safe for their master to go near 
them, so they had to be killed. The 
others were useless for any purjiose what¬ 
ever. E. .s. K. 
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(486) 
Plain Talk 
by a Big Man 
“Less than 40% of the land in the count^^ is 
reasonably well cultivated; less than 12% yields 
maximum returns. We had better frankly face 
the fact that we are relatively inefficient, take 
Stock of our shortcomings and earnestly seek the 
remedy,” says Sec’y Houston, U. S. Dept. Agriculture. And, the remedy? 
Better tillage. Liberate plant food, conserve moisture and aerate the Soil, by 
thorough pulverizing with 
Disk Harrows 
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3924 Main Street Higganum. Coon. 
