RURAL NEW-YORKER 
146S 
— - - 1 
Garden and Poultry 
Notes From a Maryland Garden 
The lettuce in the frames is heading 
nicely, while we still have a great abun¬ 
dance in the open garden. The Hanson 
lettuce has its outer leaves reddened and 
tough, but the heart of the heads is still 
white and crips. The garden now has its 
Winter blanket of fresh manure. The 
rows of onions and lettuce are well 
mulched with this, and the lettuce has 
the dead Lima bean vines over it. We 
expect to keep some of the outside lettuce 
till Christmas. The manure makes not 
only an excellent mulch for the growing 
crops, but, being perfectly fresh, and 
hence not ready to feed plants, it will be 
rotted enough by Spring to do do this. 
Hence, as we can buy only fresh manure, 
the Winter blanket becomes an impor¬ 
tant matter. Then to save coal we are 
burning some hard wood and scatter the 
ashes daily on the garden, and when in 
Spring we add a heavy dressing of acid 
phosphate the garden will be in condi¬ 
tion to return big crops. 
At the recent meeting of the Vege¬ 
table Growers of America at Springfield, 
Mass., Sidney B. Haskell read a paper, 
“Can Vegetables be Grown Commer¬ 
cially Without Animal Manures?'’ All 
down the South Atlantic coast they have 
been so grown, and but for the fact that 
tliey could be so grow’n, this great indus¬ 
try would never have been possible. The 
speaker especially cited the practice on 
the Eastern Shore of Virginia, and showed 
the favorable influence of Winter legume 
cover crops in the hands of some 
growers, and seemed to think that the 
great crops of potatoes, sweet and Irish, 
were to a great extent due to this fact. 
But, unfortunately, the growers in Ac- 
comae and Northampton counties who 
grow Winter cover crops are the excep¬ 
tion rather than the rule. Really the 
only humus-making material used on the 
Eastern 'Shore of Virginia is the leaves 
and rotted trash from the pine woods 
spread on the land intended for sweet 
potatoes, and plowed under in Winter. I 
have long been familiar with the Eastern 
Shore counties of Virginia, for I was 
born there, and have often wondered at 
the lasting power of the rather thin and 
light soil under the old-time farming, for 
GO years ago the regular rotation there 
was corn one year and oats the next, year 
after year, and the oat stubble pastured 
after harvest. Now they keep no stock 
save perhaps a cow for family milk, jdow 
with a single horse and depend almost 
entirely on heavy applications of com¬ 
mercial fertilizer to make their sale crops. 
Then, instead of a recuperative crop, they 
plant corn after their early Irish potato 
crop to get all the fertilizer left by the 
potatoes, and in Winter the area of bare 
ground left in that mild climate, Avhere 
it is far more clear of frost than frozen, 
and in Spring the soil is as poor as ever, 
and needs heavier fertilization. But with 
all the happy-go-lucky methods and the 
spending of great sums for fertilizer’, the 
growers there have thriven, the country 
banks are overflowing with ca.sh. Some 
have got to sowing Crimson clover in the 
corn planted after potatoes, and this 
makes a cheaper source of food for the 
sweet potato crop than the trash of the 
pine forest. What that section could ac- 
com[)lish with better methods it is hard 
to say. But evidently commercial culti¬ 
vation of vegetable crops has proved 
profitable through the help of commercial 
fertilizers. And the same is true of the 
Norfolk section and all the trucking re¬ 
gion of the South Atlantic coast. 
And yet a combination of animal ma¬ 
nures and fertilizers also has proved prof¬ 
itable. One ® the largest trucking farms 
in North Carolina keeps a herd of about 
150 cows and runs milk wagons in the 
nearby city. They make large quantities 
of manure, and also use immense quan¬ 
tities of fertilizers, which are mixed in 
their own establishment. If the dairy 
did no more than pay expenses they would 
still keep it for the sake of the manure, 
since, being large growers of lettuce in 
frames, they have realized that an abun¬ 
dance of rotted cow manure is of great 
value for this crop, and helps to make 
the added fertilizer more available by its 
moisture-retaining ch.aracter. In fact, 
they claim that manure and fertilizers are 
both essential to profitable growing of 
lettuce, and that the best lettuce cannot 
be produced by either alone. To this I 
heartily agree. 
Several S('uthern correspondents want 
to know about planting early Irish pota¬ 
toes in December. Several years ago a 
southern seedsman tried to get farmers to 
do this. I tried it in North Carolina, and 
the result was that the potatoes would 
come up in the warm spells in Wintcij 
and if not at once covered with earth 
would get frozen off. Even as far south 
as North Florid.a I have seen these De¬ 
cember planted potatoes frozen down twice 
and made worthless. Better plant in late 
February or Marcb. December planting 
might do but for the warm sunny spells. 
In fact, it would be better northward, 
where the soil stays frozen, if well cov¬ 
ered and the soil heavily mulched. 
W. F. MASSEY. 
Seven Eggs from Six Pullets 
The following may be of interest to 
some of your readers who may doubt the 
ability of a hen to lay two eggs in one 
day. An egg-laying contest was a special 
feature at the Paterson Poultry Show, 
held during the week from Tuesday. Nov. 
20. to Saturday, the 24th. On Wednes¬ 
day. the 21st. a pen of my S. C. Rhode 
Island Reds, consisting of six pullets, 
which I had entered, laid S('ven eggs. 
They had laid six shelled eggs during the 
day, up to about nine o’clock at night, 
when one of them dropped a soft shell 
egg, making a total of seven for the day. 
I might add that an attendant looked 
thoroughly through the litter and nesting 
material of each pen each morning when 
feeding. My pen finished second in the 
contest and in November, 1916, a pen of 
mine took first honors. 
New Jersey. Thomas birchei.i.. 
Believes in the Chicken Business 
I heartily concur with S. H. K.. page 
1374, and am certainly imbued with the 
spirit of optimism in regard to the poultry 
industry for the future. High prices of 
feeds have induced those who have stuck 
to cull their flocks more closely, which, to¬ 
gether with the greater efforts to look 
after the small details, gives them a high¬ 
er percentage of egg yield than ever. This 
automatically is improving the run of 
stock on all commercial plants, and will 
■assure intending purchasers of eggs or 
baby chicks that they are getting the ; 
product of quality, of stock that have 
necessarily made good. 
The writer, who has made a living from 
the poultry business for 18 years, and has 
sliipped baby chicks successfully for 15 
years, is of the opinion that it is in order 
for the breeders to advance their prices 
for hatching eggs and baby chicks on the 
grounds of supply, demand and quality. 
New .Tor.sey. JOHN H. weed. 
Ailing Pullets 
Could you tell me what is the trouble j 
with two pullets I have? They seem to i 
be paralyzed in the right wing, and have 
little or no control over their legs. At ; 
times when they walk the toes turn under 
them; al.so. the neck sticks out to one 
side. They do not appear to be sick, as 
they have nice red combs and bright eyes. 
They do not eat much, howevex*, but will i 
eat all the green stuff given them. The 
coops are kept in a strictly sanitary con¬ 
dition. A. w. j. 
Ma.ssachusetts. 
Ordinarily, when doctors don’t know 
what ails a patient they treat him symp- 
tom.atically ; that is, they give something 
which they think will subdue the disquiet¬ 
ing symptoms and fervently hope will re¬ 
move the cause. I.et’s be honest and 
admit that we don’t know what ails these ^ 
pullets and treat them symptomatically. 
In the first place calomel is a good old 
standby. It has been sadly abused in the 
past, and very likely will be again ; or, to 
speak more accurately, those to whom it 
has been given have been abused. Never¬ 
theless. calomel is capable of doing a 
great deal of good and won’t do any harm 
if it is given intelligently. After all, it 
is the intelligence with which drugs are 
given that counts and makes all the differ¬ 
ence between rational therapy and quack¬ 
ery. Suppose you beg of your family 
physician two one-quarter grain calomel 
tablets; better get three, you’ll probably 
lose one; then induce each pullet to swal¬ 
low a tablet. Some hours later, follow 
the tablets—that is, if they went inside— | 
with a couple of teaspoonfuls of castor ; 
oil. The more of this latter you keep off 
the pullet’s shirt front the better your 
qualifications for a trained nui’se. I don’t 
know what will happen, but I hope that 
the pullets will get well. m. b. d. 
Winter Workers are Dry Shod 
When “U. S. Protected” 
Standing in icy puddles, plowing 
through the drifts, your feet are 
warm, dry and comfortable in 
U. S. Rubber 
Footwear 
This heavy service, double duty rub¬ 
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greatest, is more than a match for 
rough weather and hard knocks. Thus 
it is economical in the long run. 
Every pair carries the U. S. Seal — 
the trade mark of the largest rubber 
manufacturer in the world. 
It is your protection. For 
sale everywhere. Your 
dealer has just what you 
want or can get it for you. 
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New York 
U. S. Rubber. Fob!twe;^M 
1 . ^ 
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