•Uhe RURAL NEW-YORKER 
1347 
Winter on the Hills 
Isolation and Loneliness Must be Overcome 
N the back-to-the-lander’s vision of the farm there 
is apt to be but one season—the good old Sum¬ 
mer time. He pictures seed time and harvest and 
fancies himself about his midsummer task with all 
nature striving to conceal the drudgery of life, or 
at least to deck it with sunshine and llowers. If the 
thought of Winter threatens his dream, it is quickly 
dismissed; what is the farm but a place of growing 
things, a place where calves and chickens romp, 
where heart-breaking competition with one’s fellows 
ceases and favors need be asked only of a generous 
earth? 
Perhaps no one deserves well of his fellow men if 
he attempts to show any other side of farm life. He 
certainly Avill not earn popularity, for the popular 
ones are those who strew the flowers of Imagination 
over mud. and speak of sweat only as perspiration. 
Rut there are two seasons upon every farm, and the 
dreariness of Winter must be reckoned with. It is 
the season that tests a family’s fitness for farm life. 
If it is a thing of dread, cast¬ 
ing its shadow over the entire 
year, a time only of lonesome 
isolation, of shrinking from the 
winds and longing for a return 
of the Summer sun, unhappy in¬ 
deed is the family that has to 
endure it. 
It is upon the women of the 
farm family that Winter bears 
most heavily. This is particu¬ 
larly true on the hill farm, the 
farm from four to seven miles 
from the country vHlage that 
holds about all of the opportunity 
for social intercourse that the 
community affords. A generation 
or two ago these hill farms had 
their own common interests. ’I'hey 
supported large families whose 
children filled the distiict schools, 
and whose teams overfiowed the 
country meeting-house sheds. 
These families asked little of out¬ 
side sources of recreation. Rut 
these children have left the hills, 
and have taken with them much 
of the old social life. District 
schools have become primary 
schools for the present genera¬ 
tion, and few country meeting¬ 
houses now bear Sunday witness 
to anything but the wide disper¬ 
sion of the children of their 
builders. 
These changes are felt most 
keenly when Winter makes coun¬ 
try roads dillicult and out-of-door 
life impossible. To many a farm 
wife they mean Aveeks of prac¬ 
tical isolation, and a home be¬ 
comes almost a prison. The men 
with their teams may meet neighbors daily, and 
make frequent trips to the village, but woman’s 
duties lie within the home, and there, for the most 
part, she must stay. The daily round permits little 
variation; meals must be prepared, clothes wa.shed, 
ironed and mended, and the never-ending housework 
ceaselessly performed, and this without the cheer 
that comes with the life-giving sunshine or the tonic 
of a change of scene and occupation. 
Fortunate now the family in which there are chil¬ 
dren to bring fresh views of life to those whose own 
outlook has become stale. Perhaps, after all, that is 
the secret of the old-time farm home cheer. These 
homes had children, if little else; children for whom 
the phonograph is a poor substitute. If the would- 
be back-to-the-lander, who thinks that he sees inde¬ 
pendence and comfort upon these low-priced, and 
often excellent, hill farms, can take with him the 
vision into the future which is seen only through 
children’s eyes, he may afford to give up social habits 
and opportunities whose hold he probably little real¬ 
izes, but if he and his wife have reached middle age 
and must face the decline of life alone, they should 
know what Winter on the hills may mean to those 
accustomed to a softer life before committing them¬ 
selves to an undertaking which can so easily result 
In disappointment and loss. m. b. dean. 
The “ Cut-Over Lands 
N page 3118 you give a discuf5sion of th letter 
of the Secretary of the Interior regarding the 
providing of lands for our returning soldiers. I be¬ 
lieve this is a move in the right direction, provided 
the returning soldiers are given a clear understand¬ 
ing of what kind of a pi’oblem they are going up 
against. I believe there is a survey being made to 
classify the lands available for such uses. A large 
percentage of such lands will be in the logged-oH 
land class, and it is that class of land I am familiar 
with. The greatest source of information we have 
had in the past was from people who have had such 
lands to sell. We have had very little information 
from those who actually cleared and developed these 
lands. There is one problem that I have never seen 
discussed in print that is largely a deciding factor 
in the success or failure of one who settles on a new 
piece of land. If these soldiers decide to settle on 
one of the pieces of land irrovided by the government 
they will come into a locality where young women 
are scarce, and their prospects of getting a wife are 
small, and I can speak from experience that doing 
your own cooking and housework while trying to 
put a piece of land in shape is very discouraging, to 
say the least. If all this land is settled by returned 
.soldiers it will be a laud of bachelors and very few 
The Cuts in a Side of Beef. Fig. 6Jf2. 
homes. I would suggest that they who are at the 
head of this movement of providing land for the 
soldiers call a conference of, say, three persons from 
each class of land they M.st. The members of this 
conference to be one married man who has been mar¬ 
ried since settling on such land, and one bachelor 
who has made a success or who is in the way of 
making a success, and one county agriculturist or 
agent. These people in conference to make sugges¬ 
tions for a bulletin that will instruct the prospective 
soldier land-owner in the conditions he will be up 
against and his chances of winning out, and to make 
suggestions that will help remedy any problems pre¬ 
sented. I think in all fairness to the soldiers they 
should get this information from some actual settlers 
and not from such sources as we have had in the 
past. If they understand what they are going up 
against there will be fewer failures, and we don’t 
want failures in this country. It is bad for the man 
and the locality. john t. liegel. 
Washington. 
Winter Work on Fruit Farms 
It seems that everyone who lives in the country, when 
in trouble or doubt, rushes to The R. N.-Y. for its solu¬ 
tion. I am no exception. I am a young man, a gradu¬ 
ate from one of New York State’s secondary agricultural 
schools, and have been working on the farm for one year. 
At school I majored in poultry husbandry, and for elec¬ 
tive subjects I filled the rest of my time in animal hus¬ 
bandry and fruit growing. At present I am working in 
the heart of the Western New York fruit belt. The one 
and only specialty is apple growing, and during the 
Winter everything in their business is at a standstill 
except for pruning the trees whe^ the weather permits. 
Is it not possible to diversify the farming enterprise so 
that there is money coming in during the Winter a.s 
well as Summer and Fall? This habit is not practiced 
around here. Is it not economical? Could not the 
farmers have a good-sized flock of poultry on the farm? 
A few fatten .steers during the Winter, and in those 
cases two or three steers will be the most on a hundred- 
acre fr.rm. Then there will be two or three cows and 
five or six horses, and that is all the live stock on the 
farm. When manure is required for the farm it is 
bought in carload lots, and when it gets here the liquid 
excrement is all dried out and it is like adding so much 
straw. Has live stock or poultry to a large extent on a 
large fruit farm been tried and failed ? ' A. e. s. 
HE problem in connection with the idle period in 
the Winter i.s a real one. We think it is one of 
the weaknesses of the system of farming in the fruit 
belt. A large portion of the fruit growers do not 
want any Winter work, as they think they work hard 
enough during the Summer to be entitled to a little 
rest in the Winter. Again, the system of farming is 
not so arranged that it provides sufficient Winter 
work. 
We understand that the farmers in the Genesee 
Valley and around Ratavia have solved this ques¬ 
tion by introducing the feeding of cattle and sheej) 
in the Winter time. This is a good solution to the 
problem. There is, of course, the 
possibility of introducing poultry 
here, although poultry work con¬ 
flicts with fruit growing rather 
severely in the Summer time. 
Moreover, poultry does not pro¬ 
duce as much manure as .sheep 
or steer feeding, adding much 
more value to the latter. 
In our own ca.se we find hogs 
profitable. Swine will take care 
of themselves. With self-feeders, 
running water and forage crops, 
they will require less care than 
most other stock, and at present 
prices the outlook for pork is 
good. We would like to have 
fruit growers tell us why they 
do not plan for more Winter 
work with live stock. 
Market for “Cat-tails” 
N page 1161 F. O. U. inquires 
concerning a market for cat¬ 
tails. I know of no economic use 
for cat-tails, but for a good grade 
of flag there is quite a demand 
both for barrel work and chair 
making. In this locality (the 
lower Genesee Valley) two va- 
I’ieties of flags are marketed, 
termed by flag-cutters “soft flag” 
and “hard flag.” The soft flag is 
light green in color, and is the 
only kind used for chairs so far 
as I know. Only the part above 
the solid butt is used, and this 
should be four feet or more in 
length, cut before the frost 
touches it. and thoroughly dried. 
Considerable care is neces.sary in 
drying to prevent mildew, black spots or undue 
bleaching, any of which render the product unsuit¬ 
able for rush seating. It is preferable to retain the 
natural green coloi’, but a nice bright straw color 
will sell almost as readily. Of course, mildew, spots, 
or excessive bleaching impair the strength as well as 
the appearance. 
The entire flag, both hard and soft, is used some¬ 
what for large casks and is known as “long lag,” but 
its principal use in tight cooperage is confined to the 
lower portion and is known as “coopers’ butts.” 
These are cut after the flag has its growth, as, if cut 
earlier, they will be soft. About the first of Septem¬ 
ber is early enough to start cutting butts, but they 
can be cut all Wixiter where conditions permit. They 
should be 32 inches long and anything over, but not 
much under one inch in thickness, and must not be 
vormy. The outer leaf on each side is discarded 
and this u.sually reveals the worm holes if worms are 
present. Rutts should be solid the entire 32 inches 
to be of good quality. They also must be thoroughly 
dry, but the extreme caution so essential in curing 
chair flag is not necessary. They are sold in bundles 
27 inches in circumference one foot from the large 
end, and used to bring 12 to 15 cents per bundie. 
It might be inferred that after cutting chair flag 
the lower portion could be cut for butts, but usually 
I think this is impractical, as after the top is cut the 
center of the butt grows out quite fast, and the result 
Is a soft, spongy butt of little or no value. 
Some nurseries are glad to get the tops of both 
hard aud soft flag as a substitute for rye straw in 
