1376 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
December 14, lOlS 
Chinese Cabbage 
This is a comparatively new crop for 
our home gardeners, and many people are 
not yet acquainted with its good qualities 
as a garden crop for food. Chinese cab¬ 
bage i.s also known as pe-tsai or wongbak. 
This crop grows best in a cool, moist 
sea.son. It will generally do very w'ell 
as a Spring crop if sown very early, so 
that it matures before hot weather, which 
.spoils the quality for food and causes the 
I)lants to run to seed prematurely. It 
should bo sown very early, at least before 
the latter part of March in the latitude 
of St. LouLs. Still better, it may be 
started about the middle of February uu- 
dei- gla.ss, and transplanted to the garden 
before April 1. The young plants, as well 
as the matured heads, are resistant to 
cold, and will stand freezing weather. 
The seedling plants may be handled in 
the same way as cabbage plants. The 
planting distance is in rows 24 inches 
apart, thinning the plants to .stand six 
inches apart in the row. As the .seed 
germinate very vigorously, the seed may 
be planted tliinly. Kieh, finely prejiared 
soil is desirable, but a gowl moisture sup¬ 
ply is more essential. This crop grows 
faster than any other vegetable which 
the writer is acquainted with. It pro- 
Pc-tsai or Chinese Cahbage 
duces a tremendous bulk on a small area, 
and is quite hardy and easy to grow. 
'I'lie best season for Chinese cabbage is 
the Fall. Seed may be sown in the gar¬ 
den during August, and as late as Sep¬ 
tember 15 in Central Missouri. It devel¬ 
ops to perfection during the cool moist 
weather of the late Fall season. The 
jilants can be used from October 1 to the 
last of Novembei’, leaving the heads 
standing in the open without protection. 
If the rows of Chinese cabbage were cov¬ 
ered with a light mulch of straw, they 
might remain green under the snow for 
some time. 
Chinese cabbage has been found desir¬ 
able crop for hotbeds and cold frames in 
the Fall and early Wintei-, sowing seed 
under glass about October 15 or later. 
The plants should stand 6x8 inches ai)art. 
Should be well watered, and will need 
little protection with sash until late in 
November. This crop should last till 
Christmas. It can also be grown in 
greenhouses if the temperature is kept 
below 65 degrees. Growing this vege¬ 
table as a cold frame crop in the Spring 
for early markets has been found quite 
profitable, sowing the seed in a hotbed or 
greenhouse about February 1 and later 
transplanting to the cold frame. 
The only serious pest of Chinese cab¬ 
bage is the green louse or aphid, which 
also attacks cabbage and many other 
vegetables. It is ab.solutely controlled by 
spraying the under sides of the leaves 
with some tobacco preparation, such as 
Black Leaf 40, diluted at the rate of one 
teaspoonful per gallon of w’ater. 
This vegetable has various uses. In 
the Spring the plants do not make very 
solid heads, so are generally used simply 
as “greens.” When the plants are well 
headed, as they generally are when 
grown in a cool season, the inner leaves 
are white, very tender and of good flavor. 
They may be used for salad, like head 
lettuce, or cut up for use as cold slaw, 
using the outer leaves of the plant as 
greens, or the whole plant may be cooked 
like cabbage. The big white leaf stalks 
are as tender as the leaves, and are not 
stringy except in hot weather. They 
should be eaten with the rest of the plant. 
The genei-al flavor is like that of cabbage 
or Brussel sprouts, but the strong taste 
and odor so familiar in cabbage is lack¬ 
ing, so that people who possess particu¬ 
lar tastes and object to ordinary cabbage 
may be very fond of the Chinese cabbage, 
either as a cooked vegetable or as salad. 
The plants wilt rather quickly after 
cutting, unless kept in a cool place, where 
they will remain fresh for a week. The 
plants will remain fresh a little longer if 
l)ulled with the roots on, instead of cut¬ 
ting at the surface of the ground. Gener¬ 
ally it is best to have the Chinese cabbage 
grown in one’s own garden so that the 
heads can be cut as needed for use. A 
row .30 feet long will provide ample sup¬ 
ply for a family that is fond of green.s, 
salad and cabbage. 
This crop shows the good results of 
acclimatization to new localities. It is 
now much more satisfactory than it was 
when first tried in the East a few years 
ago. Seed saved from plants which run 
to seed in the .Spring have been found of 
excellent quality when saved and planted 
in the same garden for crop.? in succeed¬ 
ing years. A good seed stock, when ob¬ 
tained, should be carefully kept. Seed 
several years old germinates readily on 
account of the great vitality and vigor 
of growth which this plant possesses. 
Many failures have resulted from at- 
temi)ts to grow the Chinese cabbage as a 
late .Spring and Summer crop. With a 
better understanding of its seasonal re¬ 
quirements there is no reason why it 
should not be grown much more exten¬ 
sively, especially by home gardeners, to 
whom it is most valuable because of its 
fast growth and the tremendous bulk 
produced on a small space. As a late Fall 
salad, Chinese cabbage ha.s been found 
most successful and will fill a long-felt 
"W ant. j. T. KOSA. 
Mi.ssouri. 
Experiments with An “Electrifier” 
I was very much interested in the de¬ 
scription of the “electrifier” on page 
13.3.3. It bears out some of the conclu- 
.sions I had reached in working along this 
line with garden vegetables. I made my 
“electrifiers” differently, however. 
For instance, I made one “electrifier” 
out of a common 15-foot bean pole, to 
which I tied on some stranded clothes¬ 
line wire frayed out at the top. and at¬ 
tached to the zinc of a worn-out dry cell 
for a ground. This I stood up in the 
center of a popcorn patch about one rod 
square in which I planted four varieties 
of popcorn—red, blue, white and yellow. 
It just happened that I stood my “elec¬ 
trifier” under a telephone wire, which 
may have helped (I don’t know), but I 
do know that I grew some of the biggest 
popcorn that year around the pole that 
we ever saw. Some of the white and yel¬ 
low ears were eight and nine inches long. 
The effect of the pole on the whole patch 
was very marked, diminishing with the 
distance from the pole, and the general 
appearance of the whole patch was like a 
tent; the outside rows of corn being the 
usual popcorn height. That in the center 
became nearly as high as the pole, 10 or 
12 feet high, but you probably will not 
believe this, so I suppose discretion 
should have prompted me to shut up on 
this point. Before the stalks were thor¬ 
oughly mature, however, a big windstorm 
flattened the patch. 
Similar poles seem to have a very good 
effect on strawberry plants, etc. The 
fruit seems to be larger and very much 
SNveeter. I made another type of “elec¬ 
trifier” for a TOW of peas. I used about 
the same material as for the other experi¬ 
ment, only in this case I raveled out the 
lower end of the cable, dividing it into 
two parts, carrying these two parts along 
about 20 inches above a row of peas. 
The result in this case was not so pro¬ 
nounced. but the peas in this case grew 
about six inches higher under the wire 
and a little beyond, and were thriftier.. 
A few picked from this portion of the 
patch and served to a visiting cominks- 
sion merchant still cause him to talk of 
their goodness. However, we must re¬ 
member in this case that city peas don’t 
have the flavor that those right out of a 
garden do. 
Last Winter I shocked the local mer 
chant by buying 50 %-in. iron rods, to 
which I had sharpened copper wires sol¬ 
dered on at the top and spread out in 
cluster. These I set up in a young apple 
orchard, but I cannot say that I got such 
effect from the use of them that I could 
actually prove them a benefit, but the 
trees near them certainly bore fine and 
highly colored fruit. I shall consider the 
experiment pretty thoroughly proved next 
Fall, but I am expecting these trees to 
bear more heavily, to have larger and 
better colored fruit, than their neighbors. 
Beports on European experiments lead 
me to expect this, at least, and also that 
these trees will ripen their fruit earlier. 
I hope they will. If the experiment 
proves worth while, one could well afford 
to give each tree in the orchard its 
“lightning rod.” 
Thei'e is another phase to this also, you 
know. France uses great lightning rods 
in its fields to ward off hail. Hail doesn’t 
go well with fruit. If these “electrifiers” 
would accomplish both purposes they 
would prove a wonderful adjunct to our 
Eastern orchards. H, T. demorest. 
Orange Co., N. Y. 
about four quarts to the acre of beans 
and from 10 to 12 quarts of corn, using 
the common planter. The land, if sour, 
will need lime to get best results. With 
us the beans stood the wet better than 
the corn ; in some places where the corn 
practically all drowned out there was a 
fine stand of beans. They grew from 18 
to 36 inches high and harvested with 
the corn without trouble to the harvester. 
Medium Green, Roosevelt and Black Eye¬ 
brow are the kinds which .seem to give 
the best results here. 
The Soy beans do not take kindly to 
the use of the weeder when they are just 
breaking ground. In 1918 not as many 
Soy beans were planted, as it was very 
hard_to get good seed. One local hotise 
got 500 bushels which were worthless, 
and it was too late to get more. Where 
the farmers have filled their silo.s part 
way with corn and the balance with Soy 
beans and corn they have seen a marked 
difference in the milk flow when there 
was a change in feeding from one to the 
other, and always in favor of the Soy 
bean-corn silage. g. vr. hazard. 
Vermont. 
Sweet Cornstalks for Horses 
We have sweet cornstalks, but no split- 
hoof animals to feed them to. We have 
to keep two or three through Winter, 
which are grained heavily, as they do 
long road driving all the time. Why are 
not sweet cornstalks good to feed to 
horses, especially if they are cut to not 
longer than 1% inch, for part of coarse 
fodder? Horses are very fond of them. 
Many people say cornstalks^ are apt to 
produce worms. Why cannot* they be fed 
sparingly with good hay. or other good, 
coarse fodder, with something to counter¬ 
act the bad effects of said stalks? Some 
horses are apt to have colic if allowed to 
eat a great deal of cornstalks. Will you 
give whatever information you can on this 
subject? Stalks are worth a great deal 
more to me to feed, with hay at over $30 
per ton, than to sell said stalke at four 
to five cents per bundle. c. B. F. 
Schenectady, N. Y. 
On our own farm we arc now feeding 
sweet cornstalks to five horses for half or 
a little more ^ of their entire roughage. 
During the Winter we have at times used 
such stalks for the entire roughage, but 
would advise about half hay. \1^en feed¬ 
ing such stalks freely it is better to give 
a little oil meal or feeding molasses with 
the grain. This seems to prevent consti- 
E ation and frees the horse of worms. We 
ave tried all sorts of plans for feeding 
these stalks and now feed them whole. 
The horses eat the leaves and upper part 
of the stalks, leaving the butts. When 
the dry stalks are cut the horses nose the 
mass over too much in picking out the 
softer parts. We have had horses cut 
the mouth and gums on the sharp edges 
of cut dry stalk.s. Shredding is better, 
but there is little gained unless the cut 
stalks are softened by steaming. 
“What did you read while you were 
conv.alescing?” “The ‘German Invasion of 
Belgium’.” “Did you think that an appro¬ 
priate book for a person in your condi¬ 
tion?” “Yes. The more furious I got the 
stronger I felt.”—Melbourne Australas¬ 
ian. 
“And what is his name to be?” asked 
the minister at the baptizing, as he took 
the young babe from his mother’s arms, 
the father being absent on duty in France. 
“We’ve decided,” said she tremulously, 
^n .Tohn Woodrow Pershing Wilt^on 
Wood.” “Dear me,” said the officiating 
divine, and stammering on further, “well, 
well, then have the sexton supply us with 
a little more water.—Credit I^ost. 
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Soy Beans in Vermont 
I noticed G. E. C.’s question on page 
1318; also the answer, which does not 
correspond with the results we got in 
this county (Chittenden). lu 1917 there 
were about 3,000 acres of Soy beans 
planted in this county, all of them in the 
row with the silage corn. The experi¬ 
ment station gave the average yield at 
about four tons to the acre, with a value 
per ton of twice the corn. These were 
inoculated at the time of planting and 
mixed with the corn iu the planter, using 
Do yon raise com? 
Oar book “Corn 
The Foundation of 
Profitable Farm¬ 
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help you. 
More Money 
From Vegetables 
“Potatoes: A 
Money Crop” is 
a worthwhile 
farm hook for 
all potato 
growers. 
There is money in growing vegetables but it 
takes knowledge and skill to get it. Experience 
is invaluable—nothing can take its place. But ex¬ 
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Back up your own experience with that of hundreds of other 
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Better Vegetable Growing 
99 
You 11 find It helpful. It tells how to select the right kind of soil for the 
different crops and pick out the best plant foods. There are new sugges¬ 
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every important Vegetable from Artichokes to Turnips. The ••Planting 
and Reference Table^' is a valuable guide in planning next season’s work 
and ordering the right kind and amount of seed. While the book is in¬ 
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If you tell us the timck crops which you raise your copy will be mailed FRFF 
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