The RURAL, NEW-YORKER 
107/ 
A Farmer on the Teamsters’ Strike 
What is the matter with the Department of Foods 
and Markets, in regard to the present teamsters’ strike? 
Why don’t they get after your Mayor or the Governor 
and make them put a stop to the picketing going on by 
the strikers? After the farmers have paid enormous 
prices for help to raise the crops, are you city people 
going to let those crops rot in the cars while the com¬ 
mission men and the teamsters quarrel? If you do, 
5 on may rest assured that you will receive less food 
to quarrel over next year. Those teamsters don’t have 
to work if they don’t want to. But they have no right 
to say that other people shall not go to the wharves 
and warehouses and take away the stuff that they buy. 
The farmers pay their full share towards supporting 
.‘he State militia, and this seems to be a good place to 
use them. 
Of course, the farmers cannot say what your Mayor 
should do; but we can stop shipping stuff to your city. 
A young neighbor rented his father’s farm this Spring 
and hired a man at ,$50 a month with board. Among 
other things, he got in a lot of early peas. He just 
began picking those peas, when word come of this 
teamsters’ strike. Of course, the peas had to be picked; 
but it was a rather discouraging prospect, as it costs 
about 75 cents a bushel to harvest peas, and put them 
in New York. This is besides the cost of growing. If 
this young fellow loses his peas, how much truck for 
the New York market do you think he will raise next 
year? The farmers are getting tired of working 16 
hours a day to raise food, while the city man works 
eight—and spends the rest of the time raising “trouble.” 
Madison Co., N. Y. j. grant morse. 
As for the action of the Foods and Markets 
Department, we fall back upon the oft-repeated 
text, “7 Ic is of age—ask him!" Mr. Morse expresses 
the exact feeling of the farmers who ship produce 
here. The strike of teamsters might have been 
settled two days earlier than it finally was if the 
commission men had shown any nerve. They were 
disorganized and frightened, and seemed to make 
little effort to protect the goods sent them for sale. 
If they had made any sort of a fight, they could 
have had protection. About the only real fighting 
was done by Mr. Niel Strome, who represented the 
Federation of Agriculture. He told the authorities 
that if they did not protect the farmers’ property 
he would go up and organize a regiment of farmers 
armed with shotguns to do police duty! After that 
there was fair protection. It was a case of wicked 
and cowardly “quitting” on the part of most of the 
dealers. A few strong men with any authority 
could have compelled the police to protect this 
property. The loss will reach at least $250,000, and 
under the circumstances farmers have little chance 
to recover damages. 
Defeat the Land Boom Scheme 
What is known as the Mondell bill, now before 
Congress, would appropriate $500,000,000 to start 
work at fitting wild land for the soldiers. It is 
proposed to spend this money at reclaiming desert 
and swamp land and large tracts now covered with 
stumps, from which the timber has been cut. These 
lands are now mostly owned by private parties or 
corporations who would be greatly benefited by 
their sale and improvement. This new land is not 
needed for the production of food. There is already 
land enough capable of cultivation to provide an 
abundance for any probable American population 
during the next 25 years. Give our present farmers 
labor, reasonable capital, fair chance in rhe mar¬ 
kets and good roads, and they will easily provide 
for the food situation. The land which it is pro¬ 
posed to “redeem” is far removed from the big cen¬ 
ters of population where food is most needed. 
Transportation from these distant points will be 
costly, and add to the present monopoly of the 
handlers. It is far better economy to have this food 
produced on farms nearer to these great cities 
where most of it can be shipped direct from the 
farm. We have already contracted a public debt 
of twenty-five billion dollars, and it is time to call 
a halt on expenses which do not represent a quick 
and sure interest-paying investment. The half 
billion now called for will be hardly a drop in the 
bucket before the proposed work is done. This 
money promptly invested in good roads so as to 
bring the farms right into connection with the main 
roads would pay far greater public interest, bring 
thousands of farms back into cultivation, increase the 
delivery of food, increase the value of farm land, 
and provide the needed work for soldiers. For these 
reasons we think the farmers in the older settled 
parts of the country should oppose this Mondell 
bill. Unfortunately the discussion has become sec¬ 
tional. The Far West and parts of the South, with 
their large tracts of waste land, naturally favor a 
scheme which will spend all this money in their 
territory. Just as naturall; the older settled sec¬ 
tions see a scheme for throwing millions of acres 
of new soil into competition with the older Eastern 
soil at a time when this new soil is not needed for 
feeding the nation. Let the East first recover from 
the frightful competition of the Government’s land 
policy just after the Civil War before placing heavier 
burdens upon our farming. The committee in charge 
of this bill will report it favorably to Congress, and 
prompt action will be needed in order to kill it. 
Fruit in Western New York 
It is hard to estimate just what the apple crop is in 
this locality. In ray own orchards I think I have at 
least a normal crop. I have a full crop of Maiden 
Blush and King; I think better than half a full crop 
of Rhode Island Greening and about 25 per cent of a 
full crop of Baldwin. I have a few odd varieties that 
appear to be a full crop, and I think on the whole I 
shall not have as many as I had last year, but still I 
think I shall have 75 per cent of what I had last year, 
or. in other words, last year I had 3,700 barrels, and 
I think I can figure on 2,500 this year. The majority 
of the growers say they practically all dropped oft', or 
did not set. A few of the best growers have apples; 
in fact, I think all of them have. On the whole I 
should think from what I can learn 25 per cent of a 
or* p would be plenty high; still, the foliage is very 
heavy, and when growers come to harvest them there 
may be more than they anticipate, as I find they are 
on the inside of the trees. We have had apple scab 
very severely, for we had so much rainy weather. The 
last three weeks have been very hot and dry, and scab 
has diminished rather than increased. 
I think (these are only my own thoughts in the 
matter) when we should have sprayed for pink spray, 
which is a very important spray on Greenings, the 
ground was so wet that it was almost impossible to 
draw spraying material into the orchards, and those 
that did not get the pink spray on I think lost their 
crop. Right in this immediate vicinity most of us dust, 
and we were able to dust our orchards. I never put 
so many applications of dust, or anything else, on my 
orchards as I have this year. Apples are growing very 
fast, and they are getting large enough now so they 
can be seen more clearly. In fact, all crops I never 
saw grow as fast as they have the past three weeks. 
The weather has been exceedingly hot. in fact, rather 
August weather, the ground was full of moisture, and 
they have grown very rapidly. 
The peach crop is a good‘ deal like the apple crop, 
and is hard to estimate what we have got. No one 
has a full croj>. and from my observation the only ones 
who have peaches are those who make a specialty of 
growing peaches, for the others were not able to culti¬ 
vate-or spray for the leaf curl when it ought to have 
been done. There are so many trees that were killed 
in 1918 that it is hard to estimate how many peaches 
we shall have this year, but I do not think it will 
exceed 25 per cent, and I sometimes think that is even 
high. A few have had to thin, but the most of them 
are too thin now. 
Cherries are a total failure, and pears are nearly so, 
perhaps 10 per cent of a crop. Strawberries have 
yielded pretty well, and raspberries are looking fine. 
We have had a very heavy rain during the last two 
days, which I think will secure the crop for the rasp¬ 
berries. W. P. ROGERS. 
Wayne Co., N. Y. 
Who is to Produce Food ? 
In the evolution of time, and as the days pass by, 
man must change his habits and his customs to conform 
with the new order of things. The world must eat. the 
people are bound to be fed, and the great question of 
the day is who is to produce the food. Naturally the 
answer is the farmer. In fact, it falls on the farmer 
if it is to be done at all. but with the farmer insisting 
his load be lightened there must be more farmers. No 
farm paper stands as close to the farmer as Tiie R. 
N.-Y. ; it is doing faithful work in behalf of the man 
who grows the crops and in encouraging him to do his 
best. The farmer is learning he is not getting his share 
of the consumer’s dollar out of the food the world eats. 
Under the stress of war he has been stimulated into 
doing his best, but now that peace is slowly approaching 
a complete evolution must come in the farmer’s stand¬ 
point of living and carrying on his business. The 
farmer of the future will not work IS hours a day in 
order to make a living for his family and that of the 
hired man, in addition to contributing to the general 
supply going on the table of the factory and city 
workers who put in only eight hours, and on the tables 
of the idle and the rich, unless he is paid in proportion 
to the service he renders. 
A man who raises truck in this land of milk-making 
is a rarity. A short half mile from Spruce Farm stands 
an old homestead, long since passed out of the hands 
of the original owner. The soil is light and formerly 
did not produce enough to the acre to winter a goat. 
Fertilizer and limestone have worked wonders with it. 
This Spring it again changed owners. The present 
occupant, Jacob Vaimer, took as a legacy the improve¬ 
ments and various lines of production left him by his 
predecessor. In the list is a strawberry patch of per¬ 
haps two acres. Not being as successful raising straw¬ 
berries as I am geese. I drove over this morning. I 
saw rows of ISandy just loaded with fruit, ripe and 
wasting for the want of someone to pick them. In the 
city, five miles away, the consumer today is paying 30 
cents a basket for such as he can get, while here almost 
under his nose the finest fruit one can imagine is going 
to waste. 
Being invited by Mr. Yalmer to put in practice that 
co-operation one hears so much about these days I set 
myself to picking the amount I came to purchase, and 
in one hour had filled up a half crate. Can you beat it? 
When the town whistle blew for 12 o’clock and the 
Government’s siren on the opposite side responded I 
settled my bill, received my stipend for picking and 
unhitched my grandson of Joe Patchen, who also said 
it was noon, and the flies bad, and certainly did hike 
for home at a brisk pace. 
Of course this man has no choice; he had to take 
things as he found them, but in the years to come I 
doubt if he will plant a larger acreage of truck than 
he can care for and market, and someone else must 
make up the deficiency. What I mean is there must 
be more farmers. The next generation of farmers will 
be indifferent to the old wolf cry of the middleman 
that the people are starving; they will not fall on each 
other’s necks and weep, but more likely will crank up 
old Lizzie and go to town instead of pulling weeds all 
day in the hot sun to produce a crop from which the 
distributor will take a bigger volume of money in 10 
minutes than they get for their season’s work, and out 
of which must come labor costs, fertilizer, etc. Not 
so long ago I raised a nice crop of sweet corn and had 
the satisfaction of seeing it sold right in my presence 
for more than double the price I received. 1 did not 
blame the grocer for being smart, but I blamed mj .elf 
for not setting a higher price on it; or else feeding it 
to my old cows. GEO. E. howell. 
Orange Co., N. Y. 
Crop Prospects Near the Lake 
The present season has been very disappointing to 
the farmers of Western New York. The Winter was 
open, and gave a chance to catch up with many kinds 
of late Autumn work, and to get some work ahead. 
When plowing time came many had their work rather 
ahead of the season. Then it began to rain, and the 
soil, which had been rather dry, was too wet to work. 
Farmers who took every chance to get to work in the 
fields were not very far behind at the first of May. 
Those who waited for the ground to get in good condi¬ 
tion had done nothing. About the end of April came a 
cold wave with snow and sleet. The temperature went 
down to about 20 degrees. At this time apple buds 
were nearly open. The condition ranged from Northern 
Spy, which were only nicely swelling, to Duchess, which 
showed the ends of the leaves in the opening bud. Sour 
cherry buds were swelling, but not due to open for 
several days yet. Sweet cherries w*ere farther advanced. 
Peach blossoms were nearly open. Present conditions 
indicate that most of the sour cherry blossoms and a 
large part of the apple blossoms were so injured that 
they could not set fruit. Sweet cherries and peaches 
were not hurt so much. Northern Spy apples seemed 
to be hurt the least. 
After the freeze the wet weather continued. A day 
or two of clear sky would be followed by a few days of 
rain. We managed to get our corn in by May 20. which 
is about as late as there can be assurance of well ripened 
ears in this region. By taking every chance we managed 
to get the “pink spray” on about half the old orchard 
before the blossoms got too large. While the blossoms 
were open we had perfect weather, and the prospect was 
for a very large crop of fruit. As soon as the blossoms 
were well off we started the spray guns going, and 
got over the entire orchard before any rain. The blocks 
where the “pink spray” was not applied were so badly 
attacked by fungus that they were burned very seriously 
by the spray. This attack of scab caused a large part 
of the few apples set to fall off, so that now there is 
prospect of iess than a fifth part of the barrels that 
seemed promised when the blossoms opened. This con¬ 
dition seems general through Western New York. Sour 
cherries are also very light. We have very few, and most 
of those are stung by curculio. Our peach trees were 
mostly killed by the recent severe Winter, but the few 
left, although rather scattered, seem to have a fair set¬ 
ting of fruit. 
Many farmers were not able to plow for oats until too 
late to plant corn, and most of them put the corn in so 
late that there will probably be much soft corn, and very 
little that is fit for seed this season. The weather for 
the last few weeks has been very warm, so that the few 
fields of corn which were put in early are very large for 
the season; we have corn (June 29) more than two 
feet tall over much of the field, while those with clay 
ground or land not well drained have it only well out 
of the ground. The whole situation now may be 
summed up thus; Apple crop very light, probably less 
than one-fifth of last year; sour cherries very light; 
some pears; peaches promise a fair crop; sweet cher¬ 
ries a fair crop; oats short; wheat fair to good; corn 
very late; beans short; hay. a very lai-ge crop where 
the meadows were not pastured late last year; very 
poor where pasturing was done. ALFRED c. WEED. 
Wayne Co., N. Y. 
Up-State Farm Notes 
FARMERS’ BUSINESS AND SOCIAL LEAGUE. 
—Farmers near West Sai’anae Lake have organized 
the Town of Franklin Impiwement Association for 
the purpose of improving methods of agriculture and 
to promote social activities among the 82 members. 
Meetings are held every other Saturday night and a 
field day and picnic will be held on July 26 in Paul 
Cass’s Grove at Yermontville. Six speakers will ad¬ 
dress the meeting, and a big attendance is expected. 
The association is devoting much attention to the 
raising of certified seed potatoes, for shipment to 
Southern points. It has also taken up the matter of 
marketing milk, and has sold all their milk and cream 
to a Morrisonville creamery, shipments being made 
three times a week. The association also has an offer 
from the Burlington Rendering Company for the 1919 
wool clip. The association started with 82 members 
and now hopes to secure 100. Members include fanners 
from Lake Kushaqua. Franklin Falls. Union Falls. Ver- 
montville. Sugar Bush, Bloomingdale, Gabriels and 
Saranac Lake. 
OWASCO CORN.—Corn is doing well during the 
dry weather. An Owasco farmer, Charles Riley, has 
corn 54 inches high that has been growing only 35 days. 
It is Luce’s Favorite, from certified Long Island*seed. 
Fanners are hastening the cultivation of corn and other 
crops, as haying is at hand and well under way in many 
sections. Old meadows have a light crop of hay, but 
new seeding is returning a good yield. The strawberry 
season is about over. Onondaga County growers dis¬ 
posed of their last pickiug at 10 cents a quart, as the 
market was crowded and loss of the fruit seemed likely, 
WILL SEAL GAS PUMPS.—Legislation vequmng 
the sealing of gas punxps from which tourists purchase 
fuel, also mox - e strict selling laws for ice dealers, will 
be fostered by the State Commission of Foods and 
Markets at the next session of the Legislature. De¬ 
fective gas pumps have been reported about the State, 
and fuel users want protection. At present ice dealers 
may sell by any method they wish, by weight or size. 
The sealers of the State held a conference in Albany 
this week when these things were discussed. Charles 
Quinn of Buffalo was elected chairman of the eon- 
fei - ence. 
NEW EDUCATION COMMISSION.—Frank D. 
Gilbert of Albany, chief of the law division of the State 
Department of Education, has been unanimously elected 
Deputy State Commissioner of Education by the Board 
of Regents, upon nomination by Dr. John H. Finley, 
Commissioner of Education. Mr. Gilbert sxicceeds Dr. 
Finegan, who resigned to head the Depai'tment of Edu¬ 
cation in Pennsylvania. Mr. Gilbert will have charge 
of the legal and legislative work of the department, 
sitting for the Commissioner in hearings and assisting 
in the administration of school laws. George M'. Wiley, 
chief of the division of examiners and inspectors of the 
department, will take charge of the educaticnxxl work 
forme id y in charge of Dr. Finegan, until necessary 
modifications to the appropriation bill make possible the 
permanent filling of the position. Mr. Gilbert was born 
in Chenango County in 1867, and has a salary of $6,000 
ii year. 
(Continued on page 1087) 
