7*e RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
1000 
Argument Against The “Boarder Farm 
11 
U SUROFITABLE LAND.—For years now we 
have had the anti-boarder-cow campaign. We 
have the swat-the-rooster movement every Summer. 
The effort to rid the flock of the loafer hen is un¬ 
remitting. When we get an unprofitable hired man, 
we do not cleave unto him. Oh. no; on the contrary, 
we give him the run—if there is another to be 
found. But the poor, unprofitable farm seems in 
another class. One seldom, if ever, sees the advice 
given to can it, and go hence from there. No, one 
sees instead articles telling how to bring such farms 
up to a reasonable production. How by putting on 
lime and fertilizer and manure and time and tillage, 
rue can get a crop. I am going to take the other 
side. 
THROWING AWAY WORK.—I feel that good 
tanning is thrown away on a poor farm. I am now 
farming 360 acres, which varies from as good soil 
as lies outdoors, to land, the only value of which 
is to hold the world together. There is land on this 
place which is not as good as so much sky. It often 
tains out of the sky. When one has a farm that is 
mostly such soil, he has a boarder farm. It may be 
urged that this land would be all right if it was 
handled right. I started in with a run-down farm 
of 140 acres. None of it would raise a good crop. 
It has practically all had the same 
treatment. The best fields on it will 
now raise four tons of hay to the acre 
in a favorable year. I can raise 75 
hu. of oats to the acre or 95 bn. of 
shelled corn or 40 bu. of wheat on these 
best pieces if the year happens to be 
extra favorable. I have had as high 
as 330 bu. of potatoes to the acre. At 
the very same time, with the same 
treatment and with the same seasons, 
I get 10 bu. of oats to the acre on other 
pieces, or one-half load of hay to the 
acre, or 50 bu. of potatoes. Corn on 
some of this land makes a good stalk 
growth, but lias only nubbins on it. 
This land is poor sand. I could raise 
melons on it. but what would I do with 
*20 acres of melons? If I wanted to 
manure it heavily enough, I could get 
better crops, but putting on if40 worth 
of manure to get $40 worth of crops 
never did appeal to me. It is too much 
like going to the bank and swapping 
dollar bills for silver. Now I am not 
going to say much more about this 
land on my farm, because it is in with 
a lot of good land, and one must take 
farms as they come, as far as natural 
advantages go. What I am going to 
speak of is farms that consist largely 
or exclusively of such miserable soil. 
ABANDONED FARMS.—We hear a 
lot about abandoned farms on tin* hills 
of Southern New York and Northern 
Pennsylvania. There, seems to be a 
problem of getting people to go back onto these places. 
Why? Why not recognize facts and encourage tin* poor 
drudges that eke out a bare existence on these un¬ 
profitable farms to pull up stakes and go where they 
can make a living without killing themselves, their 
wives and their children? The soil on these places 
is Volusia silt loam. When the great ice sheet 
passed bver the land here, it. scraped off all tin' soil 
from these hills. Then when it receded it left a 
thin mantle of ground-up rock, and on these hills the 
rock that formed the soil was the shale that under¬ 
lies it. Being shale, there are no underground water 
courses dissolved out of it, as in limestone, to fur¬ 
nish uuder-drainage. The soil is full of pieces of 
rock that make it harder to work. The texture of the 
subsoil is too heavy to admit of good internal drain¬ 
age. The soil is too shallow to stand drought well, 
and by the same token in a wet time there is no 
place for the water to go. The lime content is so 
low that clover does poorly on it, even if one gets a 
fair stand. If to overcome this one decides to lime 
it. one has to haul the lime for miles up steep hills 
oyer rotten roads. 
POOR MARKETS.—As to markets, the cheese fac¬ 
tories that used to dot this region have been aban¬ 
doned like the farms. This leaves those that remain 
without a market on the hill; hence they have to 
make the trip to the valley, and because so many 
have left the hills, the roads are not improved. Even 
this would not be so bad if the farmers up there 
had enough milk to pay them to haul it, but since 
production is poor, the amount to sell is small, and 
that makes the marketing cost high. The result is 
to cause most of these men to get out of dairying. 
It is a pretty hopeless task all the way round, and 
the wonder is not that so many have left the farms, 
but that, so many stay. 
LABOR INCOME.—The’writer has been on such 
places, and has had access to a large number of 
farm records, many of which were from farms of 
this type. In comparing the returns from valley and 
bill farms, it was impossible, among all those at 
hand, to find one with a labor income of as much as 
$1,000. For valley farms many went up into the 
thousands, and I visited farms last year that had a 
labor income of over $10,000. One farm was found 
on the hills that had a labor income of $900, but 
most of them showed a minus labor income. Typical 
of the hill farm was one on which the owner worked 
the whole year with industry for nothing, and be¬ 
sides tHis, failed to make interest by $281. This was 
in 1917, the one year that prices of farm products 
were really high as compared with manufactured 
goods and the products of mines. If one could not 
make money that year on a farm, he never could. 
VALUATIONS.—In traveling through the State 
investigating farm conditions and farm prices the 
much more year in and year out. Besides that, one 
has all the other advantages for nothing. In reality 
the difference is far more, since on more Intensive 
crops, such as cabbage, corn, etc., the difference 
would figure to far more. 
LUMBER SITES.—It seems to the writer that 
the men who remain there on the hills are ruining a 
line site for the growing of lumber, all to their own 
disadvantage. They themselves could go out and 
with less work and with no worry at all make $700 
to $1,200 a year working for the valley farmer, either 
as hired help or as a manager. Or they could rent 
such a. farm on shares and get more from half of the 
product than from all of that of the hill farm. At 
the same time I his hill land would grow white pine 
or other lumber, and make a good return on the 
investment. Of course, such long-time projects 
should be taken over by the State, but I maintain 
that the hill farmer can let his farm lie idle and 
still do better than to stay and work it. 
Jefferson Co., N. Y. a. H. de graff. 
This fine-wooled sheep is under a cloud just non'. Foreign- wool, shoddy and 
hard limes have combined to put him■ out of business. That bog, however, 
■will lire to sec these, sheep conic bark to prosperity, if he will keep on, in 
hope, and. continue to breed, and select the best 
writer found that almost invariably the better farms 
were showing a yearly increase in valuation. The 
owners and prospective owners thought they were 
worth more than was asked for them a year or so 
before. On the other hand, the poor hill farms had 
been showing steady decreases in price for years, 
and these had been greater than usual in the later 
years. And even at that it was impossible to find 
buyers, hence the abandoned farms. After all. is 
not the farmer the best judge of whether it is eco¬ 
nomical to run a given farm? Is there not reason 
in his leaving the hills? The only added expense 
for running a good farm is interest on the valuation 
of Ihe land and higher taxes on it. Taking $100 an 
acre land and $10 an acre land for comparison, we 
find that if six per cent is paid for the money bor- 
owed, the cost is 60c in the one case and $6 in the 
other. School taxes are likely to be as high on the 
poor farm as the other, but the general and road 
tax will lie much larger on the good farm. It will 
not be nearly so much higher as the appraisal, how¬ 
ever, since the rate is higher in a poor town than 
in a good one on account of the fact that there is 
less total property to tax. It costs more per $100 
of the assesod valuation to have poor roads in the 
hills than good ones in the valleys. Assuming that 
with taxes, the poor land cost $1 an acre a year and 
the other $7. we have a cost of $0 for the advantages 
of living on the good land. This means less than 
a half-ton of hay, and no one who knows the land 
will maintain that tlie good farm will not yield this 
“Beating Up” A Cripple 
I had some lambs tied in my field waiting for the 
butcher to come and get them. A dog came along and 
attacked them on August 5. I went out and shot and 
killed the dog. The dog had a collar and 
license tag. I reported to the town clerk ; 
license number was 52,814. The owner 
of the dog has served a summons on me 
to appear before a justice of the peace. 
A few hours after I had shot the dog the 
owner came to my house. I was sitting 
on my porch, lie asked me if I had seen 
a dog around there. I said yes. He 
sat down beside me. Tic had 1 , with him 
two men and two women. As we sat on 
the porch side by side he hit. me in the 
face violently and kept right on hitting 
me several times. He tore my shirt and 
underwear. I tore away from him after 
a while; then his son helped him hold me 
until lie knocked me some more. I am a 
poor hill farmer, trying to keep a few 
sheep. This is the third time in the last 
six weeks the dogs have bothered the 
sheep. T was all alone when this hap¬ 
pened. I have no witnesses. Let me 
know what I can do to defend myself and 
stock. 
When I read Mr. Barrah’s discussion 
on auto hogs it makes me wish I was a 
good, rugged man. T only weigh 149 lbs., 
have a bad rupture: last Winter I had 
my ankle broken and my other leg hurt, 
badly. I am still a cripple, and all alone, 
hut a good, honest, hard-working farmer. 
Delaware Co., N. Y. o. F. 
The New York State statute provides 
any person may kill any dog while it is 
attacking, chasing or worrying any do¬ 
mestic animals having a commercial 
value or attacking fowls, or while such 
dog is being pursued therefor. The 
courts have held that though the killing 
of a dog thus engaged be justifiable, 
the owner of the sheep cannot trespass 
on the lands of the dog’s owner to com¬ 
mit the act. The court has also held 
that the killing of a dog while in the 
act of chasing and worrying sheep, be¬ 
ing justifiable, no recovery can be had for its value. 
In an action brought to recover damages for the 
killing of a dog, the defendant who seeks to justify 
such killing under the above section need not show 
that at the time the dog was killed he was chasing, 
worrying or wounding sheep: that protection of tin* 
statute extends to a case where a man had seen a 
dog chasing sheep in his pasture, followed the dog 
upon the adjoining premises and there shot him. 
Under the facts as slated by you, you were fairly 
within your rights when yon shot and killed the dog. 
However, any person who shall kill a dog under the 
provisions of Article 5B, of the laws of 1920, shall 
forthwith report in writing such facts to the town or 
<ily clerk or to a justice of the peace, police justice 
or other magistrate having jurisdiction, of the town 
or city in which such killing took place. Such report 
shall state the name and address of the person who 
killed tin' dog, a description of the (log killed, to¬ 
gether with the time, place and circumstances of the 
killing and the disposition made of the carcass of the 
dog. Such report shall be open to public inspection 
at any reasonable time during the regular office 
hours of the office in which they are filed. A person 
killing a dog under the provisions of this article 
shall dispose of the carcass. Any person failing to 
make a report shall be subject to a penalty of $5, 
to be recovered in an action brought therefor as pro¬ 
vided in this article. 
The New York State Legslature has made great 
progress in the last few years in the protection of 
