The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
79 
Soy Beans in Indiana 
ROWING CERTIFIED SEED.—We have been 
growing Soy beans on our farm for over 10 
years, and thia in itself is proof that we think them 
a valuable crop. When we first started to grow 
them some of our neighbors complained that we were 
bringing something into the county that we would 
not be able to get rid of. Well, they were right 
More so than we thought, for we haven’t got rid of 
them. In fact, I think we will average Soy beans 
on every other farm in our county this year. A 
good portion of our beans have gone for seed each 
year, as we have gone to a great deal of trouble to 
make them pure, of high quality. We now have our 
seed certified each year. This work is lone by Indi¬ 
ana Corn Growers’ Association. 
HOGGING DOWN.—In our section of the country 
quite a bit of our corn is harvested by the hogs 
themselves. Just turn them in the field and let them 
go to it. This is where Soy beans come in. We 
plant about two beans to each hill of corn, and this 
furnishes the protein for the hogs; as 
Soy beans contain about 40 per cent 
protein this saves buying high-priced 
tankage. Tests in Indiana have 
proven that one bushel of Soy beans 
fed to hogs with about five to seven 
bushels of corn will save bushels of 
corn. On our farm we do not think of 
planting corn any more without Soy 
beans. However, our Experiment Sta¬ 
tion at Purdue has found that a min- 
eral mixture of 100 lbs. acid phosphate, 
100 lbs. wood ashes or fine ground lime¬ 
stone, and 10 lbs. salt, fed in a self- 
feeder, produces better results, as this 
overcomes the oil in the beans. Soy 
beans are excellent for hay if made at 
the proper time, and if proper care is 
taken of it it is equal to Alfalfa hay. 
AN OIL CROP.—In this county last 
year beans yielded from eight to 25 or 
30 bushels per acre. Our own crop 
averaged 22 bushels per acre. This is 
on soil that this year will produce from 
60 to 90 bushels of corn. As Soy beans 
contain from 15 to 20 per cent of oil, 
mills are being started in Indiana to 
extract this oil. The oil is used in 
paint, soap, salad oil, and, in fact, any¬ 
thing cottonseed oil is used for. Then 
the Soy bean cake is ground into flour 
or meal. The meal is being used for 
dairy cattle mostly. I was told by Mr. 
W. A. Ostrand, the Soy bean man at 
our Purdue Station, that it is almost 
impossible to buy it here, as Wisconsin 
dairy farmers have it all contracted 
for. The mills paid $1.35 per bushel 
for Soy beans last year. 
A SOIL BUILDER.—But most im¬ 
portant of all, Soy beans are a legume, 
and if properly inoculated will build 
up your soil in place of running it 
down. I think perhaps this is the 
thing that most impresses us with the 
Soy bean. I surely do advise other farmers to grow 
them for the sake of their soil, their stock (fur¬ 
nishing that much-needed protein), and for the sake 
of their pocketbook. When we started growing 
them no one knew anything about them, and thought 
we were crazy, but now almost every farmer in this 
community is growing them. 
Wells Co., Ind. Walters & pressel. 
Natural Storage for Apples 
N page 1523, H. S. B., Staunton, Va., asks about 
apples in natural storage. This is a subject 
that interests me. With him I should recommend 
the local cold storage house. Here conditions are 
different, and one man has built an apple storage 
house. Storage charges here are 25 cents per bushel 
to Jan. 1, and 10 cents per bushel after that. The 
storage is nine miles from his orchard, and in an 
opposite direction from his local market, where most 
of the apples produced here are sold. We are in the 
mining district of Virginia, Kentucky and Ten¬ 
nessee. 
Generally speaking, this apple house is 30x40 ft., 
of bank type; first floor room was of concrete. 
Along the front of the house are six air openings. 
These were connected with flues under the floor, 
which had an opening into the floor every 7 ft., or all 
the air could be let in directly in front on the floor 
level. These openings are controlled by sliding 
wooden doors. The air vents were in the ceiling of 
this room at the rear. Along the floor were 2x4’s on 
edge, running from front to back. Across these 
were 1x2 strips on which to stack the crates of 
apples. 
I visited the house twice in 10 days. The first 
time there was a temperature of 32°, the last time 
36°. The first time I visited the house the outside 
temperature must have been about 50°, and since 
then we have had very little if any freezing weather, 
even at night. The house has been empty some 
weeks, and no attention is paid to ventilating. 
The second floor of the house is on orchard level. 
This is of frame construction and has not been in¬ 
sulated yet. No forced draft has been used in cool¬ 
ing the storage room. I believe this would be a good 
investment though, especially when the fruit is com¬ 
ing in. The quicker the fruit is chilled the better. 
I doubt if a storage house like this will keep the 
fruit much after Christmas. Rather, I mean all the 
fruit will be ripe by then. Just how long it will hold 
up is another thing, depending on many conditions, 
such as where and how the fruit was grown, stage 
of ripeness when picked, especially care of handling 
the fruit, starting in with the picking, how quickly 
it is separated from the culls, and temperature. I 
think if jars or pans of water were in the storage 
room, or the floor sprinkled, it would help chill the 
fruit by its evaporation and keep the moisture in the 
fruit longer. 
I believe our North Carolina readers could send 
us some good information, and I would like to hear 
from them in detail. e. t. heermance. 
Virginia. 
What Kind of a Dog 
I WOULD like some advice in regard to the pur¬ 
chase and training of a good farm watchdog. I 
would like a dog that is safe for children; that will 
safeguard them and their mother; that will not an¬ 
noy or terrify harmless visitors; that will keep off 
prowlers at night. Can such a dog be obtained, 
and, if so, what breed? IIow should he be trained? 
My first preference is for a German police dog, 
but, without much knowledge of them, I feel a little 
afraid of them. My second preference is for a collie, 
but, again, I am afraid they might snap and hurt 
the children. My third preference is for an Airedale. 
Would a female that has been spayed make a sat¬ 
isfactory watchdog? Should a watchdog be tied up 
at night, or should he run loose? h. s. h. 
Maine. 
R. N.-Y.—This seems to be one of those cases 
where personal choice must be considered, for, say 
what you will, a man gives something of evidence of 
his character when he selects a dog. He just puts 
■part of his personality on four feet. Our own choice 
would be a good Airedale, though we never owned a 
police dog. Will our readers tell us w r hat breed they 
would select for such a purpose—and why? 
Growing Cotton North and South 
I HAVE been interested and amused at the various 
comments in recent issues of Tiie R. N.-Y. on 
growing cotton north of the cotton belt. These com¬ 
ments have been for the most part made by people 
who live in the North and, as might be expected, 
show that those who make the comments are wholly 
unacquainted with the cotton plant and its require¬ 
ments for growth and development; but the letter of 
Charles F. Leach of Florida, on page 1515, surprises 
me, as he is probably near enough to the cotton belt 
to be better informed than appears from his letter. 
Trobably 95 per cent of American cotton is grown 
between the thirtieth and thirty-fifth 
degrees of latitude. Some places it 
succeeds above or below these lines, as 
along the Atlantic coast and in the 
Mississippi Valley, where it extends 
above the thirty-fifth degree, and along 
the mountainous sections of the Car- 
olinas, Georgia and Alabama, where it 
lacks as much as 50 miles of reaching 
the thirty-fifth degree. And so on the 
south, the thirtieth degree is about the 
limit that the cotton plant will de¬ 
velop fruit so as to make the crop 
profitable. Further south the plant is 
inclined, as Mr. Leach says, to go to 
stalk and foliage, to the neglect of 
fruit. 
The surprising part of Mr. Leach's 
letter is where he says that poor land 
only will do to grow cotton in a com¬ 
mercial way. He evidently is a new¬ 
comer in the cotton belt, or else is 
judging the entire belt by his locality. 
As he says, cotton is a perennial be¬ 
low the frost line, and it is not neces¬ 
sary to produce seed every year and in 
large quantities in order to perpetuate 
itself. Florida, even the northern 
border, approximates conditions favor¬ 
ing perennial growth, and cotton is 
much more inclined to “go to weed'’ 
than in middle and north Gerogia and 
other parts of the heart of the cotton 
belt, and it may be that poor land, fer¬ 
tilized only to encourage fruiting, is 
the best way to grow cotton there. 
But certainly his advice to use poor, 
unfertilized land, is not good advice 
for the cotton belt proper. There is 
more fertilizer, most of it high grade, 
used in the Carolinas. Georgia and 
Alabama under cotton than is perhaps 
used for any other crop on an equal 
acreage in the world. A few years ago 
a prize of $1,000 was offered by an 
agricultural paper for the greatest yield of cotton on 
10 acres of land. The man who won this prize lives 
in an adjoining county to me. lie not only selected 
the best land on his place, but used, as I now remem¬ 
ber, about one ton of high-grade fertilizer per acre, 
besides a heavy top-dressing of stable manure. The 
10 acres made 30 bales, which is about six times the 
average for the belt. That was before the boll wee¬ 
vil came, but the same man has 150 acres in cotton 
this year and is making a bale to the acre in spite of 
the weevil, but he is doing it on highly fertilzed land. 
The government experts and all successful farmers 
hereabout advise rich land and heavy fertilizing, to¬ 
gether with rapid cultivation, in order to beat the 
weevil. 
I have serious doubts about growing cotton much 
north of the boundary now recognized as that where 
cotton can be grown with profit. None but the most 
vigilant can make any profit growing cotton under 
boll-weevil conditions in the most favorable climate. 
It would be entirely unreasonable to suppose that 
success can be reached where climate and boll weevil 
would both be against it. But this is a free country. 
Anyone is at liberty to try his hand at the cotton 
game. Good luck to any who may take a shot at it, 
but, if you take my advice, go slow. 
Georgia. w. l. wlliamson. 
One reader says: “they produced red blood in the 
little red schoolhouse.” He seems to think the modern 
system of education takes the initiative and the punch 
out of children. Are there others of the same mind? 
PROF. FREDERICK C. MINKLER 
One of the greatest live stock authorities in the world. Long a special corre¬ 
spondent of The Rural New-Yorker. 
