274 
Thf RURAL NEW-YORKER 
February 16, 1924 
N 
Hope Farm Notes 
One curious things about the YV inter 
thus far is that there has been no de¬ 
sire to read. “Snow Bound.” This is 
about the first year I have not read 
Whittier’s great picture of New England 
Winter life; but the picture does 
not appeal greatly to the imagina¬ 
tion when we must look out upon a 
dark frame of brown fields and hills, with 
not even a patch of snow in a fence cor¬ 
ner. Here in the first week of February 
the air is as soft and balmy as an April 
day. There has been practically no snow 
thus far, and no ice thick enough to suit 
the ice men. The ground froze perhaps 
10 in. deep in January, but now the up¬ 
per 3 in. will freeze by night and thaw 
by day. That is the worst possible situa¬ 
tion for the strawberries, since every 
freeze will lift the plants a little, while 
the following thaw leaves them a bit more 
exposed. Our berries are well covered 
with a mulch, but even with that some of 
these warm days takes thfe frost out of 
the upper soil. Whatever you may say , 
about the best place for a growing boy, | 
the frosty side of the barn is the best place 
for a strawberry plant in Winter. This 
open Winter seems to have closed some 
of the gates tff common sense which hens 
are credited with possessing. We had a 
nice flock of young roosters and pullets, 
which all through the Fall and early 
Winter persisted in roosting in the wal¬ 
nut tree back of the house. Most of our 
birds were quite willing to enter the 
house with the early Fall, but this partic¬ 
ular flock seem to be closer to their wild 
ancestors, and they preferred the tree 
tops. At night they would perch on a 
limb, with head under a protecting wing 
and feet well covered. We had to pick 
these red bundles of feathers off the tree 
and force them into the house to take up 
the habits of civilization, but it was hard 
to tame them. On every occasion they 
would break out and go back to the tree. 
They did this once too often. There came 
a quick freeze, and in spite of those thick 
red feathers the frost worked in and 
nipped those blazing combs. Then, mis¬ 
taking this mild spell for the return of 
Spring, these young reds started in to 
prove that Tennyson is right in his re¬ 
marks about a young man’s Spring fan¬ 
cies. and they fell to fighting. Several of 
them now resemble a heavyweight pugil¬ 
ist after a 15-round battle. 
* * * * * 
I fear that some of our peach trees 
have been as imprudent as these young 
roosters. There is great danger that these 
warm days will start the buds, only to 
be nipped by a frost later on. For the 
past three years our apple buds have been 
badly injured in May after passing safe¬ 
ly through the Winter. I hope this will 
not. make the fourth season in succession, 
but there is some danger of it. The small 
grain generally suffers in such a Winter 
without any protection from the snow. 
The young plants seem to be lifted with 
each freeze, and fail to settle back with 
the thaw. Then the c&ld dry winds of 
March settle the business. That seems 
to account for the general belief that a 
snowy Winter means a heavy crop of 
small grain and grass. I have heard 
farmers argue that “snow is manure”; 
that is, it contains much nitrogen. It 
does bring down small quantities of nitro¬ 
gen and sulphur from the air, but its 
chief value lies in the cover or mulch it 
spreads over the ground. The fact is 
that the good old earth needs a blanket 
in Winter, the same as a man. We have 
more rye than ever before this Winter, 
and it looks well. I figure that rye will 
once more prove a profitable crop on a 
farm like ours.- There is a good demand 
for rye straw. It sells for more than 
hay. The grain is good for feeding, and 
rye is one of the easiest crops to grow 
and handle. Where one has waste land 
near a large town rye will prove a good 
proposition. 
* * * * * 
I have spoken of the drawbacks and 
dangers of an open Winter, but there are 
compensations, too. We save fuel and 
feed, haul out our manure and get the 
pruning and dormant spraying out of the 
way. Last Fall 1 bought a tract of 10 
acres adjoining our other land. It is 
mostly level, and now I can abandon the 
steep'hill to apples and grass or grain, 
and do all our plowing and cultivating on 
fairly level fields. This new land is 
strong and capable of growing good crops. 
With a few drains put at the right places 
this land will produce any of the crops 
common in this locality. Years ago this 
farm was laid off into small fields by 
building stone walls. The stones were 
picked off the fields and built into fences. 
Along each wall is a strip of land 6 to 10 
ft. wide grown up into brush and briers, 
with large trees scattered along. The 20 
acres are divided into six fields in this 
way, which means over an acre of waste 
land. If these stone fences were out of 
the way I could have three fields large 
enough to use a tractor. As it is, the 
present fields are too small to use a. siza¬ 
ble tractor, though I am considering a 
small one. Years ago when these stone 
fences were built the job was probably 
considered the most useful one on the 
farm, and no one can estimate the energy 
and time spent in picking and piling these 
stones. The old-timers thought they were 
handing down to us a priceless heritage 
—a form of protection. As it turns out 
this array of stone wall represents about 
the greatest nuisance that one can have on 
the place. That is what history has done 
to the well-meant efforts of our ancestors. 
The problem now is how to get rid of this 
well-meant offering to agriculture. Some 
back-to-the-landers come out and buy 
farms with these old stone walls and pro¬ 
ceed to dig them up and bury them. I 
have known people to spend so much bor¬ 
rowed money clearing up these stones 
that they ran short of capital and in the 
end abandoned the farm in disgust. If 
they had left the walls alone and spent 
the money at raising proper crops they 
might have saved the farm. It would 
cost me more than $1,000 to bury these 
walls or cart them to some waste place, 
and how could I get this thousand back? 
I shall keep the brush and weeds cleared 
up, and let the walls stand. I believe 
that before long there will be a demand 
for such stones in building country- 
houses or other masonry work. In my 
life I have seen a dozen things, each rated 
as a first-class nuisance, turned to a 
profit with the changes of industry and 
methods of living. The old-timers were 
proud of the rude architecture they put 
into these old walls. They turned to be 
a great nuisance in our hands, but in the 
future abler architects will make of these 
rough stones great edifices which will jus¬ 
tify the vision of the old pioneers. That 
is the way life works out the problems of 
the common people. 
❖ ❖ * ❖ * 
I find about 200 fruit trees (apple and 
pear) on this farm. Most of them are 
strong and healthy — too strong, we 
thought, when we started in to prune 
them. They have not been touched for 
some years, and the limbs have grown 
“every which way”—a large proportion 
of them straight into the center. If any 
of you are familiar with the way Wolf 
River acts when left to itself you know 
what has happened. A wolf left to roam as 
it likes does not spend much time at home 
but branches out in all directions. A 
Wolf River tree, however, seems to con¬ 
sider that home L the only place, and we 
find numberless branches acting as if they 
started to run out, then got a little tired 
of adventure and turned back to the ceu- 
tei? of the tree. We are cutting them out. 
and it will make a big brush pile. 1 
never would plant Wolf River, but these 
come with the land. I have a good bun¬ 
dle of Cortland scions, and many of them 
will go into these Wolf Rivers. When 
these trees are headed out we shall em¬ 
ploy these mild days in spraying with oil. 
There is not much scale, but a little of it 
will go far if you let it alone. It has 
seemed to me, too, that the sprayed trees 
are more likely to develop healthy fruit 
buds than those that do not have the dor¬ 
mant spray. The late frost may get our 
fruit buds again this year, but we shall 
stay by the trees and do our share, at 
least. One things to be credited to the 
mild Winter is the fact that mice are do¬ 
ing little if any damage. 
Where the Farmer’s Dollar Buys the Greatest Value 
I N some of the stores of any town the farmer’s 
dollar buys the necessities of life; in others it 
buys physical comforts; in still others it buys 
pleasures. In the farm equipment store the farmer s dollar 
buys the means to make many more dollars. It buys the 
equipment which, like the land itself, is responsible 
for his progress and prosperity. When the farmer 
invests in modern farm machines, he is really buying 
clothing and education, electric lights, automobiles, 
radio outfits, etc., because these things are purchased 
with the money made by farm machines. 
Of all the stores in town, the farm equipment store is 
the one where the farmer gets the greatest return for his 
money. This is true not only on the basis of the fore¬ 
going but it is found true also by comparing the prices 
paid by the farmer for different articles made of simi¬ 
lar materials. 
An interesting comparison has been made by the 
Research Department of the National Association of 
Farm Equipment Manufacturers. T hey took, Ffirst, 
a group of eleven basic farm machines: Sulky plow, 
peg tooth harrow, disk harrow, grain drill, corn 
cultivator, corn planter, corn sheller, grain binder, 
mower, hay rake, and farm wagon—and, Second, a 
list of common articles used on the farm but not classed 
as farm equipment. Then they obtained the pound 
prices of these articles by dividing the retail prices by 
the weights. The pound-price basis is the only prac¬ 
tical way to compare these articles and it is entirely 
fair since the materials go through the same machine 
shop and factory processes and are handled by the 
same class of labor. Freight to the dealers store was 
not included, since it applies to all articles the farmer 
buys and varies with the distance from point of 
manufacture. 
The chart below shows the 
prices per pound of the basic 
farm machines and other ar¬ 
ticles the farmer buys. 
Ignore for a minute the 
low figure in the big circle 
study the pound prices of the 
miscellaneous articles. You will see 
that they range all the way from 14- cents up 
to 39,60 and even 81 cents per pound. Yet these 
are not high-priced goods; they are ordinary, 
everyday articles made of the same materials that 
go into farm machines, and the prices are 
accepted as fair by all buyers. The articles are of 
a standard line sold practically everywhere. 
Now note the low average retail price per pound 
of farm machines. The average pound price of these 
basic machines and implements, needed by every 
grain-growing farmer, is less than the lowest in the 
other group. Some of these farm machines have com¬ 
plicated parts in their makeup and all of them are 
built to stand years of hard use, yet the average price 
the farmer pays for these necessary farm machines is only 
13 cents per pound. 
The above comparisons, which can be du- 
plicated in any community in this country, 
prove the statement that the farmer pays less 
money, pound for pound, for the machines that 
do his work than he pays for any other similar 
manufactured article he buys . 
This shows what farm machines would cost if they were priced like other articles the farmer buys: 
A sulky plow, priced like a wringer, would cost about $45 MORE 
A peg-tooth harrow, priced like a forge, would cost about $30 MORE 
A disk harrow, priced like a buck saw, would cost about $50 MORE 
A grain drill, priced like a food chopper, would cost about $390 MORE 
A corn planter, priced like a forge, would cost about $60 MORE 
A corn cultivator, priced like a vise, would cost about $40 MORE 
A corn sheller, priced like a milk can, would cost about $20 MORE 
A 7-ft. grain binder, priced like the cheapest automobile, would cost about $200 MOKE 
A 7-ft. grain binder, priced like an ash can, would cost about $150 MORE 
A 5-ft. mower, priced like a law r n mower, would cost about $80 MORE 
A hay rake, priced like a garden rake, would cost about $110 MORE 
A wagon, priced like a hand washing machine, would cost about $50 MORE 
T he National Association of Farm Equipment Manufacturers has 
issued several bulletins on subjects similar to the above. We will be 
glad to see that the full set is sent to those interested. Drop us a line. 
International FFarvester Company 
Chicago, Ill. 
606 So. Michigan Ave. 
of America 
(Incorporated) 
