376 
W* RURAL NEW-YORKER 
It is time for the fruit grower to order 
“Forward, march !” if he has not already 
sounded the call. Here in Northern New 
Jersey we at last have a bit of Winter, 
with ice and a little snow. Thus far the 
open Winter has given us a good chance 
(o get ready. I have spoken of the land 
we bought last Fall. It joins our lower 
land, and gives us what we have always 
wanted—Something over 20 acres of level 
land. 'These rough hills make good or¬ 
chard laud when you can work them 
without too much expense, but they are 
not usually profitable for what we may 
call cropping. It may pay, at times, to 
put an acre or so -of strawberries at the 
top of a high hill, so as to avoid the late 
frosts, but in these days of scarce and ex¬ 
pensive labor I think it better to put most 
of your work in nearby lands. I know 
dairymen who in former years, when 
labor was abundant, planted the silage 
« urn far away from the barn on the back 
fields. That meant long hauls for ma¬ 
nure in the Spring and for corn in the 
Fall. Now they put corn on the fields 
close to the barn. This shortens the haul 
both ways, and in some cases cuts down 
the labor by 30 per cent. By seeding rye 
in the corn at last cultivation they keep 
tip the soil well, and are able to plant 
corn after corn for some years. Then by 
planting Soy beans on good land near tin* 
buildings they save much of the ordinary 
“haying.” All these changes are being 
forced upon farmers by outside influences 
for which they are not responsible. It is 
simply a matter of readjustment. Most 
of the other industries have gone through 
the same troubles. Farmers and fruit 
growers must do the same, and those who 
can make the needed changes most skil¬ 
fully will. I believe, find themselves in a 
better position than ever. 
ff $ if * * 
There are some fundamental principles 
of country living which we must till hold 
to as a magnet holds to steel, but there 
are old methods and practices which we 
must get rid of. The usual back-to-the 
lander cripples his business, if he does 
not kill it, by putting too much money 
into “overhead.” Ilf thinks he must have 
the finest buildings . and equipment, to 
start with—before he produces any crop. 
The result is that he ties up too much of 
his borrowed capital in a form of prop¬ 
erty which gives no income. It cannot 
produce income unless he borrows more 
money and increases his output. In the 
majority of cases he gets so much bor¬ 
rowed capital into unproductive property 
that he cannot meet his obligations, and 
fails, or limps along, a hopeless debtor. 
On the other hand, too many old farmers 
and fruit growers try to get along with 
too little “overhead,” which means poor 
buildings and inferior equipment. In one 
case the man has equipment too large 
for his production ; in the other the equip¬ 
ment is not large enough to give his pro¬ 
duction full opportunity. In these times 
neither man can hope to make a full suc¬ 
cess. There has got to be a fair adjust¬ 
ment of invested capital to labor. There 
are some fruit growers who get in wrong 
through no great fault of their own. They 
cannot jam on through, but must now 
back out as gracefully as they can. For 
example, some years ago there came a per¬ 
fect craze for planting Wealthy apples. 
It seemed like the finest advice to use this 
variety as a "filler” in planting perma- 
menit orchards, and millions of \V ealthy 
were put out. Now they are coming into 
bearing and are ruining the market for 
early apples. The Wealthy is a fair ap¬ 
ple when permitted to ripen and color 
well, but too many growers are picking 
the small, half-ripe, uncolored fruit, and 
dumping it into market regardless of its 
effect upon sales. The result is that the 
early market is demoralized and some of 
the finest early apples lose their market 
value in the face of this Wealthy flood. 
The Wealthy apple leads to poverty 
rather than wealth as at present handled. 
I think it an economic crime for a fruit 
grower to plant heavily of Wealthy on 
the upper Atlantic slope. Then there are 
people who have planted McIntosh freely 
on heavy or even damp soil. _ That is al¬ 
ways a mistake. McIntosh, like Baldwin, 
is a variety for rather light, well-drained 
soil. Such varieties as Northern Spy or 
Greening will do well on moist soil, but 
McIntosh on such land is out of place. A 
duck or a goose will do well in a swamp 
where a hen would melt away and fail 
Then there are growers who attempt to 
grow Gandy strawberries on very light 
soil, or Big Joe in a damp marsh. The 
exact reverse of this proposition would 
pay, but Big Joe is as far out of place in 
a swamp as a big, clumsy, advanced regis¬ 
ter Holstein cow would be on a dry hill 
pasture, where an active Ayrshire could 
make a good living. After considerable 
trouble and loss, peach growers are learn¬ 
ing that the Carman peach does not pay. 
It had a mighty run for a time, but cold 
experiment shows that its day is done. 
and other varieties are wanted. 
***** 
So one bi'g problem for us in this new 
adjustment is to fit varieties to our soil 
and conditions. I have people come and 
tell me that the Wolf River apple pays 
. them as well as any variety. Not for me. 
My customers do no want any _ second 
bite. Quite a common mistake in mis¬ 
fitting is to substitute Wolf River for 
McIntosh. The young trees look much 
alike, but when a man waits long for a 
fine McIntosh and is finally presented 
with a sour Wolf River he feels that he 
has been insulted, as well as injured. 
Some of the new yellow apples are of 
exquisite flavor and about all an apple 
ought to be, except for the color. The 
great majority of the customers in our 
section do not want a blonde apple, even 
though you tell them that a golden color 
is associated vrith vifamines. They want 
a dark-colored or red apple. Too many 
of them “eat with their eyes” and seem 
to think quality must blush in order to 
be superfine. A fruit grower of the fu¬ 
ture. in order to succeed, must produce 
what his eustomersfcall for, and produce 
it right. I.ife is too short, or rather too 
in the year. Quite a little of it seems, to 
be carried over in storage. Considering 
labor and fertilizer and general expense. 
I believe we can make more net profit (if 
any profit at all) in an acre of good rye 
than in the average acre of sweet corn. 
As for tomatoes, about the only money m 
that crop for our section comes in the 
very early fruit. Where one has light, 
warm land, knows how to get the plants 
growing early, and has money and phil¬ 
osophy enough to discount a late frost, 
there is still some profit in the crop. On 
our cold, late soil, I am convinced that 
we are out of it except for supplying a 
canning factory. I find that a good many 
of our gardeners are branching out into 
asparagus. A , heavy planting will be 
made this Spring, and some shrewd men 
fear an over-production, just as has 
turned out with the Wealthy apple. I do 
not think there is great danger of that 
for people who are close to market. The 
shippers from a distance may have trouble 
in the future. It will be largely a matter 
of distribution ; no one ever saw the time 
Celery Crown Under Jrrigdtioh. ISte "J'rojitable Crops ,” 1 ‘<kjc 353 
long, for the average man to attempt to 
educate a lot of customers away from 
their usual eating habits. Most of us 
have been growing these ill-adjusted and 
poor suited varieties to our loss. Then 
again, some of us have been growing cer¬ 
tain fruit or garden crops too long, not 
aware that other farms or other sections 
can grow them to better advantage. I 
have become convinced that we have for 
several years been growing sweet corn 
and tomatoes at a loss. Others evidently 
make some money out of these crops, or 
they would not continue to grow them, 
but my figures show that they do not pay 
under our conditions. We can raise good 
corn, but during the past few years 
transportation has so developed that corn 
may now be brought safely for hundreds 
of miles. The cheaper, distant land, can 
produce good corn for less money than 
we can on our more expensive soil. So I 
think sweet corn has passed out of the 
list of garden crops which may claim a 
monopoly, or close to one, through short 
hauls. It is now more of a field crop. 
Last year we found it in market delivered 
from points nearly or quite 1000 miles 
away. If you are willing to pay the 
price you can get an ear of sweet corn at 
the more expensive restaurants any day 
when all the people had all the asparagus 
they wanted. It has paid me better to 
grow the roots than the “grass” for sale, 
just as in the chicken business well-bred 
stock has paid us better than Winter egg 
production. 
***** 
$o. in the future I shall plan to cut 
out the market garden crops, take up a 
few side lines and concentrate our work 
on apples, peaches, cherries and straw¬ 
berries. We have the farm quite well 
planted to these fruits now, though we 
shall add about 300 trees this Spring. 
Apples will ever be our main crop. I 
think it best to concentrate on some chief 
business crop, and group a few side lines 
around it. On our new farm we find 
about 200 trees of apple and pear. There 
are half a dozen or more varieties—more 
kinds than I like. Some of them will be 
grafted to Cortland, which 1 consider a 
most promising variety. These trees 
have been pruned, and it was a job to 
head them back, for the branches had 
grown in every direction. As soon as 
this present cold snap is over we plan to 
spray these trees thoroughly with an oil 
spray. We have used oil for many years 
—always with good results. On trees 
with rough bark we find that the oil 
March 1, 1924 
spray is penetrating. It spreads better 
than lime-sulphur and works thoroughly 
into every crack and dent where the 
scale will congregate. While there is not 
much scale left in our orchards, we know 
there is some of it. and we think the in¬ 
sect is coming back. We must fight it 
once more. Then again, it has been my 
experience that a thorough dormant spray 
has some sort of vitalizing effect upon the 
fruit buds. I am sure that we get a 
larger proportion of strong, vital blooms 
when we put on the dormant spray. I 
do not know how to account for it, but 
that seems to be the fact. I also believe 
that the oil, like lime-sulphur, has some 
effect in destroying disease germs. Here 
again I cannot offer definite proof, but 
that is my conviction from observation. 
At any rate, we put on the spray and try 
to make every square inch of the tree 
glitter with its oily coat. We also spray 
the peaches and cherries with the same 
solution, though I do not notice so much 
value from the cherry spraying. 
* if ■* if if 
As for fertilizing, many of the trees on 
this new farm are in a tough old sod, 
which has not, apparently, been plowed 
for some years. We”"have put about 15 
lbs. of strong chicken manure around 
each tree. A little later 3 lbs. or more of 
acid phosphate will go on top of this 
chicken manure. Then wherever it is 
possible to do so the sod will be plowed 
and harrowed well. Some of these trees 
stand on a rocky ledge where it is im¬ 
possible to do a good job of plowing. In 
such cases the ground for about 4 ft. 
around each tree will be chopped up with 
a heavy hoe or grub, so that the manure 
is covered. This plan will be followed all 
through the orchard, as far as the ma¬ 
nure will go. In place of the manure we 
will use fertilizer. There is a tendency 
now among many orchardists to use 
nitrate of soda alone in the early Spring 
around trees. That makes a strong, 
quick growth and usually increases the 
apple crop. It is my belief that the ap¬ 
plication of this quickly available nitro¬ 
gen early in the year stimulates some of 
the fruit buds into action, when, without 
this stimulation, they would do little 
more than produce leaf growth. The same 
seems to be true of chicken manure, and 
less so of stable manure. I think, how¬ 
ever, that while this is true, we do better 
to use a mixed or complete fertilizer, in¬ 
stead of nitrate alone. From choice, and 
especially where a cover crop is to be 
seeded, I would use a mixture of one 
part, by weight, of nitrate of soda, three 
parts acid phosphate and one part muri¬ 
ate of potash. Sulphate of ammonia may 
be substituted for the nitrate if by figur¬ 
ing carefully you find that a pound of 
nitrogen comes cheaper in that form. It 
rarely pays to try to mix these chemicals 
except where large quantities are needed. 
A good mixed high-grade fertilizer will 
answer. Our plan is to feed nitrogen 
enough to provide for a good growth of 
wood and healthy foliage, and phosphorus 
enough for wood and seed growth. I am 
not so sure about the need of potash on 
our soil, but I prefer to be on the safe 
side. I do not think lime an essential 
for use in most orchards, except as we 
plan for a cover crop containing clover. 
While pruning and feeding are very nec¬ 
essary, I have found spraying or dusting 
even more so. and while I do not pretend 
to be an expert at it, I will tell how we 
try to do it. H. w. C. 
Cend for it to«day/ 
tells you why . • 
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