7S6 
Tht  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
And  it  was  Swamp  Land — 
MANY  farms  in  this  state  are  getting 
big  crops  this  year  from  acreage  that 
was  waste  swamp  land.  Reclaim  your 
swamp  land  this  season. 
Ditching  the  du  Pont  way  is  a  quick,  out- 
of-season  job  that  is  inexpensive  and  pays 
big  dividends.  Du  Pont  50%  or  60%  low- 
freezing  straight  dynamite  is  the  explosive 
to  use.  Ask  your  dealer. 
Our  100-page  “Farmers’  Handbook  of  Explosives” 
will  give  you  complete  information  on  ditching, 
land-clearing  and  tree-planting  with  dynamite.  A 
copy  is  yours,  free  for  the  asking. 
E.  I.  DU  PONT  DE  NEMOURS  &  CO.,  Inc. 
Equitable  Bldg., 
New  York,  N.  Y. 
Fulton  Bldg., 
Pittsburgh,  Pa. 
Harvey  Bldg., 
Boston,  Mass. 
jfor-  DITCHING- STUMPING -TREE  PLANTING 
Berry  Plank 
Vegetable  Roots 
Vegetable  Plants 
Flower  Plants 
Strawberry,  Raspberry,  Dew¬ 
berry,  Blackberry.  Locanherry, 
Gooseberry,  Currant,  Grape 
plants. 
Asparagus,  Rhubarb, 
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Celery, Tomato,  Parsley,  Era 
Plant,  Onion,  Beet,  Sweet 
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other  perennials  ;  Pansy, 
After.  Columbine  Salvia,  Snapdragon,  Zinnia  and  other 
annuals  Roses,  Shrubs.  Catalog  free. 
HARRY  L.  SQUIRES  -  Hampton  Bays,  N.  Y. 
TOMATO  PLANTS'- Ready  May  25.  $1.98  per  1.000 
CABBAGE  PLANTS  "  "  20.  1.75  ’*  " 
ASTER  PLANTS  “  ’’  25.  75c  ”  100 
DAHLIA  ROOTS  $1  per  Poz.  All  Plants  P.  Paid. 
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MILLIONS  ”  Frost  Prool  ”  CABBAGE  PLANTS 
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SSO,  Cash.  Don't  take  chances.  Order  from  largest  grow¬ 
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Kelly  Bros.  Nurseries 
1160  Main  St.  Dansville,  N.  Y. 
Send  for  Free  Price  List  of  all  Vegetable  Plants. 
PAUL  F.  ROCHELLE  Drawer  269  Morristown,  N.  J. 
Cabbage  Plants 
One  Million  Danish  and  Glory. 
A-knicnd  Williamson,  X.  Y. 
4,000,000  SWEET  POTATO  PLANTS 
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mond,  at  A!. 60  per  1,000.  C.E.  BROWN,  BrldgeiM®,  Delaware 
Martha  Washington  ASPARAGUS  SEED 
8*4  per  lb.  Why  not  sow  the  best  ? 
LESTER  W  DENNETT  Victor,  N.  Y. 
PLANTS 
SENT  BY  EXPRESS 
OR  PARCEL  POST 
For  100 
600 
1.000 
6  000 
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CAULIFLOWER  &  PEPPER.., 
TOMATO  AND  6.  SPROUTS 
SWEET  POTATO . 
CELERY  . .  .  — -  _ 
Catalog  Free.  C.  E.  FIELD,  SewelJ,  N.  J. 
C'  1%/iinli  A  marie.  •  At  •1-‘°  Per  100  for  short  ,im® 
AjIaUlOll  /vminc*.  only.  Surplus  fine  bulbe. 
10c  extra  for  f«l«l  pert.  E.  A.  TILTON,  AibUbnl*,  Ohio 
PI  A  NTC  POSTPAID  TO  YOU 
L  M  ll  I  o  ALL  VARIETIES 
Transplanted  early  Celery,  Tomato,  Aster,  Cauli 
flower,  4  doz.,  SOe;  100,15c;  500,  $3;  1,000,  $5.50 
Beet,  Cabbage,  Lettuce.  Alyssuni,  3  doz..  25c;  100 
50c;  1,000,  S3.  Egg  Plant.  Pepper,  Colens,  Mari 
golds.  Zinnia,  Snapdragon,  Larkspur,  Dianthus 
English  Daisy,  3  doz.,  $1;  100,  $2,50.  Strong  Plants 
SUNNYBROOK  GARDENS  Route  6  Lancaster.  Pa. 
4 , 0  0  0 , 0  0  0  ll*  SweetPotatoPlants  cabbage. 
Tomato,  Pepper  and  other  vegetable  plants.  Red  skin  and 
superb  potato  seed  ;  small  size,  at  $1  per  bn. ;  large  size 
at.  $1.60  per  bn.  Can na  Roots.  All  fine  stock.  Catalogue 
free.  M.  BORCO  -  Vineland,  N.  J. 
Cortl- 
B 
Russet  Rural  Sead  Potatoes 
ordo  Arsenate  and  Arsenate  of  Lend.  20  cents 
CHAS.  F.  KIFER  .  Wyoming,  Dklawark 
Parenl  Pool  A  rid  roc  <?  labels.  $1  per  100.  How  many  . 
rarcei  rosiAuaress  Address,  u*el  co..  w.id.n.  n.  t 
When  you  write  advertisers  mention 
The  Rural  New-Yorker  and  you’ll  get 
a  quick  reply  and  a  "square  deal.  ”  See 
guarantee  editorial  page. 
I  was  rhe  small  number  of  caps  that  were 
required  for  the  job.  Only  one  cap  was 
placed  at  the  end  of  each  row,  and  the 
remainder  of  the  dynamite  was  set  off 
by  the  detonation  from  the  one  preced¬ 
ing.  Forty  per  cent  dynamite  was  used, 
as  it  is  one  of  the  best  of  the  explosives 
for  ditches  to  be  dug  by  the  propagated 
method.  This  dynamite  was  set  off  by 
an  electric  blasting  machine  as  a  gener¬ 
ator  delivering  the  spark  to  the  caps  by 
two  strands  of  wire  arranged  in  series. 
No.  G  caps  were  used. 
Cost  i  \  Labor  and  Material. — What 
does  such  a  job  cost?  This  is  a  logical 
question  for  anyone  to  ask,  particularly 
if  he  has  ever  dug  much  ditch  by  hand 
or  worked  with  some  form  of  dredge. 
One  might  naturally  think  removing  this 
volume  of  dirt  would  incur  tremendous 
expense.  In  order  that  I  might  have  the 
figures  accurate,  I  have  written  Mr. 
Griffrath,  the  community  chairman  afore¬ 
mentioned,  and  asked  for  a  detailed  state¬ 
ment  of  the  actual  cost.  Here  it  is  : 
Dynamite  . $2,572.75 
Labor  in  placing  dynamite .  008.00 
Other  expenses,  covering  tools, 
insurance,  etc .  371.23 
In  addition  to  this,  the  community 
went  one  step  further.  They  raked  ragged 
pieces  of  dirt  from  the  sides  that  might 
fall  back  and  aid  in  refilling  the  ditch. 
Some  time  was  also  used  in  cleaning  up 
around  ihe  highway  and  bridges.  This 
additional  labor  cost  $232. 
The  Co-operative  Spirit. — The  inter¬ 
esting  part  of  this  story  is  not  concern¬ 
ing  the  wonderful  work  that  the  dynamite 
did,  but  something  back  of  it  all  that 
made  the  piece  of  work  possible.  It  was 
the  spirit  of  co-operation  which  some 
men  had  that  had  to  be  taught  to  others 
on  how*  a  big  job  can  he  made  small  if 
there  is  unity  of  action.  For  the  total 
area  involved  the  cost  was  approximately 
$5  per  acre.  The  land  ranges  in  value 
from  $200  to  $500  per  acre,  and  some  of 
the*  land  that  could  not  be  used  before 
the  ditch  w*as  dug  is  now  part  of  the 
most  productive.  The  cost  has  been  spent 
many  times  over  when  the  heavy  rains 
came,  and  the  old  ditch  could  not  take 
the  water  off  fast  enough  before  the  crops 
were  ruined.  There  is  nothing  particu¬ 
larly  new  in  this  story  to  those  who  have 
watched  dynamite  do  its  work,  but.  pos¬ 
sibly  the  method  of  organization  may  be 
of  help  to  some  of  Tiie  R.  N.-Y.  readers. 
The  whole  matter  may  be  summed  up  in 
a  few*  words.  Co-operation  on  the  part 
of  some  men  who  had  vision  enough  to 
see  possibilities;  an  iron-bound  contract 
for  those  whose  selfishness  might  lead 
them  astray;  a  shower  that  furnished 
the  immediate  urge,  and  the  product  of 
the  chemist  that  put  more  force  into  the 
shoveling  than  could  possibly  have  been 
done  by  human  hands,  and  all  at  a  cost 
that  was  in  no  way  prohibitive. 
E.  A.  F, 
Making  Cider  Vinegar 
On  page  717  W.  L.  N.  complains  of 
his  vinegar  being  weak  and  not  coming  up 
to  the  standard  four  per  cent  acetic  acid. 
There  is  much  more  in  handling  the  cider 
than  there  is  in  the  apples.  a>  very  poor 
apples  should  make  over  4  per  cent  of 
vinegar.  Ordinary  apples  make  from  5  to 
6  per  cent  vinegar.  (  'ider  that  is  made  from 
vinegar  should  never  be  put  into  old  vine¬ 
gar  or  musty  barrels  to  ferment.  It 
should  be  fermented  in  good,  clean,  sweet 
barrels,  as  the  acid  retards  the  first  fer¬ 
mentation  and  does  not  let  all  of  the  fruit 
sugar  be  converted  into  alcohol.  After 
the  first  fermentation  is  finished,  the  more 
acid  the  better.  It  can  be  dawn  off  into 
vinegar  barrels,  and  to  help  start  the  acid 
fermentation  add  two  or  three  gallons  of 
good,  strong  vinegar.  The  things  next 
essential  are  temperature  and  air.  Vine¬ 
gar  makes  fastest  around  8G  deg.  F.,  and 
ceases  to  make  around  CO  deg.  F.  As 
many  cellars  do  not  go  much  above  CO 
or  05  deg.  F.,  a  cellar  is  a  poor  place 
to  make  vinegar,  unless  it  has  heat  in  it. 
As  mentioned  above,  the  two  things 
that  convert  alcohol  into  acetic  acid  or 
vinegar  are  heat  and  air.  The  barrels 
should  not  be  over  half  full,  as  the  less 
there  is  in  the  barrel,  the  more  air  comes 
in  contact  with  the  liquid,  and  if  the  air 
is  warm  the  quicker  it  will  make.  The 
bung  should  be  left  out,  and  no  bottle  put 
into  it,  as  he  mentions. 
There  is  also  a  limit  to  heat,  as  above 
95  dee*.  F.  the  formation  of  acetic  acid 
decreases  rapidly,  and  at  a  tempeature  of 
104  deg.  F.  it  discontinues  entirely.  He 
also  asks  if  it  would  be  practical  to  make 
a  generator  and  convert  it  by  the  quick 
process.  It  would  not,  unless  he  was 
making  two  or  three  hundred  barrels  a 
year ;  then  it  is  by  far  the  best  way. 
Connecticut.  F.  T.  p. 
Farm  Life  in  the  Dominican  Republic 
FTlie  R.  N.-Y.  has  readers  everywhere, 
from  Alaska  to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope, 
and  they  are  all  like  members  of  a  great 
family.  We  propose  to  print  from  time 
to  time  pictures  of  life  in  some  of  the 
outlying  places  where  our  people  live. 
Here  is  one  from  the  Dominican  Repub¬ 
lic.  This  country  as  our  readers  know, 
occupies  the  eastern  half  of  the  island 
on  which  Columbus  made  his  first  settle¬ 
ment.] 
What  I  am  going  to  say  applies  to  the 
major  part  of  the  country,  but  not  to  the 
western  part  of  it.  In  the  morning  we 
get  up  about  G  o’clock,  and  the  wife 
makes  a  fire  to  make  strong  coffee,  whilA 
the  men  folks  milk  the  cows,  bring  in 
plaintain  from  the  farm,  bring  in  wood 
June  2,  1923 
from  the  woods  and  one  of  the  boys  brings 
in  some  w*ater. 
At  about  7  a. m.  breakfast  is  ready, 
and  it  consists  of  eggs,  plantains  (ba¬ 
nanas),  milk  and  sometimes  sweet  pota¬ 
toes.  After  it  one  of  the  boys  goes  to 
town  to  sell  the  surplus  milk,  eggs  and 
plantains,  and  to  buy,  with  the  money 
from  the  surplus,  what  is  not  raised,  as 
rice,  lard,  clothing,  shoes,  stockings,  etc., 
and  the  men  go  to  pull  out  weeds  or  to 
plant  vegetables,  and  to  do  odd  jobs  on 
the  farm. 
We  do  not  cultivate  the  land,  therefore 
we  suffer  a  great  deal  when  we  do  not 
have  rain,  because  most  of  the  water 
evaporates  and  the  earth  bakes.  At 
about  12  m.  dinner  is  ready,  and  it  con¬ 
sists  of  soup,  beef,  rice,  beans,  salad, 
plantains  and  coffee,  and  seldom  a  little 
sweet.  After  dinner  we  take  a  real  rest 
that  we  call  “siesta,”  and  you  take  it  bv 
going  to  your  bed  and  lying  down,  with¬ 
out  reading  or  talking,  until  2  o’clock, 
at  which  time  you  get  up,  and  everybody 
goes  to  work  on  the  farm,  the  women  un¬ 
til  4  p.m.  and  the  men  until  G  p.m.  The 
women  return  to  the  house  (home)  at 
4  p.  m.  in  order  to  do  odd  jobs,  such  as 
sewing,  mending,  reading  and  cooking  the 
supper  that  is  like  the  breakfast. 
If  there  is  a  girl  of  marriageable  age. 
she  receives  the  visit  of  her  sweetheart, 
if  she  has  any,  until  half-past  eight  sharp, 
at  which  time  he  leaves,  and  everybody 
goes  to  bed.  We  grow  corn,  cattle,  coffee, 
cocoa,  sugar  cane,  plantain,  sweet  pota¬ 
toes,  hens,  turkeys,  guineas,  pigs,  beans 
and  a  little  rice. 
As  a  rule  our  agricultural  methods  are 
about  200  years  behind  yours,  and  von 
have  nothing  to  copy  from  us.  However, 
there  is  a-  case  in  my  neighborhood,  an 
uncle  of  mine,  whose  only  business  is 
to  produce  and  sell  milk,  that  I  think  is 
worth  while  mentioning.  This  man  has 
been  very  successful.  lie  has  solved  the 
labor  problem,  works  very  little  on  his 
farm,  has  made  a  little  fortune  (about 
$40,000  or  $50,000),  and  is  having  an 
easy  life,  and  when  he  began  the  dairy 
industry  was  a  bankrupt  in  business,  ow¬ 
ing  about  $300.  and  was  obliged  to  accept 
hi_s  father’s  farm  for  four  years  on  shares 
(.)0  per  cent  each)  in  order  to  sustain 
himself,  Ins  wife  and  pay  off  his  debt** 
Dominican  Republic  r.  s.  vasquez. 
R-  N.-l. — This  idea  of  sending  the 
young  man  home  at  half-past  eight  strikes 
us  as  a  very  good  one.  It  would  requite 
something  more  than  a  hint  to  get  rid  of 
some  of  our  young  Americans  at  that 
hour.  They  would  be  just  about  ready 
to  wake  up. 
Mr  Dunn  was  peacefully  smoking  his 
pipe  before  the  fire  when  the  door  of  his 
study  flew  open  and  Mrs.  Dunn  rushed  in 
with  a  very  excited  air,  and,  seeing  her 
husband,  exclaimed:  “Oh,  George,  Mary 
has  made  a  mistake  and  tried  to  make 
the  kitchen  fire  burn  by  pouring  gasoline 
on  to  it.”  “Gasoline,  eh !”  was  Mr. 
Dunn’s  calm  reply.  “Did  she  get  it  to 
go?”  Mrs.  Dunn  breathed  more  rapidly. 
‘Did  she  get  it  to  go?”  she  cried  in  a 
shrill  voice.  “It  blew  her  right  out 
through  the  kitchen  window.”  Mr.  Dunn 
took  a  reflective  draw  at  his  pipe  as  lie 
replied,  philosophically :  “That’s  all 
right,  my  dear.  It  was  her  afternoon 
out,  anyway  !” — New  York  Globe. 
CONTENTS 
THE  RURAL  NEW-YORKER,  JUNE  2,  1923 
FARM  TOPICS 
Uncle  Sam’s  Farm  Business  Office .  194 
Reforming’  an  Old  Pasture .  794 
A  Big  Job  of  Dynamite  Ditching . 794,  795 
Hope  Farm  Notes .  804 
LIVE  STOCK  AND  DAIRY 
April  Milk  Returns...., . 7 .  807 
Garbage-fed  Pigs  .  810 
Ration  for  Cows . 810 
Obstructed  Teat  .  812 
Drying  Off  a  Cow...,. . 812 
Short  Ration  for  Good  Cow .  813 
Water  Supply;  Milking  Machine;  Care  of 
Bull  . 813 
THE  HENYARD 
Stopping  the  Fence  Flyers .  801 
Construction  of  Poultry  House  and  Brooder  814 
Red  and  Silver  Leghorns;  White  Wyan- 
dottes  .  814 
Thin  Eggshells  .  814 
Egg-laying  Contest  .  81G 
Dried  or  Semi-solid  Milk;  Blood  Spots  in 
Eees  .  8i6 
HORTICULTURE 
The  Backyard  Gardener  Up  Front.... .  794 
Suitable  Cover  Crop  for  a  Vineyard .  794 
Pedigree  in  Apple  Trees . . .  797 
Ten  Years’  Results  of  Dusting — Part  II .  . .  799 
Planting  Narcissus;  Forcing  Hyacinth; 
Peony  Blight  .  803 
Bark  Splitting  and  Winter  Injury.... .  803 
WOMAN  AND  HOME 
Maple  Sugar  and  Fudge .  799 
Suggestions  from  a  Boarder .  805 
From  Day  to  Day .  808 
Canning  Dandelion  Greens . ! ’ ’  808 
The  Rural  Patterns .  808 
Gelatin  Ice  Cream;  Sweet  Potatoes  and 
Apples  . .  808 
Letters  of  an  Indiana  Farmer . 808,  809  * 
Torchon  Lace  .  809 
Tennessee  Notes  . ■ . 809 
Practical  Salads  . ’ .  gog 
MISCELLANEOUS 
Controlling  Black  Ants .  797 
Slugs  and  Snails . 797 
Dynamiting  Cesspool  . 801 
Parliamentary  Rules  of  Congress .  801 
Making  Splint  Brooms . ’  801 
Taking  a  Motor  Trip — Part  II .  805 
The  School  Bill . . . ’  ’  ]  807 
New  Road  Construction  Held  Up.......!!!  807 
Co-operation  on  Pacific  Coast .  807 
Publisher’s  Desk  .  818 
