The  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
1563 
The  Back  Track  to  the  East 
Fart  II 
THE  ROUTE— Now,  as  to  the  actual  traveling, 
provide  yourself  with  an  Automobile  Blue  Book,  cov¬ 
ering  the  section  west  of  Chicago;  east  of  Chicago 
you  won’t  need  any.  The  particular  section  will  give 
you  the  route  to  Chicago  from  any  town  in  the  East. 
The  road  to  Chicago,  and,  by  the  way,  that  is  the 
best  way  to  go  West,  via  New  York,  Albany,  Buffalo, 
Erie,  Cleveland,  Toledo  and  South  Bend,  Ind„  is  in 
perfect  condition.  The  shorter  way,  through  Phila¬ 
delphia,  Pittsburgh,  Lima,  etc.,  has  about  seven  de¬ 
tours  at  present,  more  or  less  bad,  hut  all  consuming 
a  lot  of  time,  together  with  some  hard  grades  from 
Gettysburg  to  Pittsburgh  over  the  Alleghany  Moun¬ 
tains.  One  hundred  miles  west  of  Chicago  dirt  roads 
begin  and  stretches  of  hard  road  disappear.  The 
dirt  roads  of  the  West  are  entirely  dependent  upon 
the  weather;  in  dry  weather  where  the  roads  have 
had  any  attention  the  going  is  good;  in  wet  weather 
they  are  bad.  Easterners  accustomed  to  the  hard  sur¬ 
faced  roads  of  the  East  will  have  a  few  surprises 
awaiting  them.  In  various  parts  of  the  West  the 
roads  are  different — gumbo,  dobe,  sand,  desert,  clay 
— each  acts  differently  from  the  other.  Across  Iowa, 
Nebraska  and  the  surrounding  States  a  hearty  at¬ 
tempt  is  made  to  keep  the  roads  in  shape.  As  soon 
after  a  rain  as  possible  the  roads  are  dragged,  and 
as  such  are  pretty  good,  but  immediately  after  a 
rain  the  roads  become  badly  rutted,  and  traveling  is 
hard.  In  the  mountainous  States,  like  Colorado,  the 
roads  are  of  clay  structure,  called  “dobe,”  which 
has  the  peculiar  quality  of  gumming  up  everything 
when  they  get  wet.  The  wheels  just  get  covered 
with  thick  clay,  which  sticks;  chains  are  of  little 
avail;  without  them  you  can't  travel  at  all,  and  with 
steep  hills  the  going  is  positively  dangerous.  How¬ 
ever,  these  roads  have  the  virtue  of  drying  out 
quickly,  and  so  it  behooves  the  traveler  to  wait  for 
favorable  weather  ^conditions;  it  pays.  In  'the 
sparsely  settled  parts  the  roads  are  rough  and 
“cliucky,”  but,  withal,  one  is  well  repaid  when  this 
wonderful  West  unfolds.  There  are  several  routes 
to  be  taken — all  of  them  except  the  Southern  route, 
over  the  Santa  Fe  Trail,  require  the  autoist  to  cross 
the  Continental  Divide.  This  is  practically  impos¬ 
sible  at  this  time  of  year,  owing  to  the  snows  at  the 
high  altitudes.  So  the  route  should  lie  from  Chi¬ 
cago  to  Davenport,  la.,  then  continually  working 
south,  or  cut  straight  for  Denver  and  then  south  over 
the  Santa  Fe  Trail  through  the  Grand  Canyon  to 
Los  Angeles.  The  exact  route  can  be  determined 
after  one  gets  to  Davenport.  Some  motor  club  will 
give  information  of  the  character  wanted,  and  they 
will  give  some  valuable  information,  but  the  best  bet 
is  to  get  your  information  from  an  autoist  coming 
from,  the  direction  toward  which  you  are  traveling. 
That  isn’t  as  hard  as  it  seems.  If  one  is  going  to 
California,  and  you  see  a  California  car,  10  chances 
to  one  he  has  the  information  you  want  and  he  will 
be  glad  to  exchange  notes  with  you.  It’s  quite 
obvious  that  a  man  coming  over  the  road  you  are 
about  to  take  can  give  you  more  exact  information 
than  even  an  auto  club,  and  the  looks  of  his  ma¬ 
chine  will  be  proof  enough.  Not  only  that,  they  can 
give  you  advice  on  what  towns  to  go  to.  what  to 
avoid;  where  food  can  be  obtained,  good  water, 
Avhere  good  camp  are,  approximate  distances,  etc., 
and  they  are  all  glad  to  do  it.  Sometimes  their 
ideas  are  varied  about  these  things,  but,  taken  by 
and  large,  they  are  safe.  Information  from  the 
townspeople  is  not  so  good.  Surprising  as  it  may 
be,  they  know  very  little  outside  their  own  little 
town,  which  only  took  you  four  miles  out — the  rest 
they  “guessed.”  Signs  are  very  misleading.  Some 
unscrupulous  garage  men  or  hotelkeepers,  to  have 
trade  come  through  their  particular  town,  will  post 
signs  so  that  the  unwary  traveler  will  go  five  to  10 
and  even  more  miles  over  bad  roads  and  out  of  the 
way,  so  that  they  may  get  a  trickle  of  the  business 
the  well-traveled  highway  gets.  Stick  to  your  Blue 
Book — that  is  reliable. 
CAMPS  AND  FOOD. — All  along  the  route  are 
camps,  public  and  private.  Western  towns  take 
pride  in  their  camps;  some  are  worse  than  the  road¬ 
side;  some  luxurious.  These  camps  are  of  varying 
size,  sometimes  in  picturesque  spots,  others  not  so 
good,  where  water  and  comfort  stations  are  avail¬ 
able.  Some  camps  have  showers,  laundry  and  rec¬ 
reation  halls;  some  even  have  the  morning  news¬ 
paper  and  bottle  of  milk  delivered  to  your  tent  door. 
In  the  matter  of  food  it  was  found  most  desirable  to 
cook  supper  and  breakfast  in  camp ;  this  necessitates 
but  one  packing.  Dinner  to  be  had  at  any  conveni¬ 
ent  restaurant  or  hotel.  A  good  dinner  can  be  had 
in  the  West  for  from  35  to  50  cents,  and  it  is  well 
worth  it.  We  found  that,  on  the  average,  it  cost  for 
two  people  $5  per  day  for  traveling  expenses.  This 
included  10  gallons  gas,  two  quarts  oil,  dinner,  and 
food  for  the  supper  and  breakfast.  That  beats  the 
railroad  to  a  frazzle  that  imposes  the  restriction  of 
a  timetable.  Of  course,  there  are  many  other 
things  that  will  take  cash,  but  that  is  a  matter  of 
individual  taste. 
TIME  REQUIRED. — A  trip  to  California  will  con¬ 
sume  at  least  three  weeks,  and  four  would  not  be 
too  much.  It  will  be  found  that  a  side  trip  of  some 
20  miles  will  many  times  be  well  worth  the  time  and 
effort  to  see  some  particularly  interesting  spot  off 
the  beaten  path.  And  there  is  so  much  to  see — the 
level  corn  lands  of  the  Middle  West,  the  booming 
cities,  the  prairies,  the  Rocky  Mountains,  the  deserts, 
the  irrigated  lands,  producing  a  wealth  of  fruit 
never  before  dreamed  of:  the  rancher,  the  Indian 
and  the  idolized  cowboy  in  their  native  glory.  Do 
not  let  any  fear  prevent  you  from  making  the  trip 
A  Precocious  Baldivin  Apple  Tree.  Fip.  6SD 
— there  are  more  gray-liaired  men  and  women  tour¬ 
ing  the  country  this  way  than  younger  men.  Such 
a  trip  is  something  one  never  forgets,  and  when  you 
come  back  home  you  will  be  proud  to  be  an  American 
and  know  what  a  fine  place  “back  home  East”  is. 
New  York.  august  fischer. 
Are  Bud  Variations  Responsible  for 
Differences  in  Yield? 
I  am  inclosing  a  picture  of  a  Baldwin  apple  tree  set 
in  a  bearing  orchard  five  years  ago  last  Spring.  Last 
Spring  it  set  20  apples.  We  picked  off  five,  and  the 
remaining  15  developed  into  15  fine,  large  apples.  In 
this  same  orchard  are  a  number  of  Baldwin  trees  set 
18  years  last  Spring  that  had  a  few  apples.  Some  of 
them  have  never  had  an  apple.  If  this  is  not  a  varia¬ 
tion  of  bud.  then  how  do  you  account  for  it?  j.  p.  M. 
Wappingers  Falls,  N.  Y. 
F  we  had  a  number  of  trees  of  one  variety  that 
produced  earlier  or  more  heavily  than  another 
group  of  the  same  variety  we  should  wonder  what 
influence  of  soil  or  surroundings  produced  this  re¬ 
sult.  The  reason  we  should  not  at  first  ascribe  the 
difference  in  behavior  as  due  to  bud  variations  is 
because  the  chances  are  remote  of  getting  a  group 
of  trees  that  are  propagated  from  the  same  in¬ 
dividual.  Nurserymen  do  not  bud  from  fruiting 
trees.  They  gather  their  bud  sticks  from  the  trees 
growing  in  the  nursery  row — one  here  and  one 
there.  Then  when  the  trees  are  dug  they  are  mixed 
indiscriminately,  and  finally  they  are  graded  and 
shipped  out  in  smaller  lots.  Thus,  it  can  he  seen 
how  improbable  it  is  that  trees  budded  from  the 
same  individual  will  be  received. 
Just  what  makes  different  trees  of  the  same  va¬ 
riety  act  so  strangely  is  a  question  not  to  be  an¬ 
swered  off  hand.  Folks  talked  for  years  about  the 
“running-out”  or  “degeneration”  of  potatoes  until 
it  was  found  that  this  habit  was  not  a  responsi¬ 
bility  that  rested  with  the  potato,  but  that  the  trou¬ 
ble  was  due  to  insects  and  diseases.  Likewise. 
black  currants  were  said  to  “run  out”  before  certain 
new  diseases  were  discovered  in  them.  And  now 
witness  the  “running-out”  of  raspberries  only  to  find 
the  degeneracy  no  degeneracy,  but  a  mosaic  disease. 
Likewise  the  Baldwin,  from  evidence  here  and  there 
about  the  country,  was  said  to  be  “running  out”  or 
to  be  reverting,  but  when  Baldwin  trees,  from  40 
different  localities  in  the  country  were  planted  in 
one  locality  the  fruit  that  they  bore  was  identical.’ 
A  single  tree  tends  to  maintain  its  individuality. 
If  records  are  kept  in  an  apple  orchard  it  will  be 
found  that  certain  trees  are  high-yielding  trees  and 
certain  others  are  low-yielding.  They  will  always 
maintain  this  relative  position.  Now  if  apple  trees 
are  propagated  from  both  the  high-yielding  trees 
and  the  low-yielding  trees  and  the  two  lots  are  set 
out  side  by  side,  it  will  be  found  that  there  is  no 
uniform  difference  in  yield  between  the  two.  This 
indicates  that  the  differences  are  not  due  to  differ¬ 
ences  in  the  origin  of  the  trees  but  to  purely  local 
conditions  affecting  their  habits. 
The  stocks  upon  which  the  trees  are  budded  have 
a  large  effect  upon  the  performance  of  the  trees. 
Even  though  a  soil  may  appear  uniform,  yet  the  ac¬ 
tivity  of  micro-organisms  in  the  soil  may  be  so  af¬ 
fected  by  slight  differences  in  water  level  or  drain¬ 
age  that  the  whole  nature  of  one  section  may  be 
altered  thereby.  Low-headed  trees  come  into  bear¬ 
ing  earlier  than  high-headed  trees,  and  trees  that 
are  lightly  pruned  bear  earlier  than  those  that  are 
pruned  heavily. 
It  is  the  easiest  and  simplest  way  out,  merely  to 
say  “bud  variation”  and  let  it  go  at  that,  but  it  is 
more  to  the  point  to  endeavor  to  discover  the  con¬ 
ditions  that  may  cause  this  difference.  Something 
may  be  learned  that  will  be  of  value  to  the  fruit¬ 
growing  industry.  ir.  b.  t. 
How  to  Line  Out  Large  Orchards 
IF  you  have  any  data  on  how  orchard  trees  are 
lined  up  for  large  commercial  plantings  I  shall 
appreciate  them.  Most  growers  in  this  locality 
mark  the  orchard  site  with  a  horse  marker.  This 
plan  is  not  as  accurate  as  setting  out  stakes;  be¬ 
sides  if  a  wheel-marker  is  used  on  a  slope  it  has 
tendency  to  slide  down  hill  and  out  of  line,  and 
the  marks  are  liable  to  be  washed  out  by  rains.  But 
the  horse-marker  is  the  quickest  way  that  I  know 
of.  Having  one  man  sight  tc  a  target  and  line  in 
stakes  set  by  another  man,  is  more  accurate,  es¬ 
pecially  on  a  slope.  Having  two  men  sight,  one 
lengthwise  and  another  laterally,  and  another  set 
the  stakes,  thus  lining  in  the  stakes  both  ways  in 
one  operation,  is  much  speedier  than  sighting  one 
way  only  and  going  over  the  job  a  second  time  to 
line  in  the  other  way  also.  But  setting  stakes  is  a 
slow  job  at  best,  requiring  three  men  to  work  to 
advantage;  besides  a  planting  board  must  be  used 
which  makes  planting  much  slower  than  if  the 
ground  were  marked  if  the  marks  would  not  be 
washed  out  by  rain.  I  have  no  data,  but  if  I  were 
to  guess  I  would  say  that  one  man  with  a  team 
will  mark  five  times  as  much  ground  as  tln*ee  men 
will  stake  in  a  given  time.  It  occurred  to  me  that 
orchard  men  have  a  speedier  way. 
If  you  know  where  I  can  obtain  data  of  costs  on 
growing  apple,  cherry  and  peach  orchards  I  shall 
be  much  obliged  to  be  informed.  I  realize  that 
costs  and  time  of  bearing  would  vary  greatly,  but 
some  such  records  would  be  of  interest,  and  useful 
to  a  prospective  planter.  I  want  to  find  the  value 
of  a  peach,  apple  and  cherry  orchard  less  the  land. 
Ohio.  H.  A.  BORLING. 
R.  N.-Y. — There  are  so  many  different  ways  of 
doing  this  that  there  should  be  a  full  discussion  of 
it.  We  use  stakes  with  two  men  to  sight,  but  that 
is  a  slow  method.  We  want  to  hear  from  orchard 
men — telling  just  how  they  do  it  and  why  they 
think  their  plan  is  best. 
THERE  is  just  one  ching  to  say  to  the  dozens  of 
people  who  write  us  about  wandering  hens. 
Most  of  them  feel  grieved  because  the  neighbors  do 
not  want  these  hens  running  over  their  property. 
The  hen  owners  seem  to  feel  that  the  birds  have  a 
right  to  go  anywhere.  That  is  a  mistake.  A  tres¬ 
passing  hen  has  no  more  right  on  a  neighbor’s  prop¬ 
erty  than  a  horse  or  a  cow.  When  she  crosses  the 
boundary  line  off  your  farm  she  has  no  rights  which 
a  farmer  or  gardener  is  bound  to  respect.  When 
you  permit  your  hens  to  go  on  your  neighbor’s  prop¬ 
erty  you  are  legally  in  the  wrong,  and  not  entitled 
to  sympathy  or  redress  if  the  hens  get  you  into 
trouble.  Call  this  a  hard  doctrine  if  you  will,  but  if 
you  keep  hens  at  all  it  is  your  duty  to  keep  them  at 
home. 
