AmNovU"'x87h7arm }         HoP  Culture  in  New  York.  541 
alternately  with  stakes;  to  the  third  row  are  placed  stakes,  as  in  the 
first ;  to  the  fourth  row  stakes  and  poles,  as  in  the  second  ;  and  so  on 
through  the  yard.  From  each  stake  are  run  two  strings,  nearly  to  the 
top  of  the  neighboring  poles  ;  two  vines  are  usually  run  on  each  string, 
and  two  on  the  poles.  This  kind  of  training  is  called  tent  fashion, 
from  the  resemblance  of  the  yard  to  a  series  of  tents,  and  is  the  usual 
way  of  training  the  vine  on  strings.  Other  ways  have  been  tried,  but 
this  method  has  thus  far  proven  the  most  successful.  The  chief 
advantage  of  this  method  of  growing  hops  is  that  it  is  much  the  cheap- 
est way,  only  one  pole  having  to  be  provided  where  sixteen  are  used  if 
the  hops  are  poled  in  the  ordinary  way.  The  kind  of  twine  used  with 
the  best  satisfaction  is  coarse  wool  twine  ;  this  costs  about  eleven  or 
twelve  cents  per  pound,  and  it  takes  from  fifty  to  sixty  pounds  to  the 
acre  ;  the  stakes  used  are  worth  two  to  four  cents  each.  When  hops 
are  poled  in  the  usual  way  it  takes  about  1,500  poles  to  the  acre  ;  these 
cost  from  about  twelve  to  fourteen  cents  each.  Another  advantage 
claimed  in  stringing  hops  is  that  they  are  not  as  liable  to  be  damaged 
by  winds  ;  the  strings  giving  more  than  poles  before  the  storm,  prevents 
the  hops  from  being  whipped  together.  The  vines,  however,  do  not 
climb  the  strings  quite  as  readily  as  poles,  and  consequently  it  is  more 
work  to  keep  them  tied.  Another  disadvantage  is  that  they  are  not 
quite  so  conveniently  picked  as  from  the  poles,  and  it  may  be  also  men- 
tioned that  the  idea  prevails  among  some  growers  that  the  vine  trained 
on  strings  is  not  quite  as  productive. 
After  hops  have  got  a  fair  start  in  the  spring  the  growth  of  the  vine 
is  generally  very  rapid  ;  a  number  of  vines  watched  by  the  writer  grew, 
on  an  average,  more  than  six  inches  a  day  for  eight  days  in  succession, 
and  in  favorable  weather  exceptional  vines  have  been  known  to  grow 
ten  to  twelve  inches  in  twenty-four  hours.  But  the  hop  is  about  the 
most  uncertain  crop  ;  the  prospects  of  a  yard  may  be  wholly  destroyed 
in  a  single  hour  by  hail,  which  proves  very  destructive  to  the  vine  ; 
heavy  winds  at  times  lay  the  poles  level  with  the  ground  ;  then  may 
come  lice  or  blight,  either  of  which  is  liable  to  destroy  the  crop  in  a 
few  days'  time  :  only  after  picking  is  well  advanced  is  there  a  certainty 
as  to  what  the  crop  will  be. 
The  hop-leaf  louse  (Apis  humuli)  is  the  great  dread  of  the  hop 
grower  •,  more  hops  are  probably  destroyed  by  this  insect  than  by  all 
other  causes  combined  ;  indeed  growing  yards  are  now  scarcely  to  be 
