Jasper County Democrat, Volume 7, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 May 1904 — HINTS FOR FARMERS [ARTICLE]

HINTS FOR FARMERS

Should deed PoMsm Bo Cut* The almost universal practice of potato growers in this country is to cut seed potatoes down to two or three eyes, thus decreasing the cost of planting, which is always heavy in growing potatoes unless you do os some people have been known to do, attempt to grow a small patch from the potato peelings. Potato growers in Europe who have made this matter of special study apparently all avoid this method. They plant what they caU big seed, usually from 1,500 to 2/100 pounds per acre. This seems extravagant, yet all the large growers with whom we have conversed follow this method. In fact, on a special patch we have seen as much as thirty-two hundredweight, or sixty bushels, per acne used for seed. According to the report of Consul General Mason the same method is adopted in Germany. Many of the most highly educated and progressive fanners plant as much as 1,5)00 pounds, or thirty-six bushels of sixty pounds, per acre. While few of our readers would care to risk such heavy planting on the whole field it would certainly be advisable to try It on a part of It or in a few rows. We believe there Is sound philosophy underlying this practice. The expense need not be considered provided it pays. Everything depends on that, which can be ascertained only by experiment. We do not think there Is anything in the abjection that the seeding would be too thick. The main strength of the potato would go to one or two shoots, and the rest would either not start or drop off. The dry matter of the potato is mostly starch. The idea of nature is to give the young plant a good strong start until it can establish a root system. The more starch, or, in other words, the larger the potato, the better start, and the greater chances for a full crop.—Dormers’ Advocate.

The Mrawtwrrr Bed. The strawberry neato no cultivation the spring that it fmlts. The all Important thing te to kaep It clear of weeds. If the weeds are very thick a light scraping with a hoe will be necessary. If there are not too many pull them out by hand. A field or bed If much given to weeds will, even after being scraped oot, need more or leas band weeding. If too thick they should be thinned to stand not lees than sis inches apaxt. A garden trowel can tie need to thin a small bed.- Where it has to be dons on a large scale a hoe will have to be called in. And the .man who has to do much of it will repent of not having avoided it ail by not heaping the runners chopped last summer. Wood ashes and stable manure make a perfect fertHlaer lor strawberries. No kind of fertOlaer should be sown on plants when wet with rain, frost or dew or after growth starts. If it has been neglected sow around and between plants. Some kind of mulch should be applied to keep the berries clean. When .ft is to be had, ptfee straw Is an ideal mulch. If pine straw is not to be had. any other kind of grass or straw cun be used.—O. W. BJacknell in American Agriculturist

Whether the farmer should spread ottt and term on a laager scale or ■train oat and boll down his operations depends scsnofVfcast on the man and on his ago, ocaxStJktjs and capital. Bat the majority err an the side of trying to do too much. A sound basis Is better than large cgeratlons. It was lately remarked by a.djsnd observer that his experience move and more convinced him that one of the chief causes of failure was to ran Into debt for a large farm and reserving too tittle capital to make a anooesa An established farmer who bought more land before providing decent Block and equipment for what lend he already had would be sneered at by his neighbors, yet that la practically the position of the man who goes deep Into debt for a big farm without money to carry on the business as it should be done. The man seldom tells who carefully marks out a task no bigger »han he can safely and reasonably expect to accomplish.—. American Cultivator.

ImporUan at Seed Meettoa. lowa as one of theJeadlag com producing states devotes (USOOyOOO acres to corn each year, the average yield being thirty-two bushels per am It Is believed that ten bushels pa acre could be added to this average were accurate and scientific methods of selecting and testing the seed adopted and corresponding care exercised in planting. While this is not jl large matter tor

any one farmer, it nSfibte into the enormous total at £G*OftQfOOO bushels for the whole state, aßiw in iSliqj a aaab value of about $£0)000(000.

(stung BaaptMnj mane There are two Mndfe afcaad raspberry plants, the dormant plants dug and kept in storage and Q» green sucker plants dog in May or Jam » ors the year they are set There is-a difference of opinion among planter as to which kind is best, says an eatenstve berry grower of Oewego county, X. Y. He has had the best results' when planting green sucker plants of either rad or black raspberries. He dtgs them up In May o* early June, cuts back and sets oni at onoe.

Conawfiug Skatertw*. Modstnre must be hekFtn the surface soli by Intelligent cnltnv. Quick culture after rain or Irrigation cannot be too much stressed. To make it more effectual partially cultivate each row to going over the first time. One furrow will usualfy cover seven-eighths of tho surface to a field. The remainder can be reached to tbe return trip to complete the work. —Farm and Ranch.

(•methlns About Birds. Birds have very short fives, but they enjoy them more than we do. They live faster, so to speak, and know more of exuberance the pure joy of living, than wo can imagine. Did you ever think, too, how warmly they are clothed? Feathers are wanner than fur. When we human beings want to protect ourselves from the cold of winter we send hunters up into the froaen north to bring down to us the breasts of the eider dock. Think of that down? One side of it has lain against the warm breast and the*other against the lee floes, and when we have it made up into quilts or garments we find that it keeps us warmer than anything else possibly eoukl.

It is also wonderful to think how light in weight these feathers are which give such warmth. You see, they have to be. A bird eoukl not carry much weight as it cleaves tbe air any more than you eoukl when swimming. How exactly tbe need of the little creature was met when it was clothed to feathers!

Very I llrly. The other day a new baby came to Mr. and Mrs. Jones. A day or two after the baby's arrival little Margaret. aged five, was ashed by Iwt neighbors if her parents bad named the new tittle brother yet “Xo'm,’' was the small miss' answer, “bat they named the vest of us children Jones, so I s*pose they’ll call him Jones too."—Philadelphia Ledger.

ia bMUaut inihntl Sticklebacks, perch, bass and catfish ate among the most easily tamed fish, and the story to tokl of an okl fisherman who day otter day led a large horse mackerel in the open sea with places at the fish be cleaned. It gradually got into the habik-oi coming nearer and nearer to whose the boat was moored until, finally eonvinred that it would not be harmed, it consented to take its daily meal directly from the fisherman’s hand.

When Onuk’m* Bate* the Plea. When gran'roa bake* the pies, you know,’Fm Uokied “e I can be— ■ She’s never made a good thing yet ■ •p-r--ArT not remembered me. She bakes twelve big ones, moss os less An’ then she says: "Oh, my! I do beUsve my hoy mute have A little saucer pie."

Ans when she takes ■an' frills tbs edge Just like her cup cake tin. An’ fills U full o’ pumpkin soup (For I don't like ’em tLin), An’ bakes U Just a golden BrownGee whia, but It smells nice When gran'ma sets U opt to cook Ail atonamon an' sploa But when she hakes the apple pie— Turnovers are the thing. She saro. to make a little man As happy as a king. An’, oh. such tender, puffje crost, With apples In between. An’ so much sugar an* alteptse fm sure was never seen.?

One time she said; “When mothes dear, Wfes just a tiny child She bggged for apple pie. one day Until her ma was wild. There Is no sugar an no frott Except the green grapes yon. But ypu may make a pat of dbQgh Your pie to put upon*'"

Ajaf so she roiled her risen dough Her ma took from the bread An’ went an’ put her grten (rapes tn— It must have been Uhe todBut soil she imagined It a treat Because she named ft pfct She lived a hundred yeare-ego. rm glad U wasn’t II

The United States is thirty-two times as big as Great Britain and Ireland; Australia twenty-six tftneei