Rensselaer Republican, Volume 15, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1883 — Fann Notes. [ARTICLE]

Fann Notes.

It is said that in England a new use has been discovered for damsom pl ink Farmers are planting quite largely, lees for pies than for dies, it having been ascertained that a beautiful color can be obtained from the ripe fruit. The greater part of the soil of England has been under cultivation for a thousand years, and yet the land is richer and the crops more prolific than they were a thousand years ago. Why, then should so many" thousands of acres in many sections of this country have become so greatly deteriorated in productiveness in a comparatively few yean? Careless and unskilled culture must necessarilg be the answer. The housewife who is on the lookout for little ways to economise, will find it to her advantage; if she has seemless sheets which have been used for several years, to tear or cut them in ‘the center, and sew the outside edges together; laythe and stitch them with a machine Or they may be sewed over and over. Hem the raw edges. Sheets turned in this way will last for a long time. . Field mice may ruin a whole orchard in a single winter by gnawing the tender bark from the trunks of the fruit and other trees. The greatest destraction is done while the earth is covered with enow. At this time the mice burrow from tree to tree, and forage at their free will, under cover of the snow. So soon as the storm is over, the Alow should be

tmmped down around each tree, to shut off the mice. Rabbits may be kept from h® 4re Wame-uiag the bark with blood, or rubbing the bark with refuse meat ; la the New York'Tribune a resident of Oil Creek warns fruit growers against using petroleum on fruit trees’and shrubs. It kills all trees around where it is pumped, and a neighboring orchard that has been painted with it began to decline This applies to crude oil, but others claim that refined oil, as used in lamps is lees harmful It kills lice and destroys the eggs of insects if brushed on lightly in winter, but in summer must not be applied to the foliage exeept when largely diluted with water, which should be kept constantly stirred. Nature suggests in the natural and thick growth of a variety of grasses and weeds together that a mixture of vegetation may yield a larger quantity of vegetable produce from any given area than can be obtained from the growth of one species alone. Actual experiment has shown that a mixture of grasses is usually more productive than the cultivation of a single one. An acre of peas and oats grown to-gether will yield more than half an acre of each sown singly. A field seeded to timothy and clover produces nearly twice as much as when either is sown alone. A pasture sod composed of orchard grass, timothy, red clover, and Kentucky blue grass is in good grazing condition from early spring until autumn the decay of the earlier ripening species furnishing plant food for the species next •coming to maturity.