Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 May 1895 — TOPICS FOR FARMERS [ARTICLE]

TOPICS FOR FARMERS

A DEPARTMENT PREPARED FOR OUR RURAL FRIENDS Tlje Farmer's Garden Is Usually Too Large Underdraining "Wet LandHow to Prevent Bruising Filuit— Always Plenty of Work on the Farm. Thc Farmer'a Garden.' One of the principal mistakes made by some farmers who want to grow vegetables and small fruits, is that the garden is made too large. My experience is that one-fourth acre is suf Relent, except sos growing potatoes and late sweet corn. Another mistake is in laying out the garden. My plan is to have it eight rods long and five wide. Put everything in rows .the long way. Commencing on one side, lay out about one-half of the plat in rows seven feet apart for permanent plants and fruit bushes, such as asparagus, pieplant, grapes, blackberries, raspberries, cfirrants and gooseberries. Some of these will take a whole row; for others a"half row is sufficient. This part of the garden is worked with a onehorse cultivator. The other half can be plowed and harrowed every spring, as only annuals are planted, except a strip for the strawberry bed, which, to facilitate cultivation, should be on the outside of. this half, alternating from one side to the other from year to year. The rows for vegetables may be three feet apart, except for melons and other vines, which will need a double row or more. Use a line and measure to lay out the rows. The tomatoes are trained to a trellis and take no - more room than a row of corn. While the fruit is much finer than when the plants are left to nin on the ground. No spading is necessary, except in dressing the and pieplant beds in the early spring and loosening the soil about the roots of the berry bushes. To get the best results from this small piece of ground, it is essential that it be made very rich with composted manure and that it have thorough cultivation. Run through. It every week with horse and cultivator. Don’t wait for the ground to get weedy. It should be done as regularly as going sto meeting or as wash day is observed in the house. The garden properly laid out and cared for is a thing of beauty. Its usefulness no housekeeper questions. Besides supplying the table with a fresh variety of vegetables for a large part of the year, it will supply fruits and berries, fresh or canned, 365 days. The cash value of tlie product of the one-fourth acre can be SSO to SIOO, and besides, a valuable lesson may be learned of results from rich soil and thorough tillage. - American Agriculturist. ;

Draining Leased Land. An Indiana farmer, J. C. Wainwright, tells, in the Drainage Journal, Ids experience in under-draining eight acres of wet land, which had never produced enough to pay for cropping. The land belonged to a neighbor who could not be persuaded to drain it. Finally he offered to give a five years* lease of the land to Mr. Wainwright, who thereupon set to work to underdrain and crop it. There was a good incline to the field, and 250 rods of drain tile were required to conduct the surplus water and fit the land for cropping. This cost $122.70. The first year oats were sown., The yield was forty bushels per acre, and the crop from the eight acres sold for S9O. No account was made of the straw. Wheat followed the next year, ty-nine and a half bushels per acre, and selling at 60 cents per bushel, or $141.60. The third yield the field was In clover, yielding two tons per acre of hay worth $96 and a crop of twentyseven bushels of clover seed, which sold for $121.50. The fourth year the field was in corn, yielding 504 bushels of grain, worth 40 cents per bushel, or S2OO. After cutting the corn the field was sown with wheat, which yielded thirty-five and a half bushels per acre, or 384 bushels, and was so good that it sold to a seed company at 75 cents per bushel, making $213 for the crop. Mr. Wainwright estimates his expenses for the above crops at S2OO, rent $l2O, ditching-$122.70. Total, $442.70. The total receipts were SS6B, leaving a profit of $425.30, besides which Mr. Wainwright fed on his own farm the cornstalks and the straw from two wheat crops, and the clover hay from which the seed was threshed. The field was turned over to Its owner improved fully 100 per cent. Both parties made well by the bargain, though the neighbor who leased his land to be drained might have done better If he had drained the field himself. Barn Plans. We have three letters asking for plans for dairy barns and economical building. To give advice in regard to building a barn is much like instructing a man in politics; he has his ideas, and many men when advice in given say, “Oh, that Is for book farmers,” if any new, modern ways are mentioned, while others hear the truth gladly. It is difficult to tell a man how to build when the location and conditions are not known. Our own Idea Is that the cow’ stable of the future will not be part of • the barn. The latter will be a storage for hay, grain and the like, nnd the cattle will be kept in an “ell” or additions, so arranged as to afford the most light and warmth, and with special reference to sanitary conditions. That thousands of dollars are needed to build a bam, where hundreds would do as well, is, we think, the economic policy of the future. If for cows, the stable needs to be down on the ground, not with floor stilted up' above the earth to give a chance for a cave of foul smell under the stable. In the future, silos will be used largely for the storing of food, which will largely do

away with the need of great storing places for feed. There is no need sos the high castle-like building if for a dairy barn, and the best authorities now pronounce against two things, manure cellars under the cows, and .haylofts over them to absorb the air and dampness from the cows and stables. .This means a cow stable, separate from the. barn proper. Unneeded capital used in barn building i$ a poor investment beyond the actual need.. A thousand dollars wisely invested will go a long way toward giving a man a good cow stable, light, warm, comfortable and dry, and the storage for silage and hay may even be included in this estimate. Let the plan be made to conform to location and capital and the uses of a barn, and not in unneeded things that often are mere show and an actual disadvanta ge.—-PractiealFarmer.

To Prevent Bruising Fruit. Prof. B. D. Halsted says: “There is no question about the Importance of so far as possible preventing the bruising of fruit. From what has been said in strong terms concerning the-barrier of a tough skin which nature has placed upon the apples, it goes without saying that this defense should not be ruthlessly broken down. It may be safely assumed that germs of decay are lurking almost everywhere, ready to come in contact with any substances. A bruise or cut in the skin is therefore even worse than a rough place caused by a scab fungus as a lodgment provided by the minute spores of various sorts. If the juice exudes, It at once furnishes the choicest of conditions for molds to grow. An apple bruised is a fruit for the decay of which germs are specially Invited, and when such a specimen is placed in the midst of other fruit It soon becomes a point of infection for its neighbors on all sides. Seldom is a fully rotten apple fouhd in a bin without several others near it being more or less affected.” Plenty of Work to Do. The farmer should not worry about work to do. There is steady employment for him on the farm throughout the year both for hands and brains, if he will but see it, and there are endless little resources for making a little more money even during the hardest times. Certainly his lot is by far the better during periods of financial depression. He must suffer the same as all other laboring and business men. There will be less money to buy his goods and a smaller margin of profits. But the soil, and weather are not depressed by any money or business depression, they will often combine at such times to produce larger crops than at other seasons. If the margin of profits is smaller, then the increased yield can partly compensate for the loss. Greater activity in cultivation and study of crops in such years can certainly be made to yield better returns if the weather and soil do not conspire to prevent.

Richer Feed for Holstein Cows, It seems to be generally conceded that the Jersey and Guernsey cows give richer milk than the average of Holsteins and other breeds that have larger frames. But there is great difference in the character of milk given by the larger breeds of cows. It is, perhaps, in part due to difference in feeding, and in part is hereditary. If more rich foods were given to Holsteins, they also will increase the proportion of butter fats in their milk. The first calf of any cow is apt, if a heifer, to give rich milk. Its dam while bearing it has had to provide for some growth of her own frame and for that of her foetus. The fat in the milk is not required for this. Heifers’ milk is usually rich in fats and poor in casein, or the nutrition that makes strength, bone and muscle. The heifer's milk. Is deficient in quantity, and it is better for making butter than for cheese making. Grain Feeding for Young Lambs. Lambs intended for the butcher soon begin to need more nourishment than their mother’s milk will furnish. They should have it in the form of grain. Those that are intended to be kept for breeding should have little or no grain, but be fed a small amount dally of wellcured clover hay. A lamb ten days>or two weeks old will begin to pick at hay placed where it can reach it, and if fed properly will soon eat almost like an old sheep. The greatest care in feeding fattening lambs should be to not give them too much. The sheep is always a delicate feeder, and a quarter of a pound of oats per day Is heavy enough for lambs that are sucking their dams. That is only two ounces per lamb at a feed, but it Is better than more. If the lamb needs more nourishment give it what clover hay It will eat. It is better not to feed the lamb through the owe with grain. That will fatten the ewe, and soon dry her up, besides unfitting her for breeding next year. The breeding ewes should not be allowed to become very fat The Munson Grape Trellis. Grape trellislng, according to the~ Munson system, has proved so successful at the Oklahoma Experiment Station that Prof. Waugh unhesitatingly recommends it for adoption in general vineyarding. According to this system, posts stand six feet out of the ground. At the top a crosspiece two feet long is nailed, and at each end of tfils a wire is run. A third wire Is run through the middles of the posts eight inches below these two, so that the three wires set in a sort of V shape nearly six feet from the ground. This great height is an essential feature of the system, and should not be modified. On this trellis the grape vines spread out as they do where they grow wild in the fruit At the same time the fruit is so far above ground as to be safe from the Intense reflected rays of the sun, which caused more damage in Oklahoma vineyards last year than all other causes combined. The trellis also has many other advantages and only a few disadvantages.