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Y ' THE IHDUSTEIAL ASD EDUCATIONAL UTTEBEST3 OP OUE PEOPLE PARASIOUHT TO ALL OTHER COXSDEBATIOKS OF STATE POLICY fOl. I4' EALEIGH, IJ. 0., SEPTEMBER 26, 1899. No. 33 PUBLISHED WEEKLY V,te on your label tells you when your ntfon expires. Receipts for money on is:rji03 will be given In change of date on if not properly changed In two weeks, it IIS. -rOVTI NUANCES. If a subscriber wishes 2i!rf the paper discontinued at the ex I's CS 0f his subscription, notice to that effect ' i kipnt. Otherwise it is assumed that a rfnaceof the subscription Is desired, and cfUwAT-ses must be paid when paper is tiered stopped. rrvRt our risk If sent by reglslered letter 4iey order. Please don't send stamps. .-nri TO Kite wu a.uu change of postofflce. of Advertising Rates: ten cents per agate t1". n..,oi r!ifrnTitf fnr time and soace. t-, jjiiti'" " - TTTteni is marked to remind you that you -.fniiv PTuminft this FamDle coov and I for a year's subscription. Will also 'j mrer on trial 6 months for 50 cents, or v-'t for 25 cents. Or we will send your 'r Wee for one 5"ear 5 ou een( ns 5 in '"V -vt riptions, or free six months for J 3 In 1 subscriptions, at these rates. ivo w.:it intelligent correspondents In every -r xx in the State. We want facts or value. K accomplished of value, experiences of r," plainly and briefly told. One solid, Voastrated fact. Is worth a thousand theo- :e tt,s psogressivb Farmer Is the Official (vc!in of the North Carolina Farmers' State PRACTICAL FARM NOTES Written for The Progressive Farmer by the Editor, and Guy K. Mitchell. It is now certain that the cotton crop is short. We make no claims to the gift of prophecy but increased price cuzht to follow. At any rate it does Kcsjem advisable to ru9h cotton on & market. A Wake county farmer in the spring 0! '95 purchased a Poland Cihna pig; e aime spring he planted three acres cf cotton. K-eping a strict account with each he found he made more pro : from the pig than from the three seres in cotton. D j you see the point la this issue we copy from the Ral eigh Post a letter from Mr. J P. Alli en, of Concord, calling for the organ intion of a cotton growers' trust. We Is nos Know whether or not euch a tia? i3 practicable but the matter toli be ttoroughly investigated. Dcj:3 it in your Alliance. m m m 'Vhat is the Bibcock tester?" ass a corespondent. It is a machine in hered by Prof. Bibcock, of Wiecon s!a Agricultural College, for testing th2 rienness or per csnt. of butter fat b ni'-k. The milk is mix-d with eui phuric acid before testing. With the iir:c i:ii3 which accompany each ma chine, anyone can use it and thus tell which cf his cows are profitable and wbi-ri are unprofitable. V.::n i; cornea to raising tobacco C:l. hzn S dningham, of P jrson couaty, 13 tha champion. Ha is fie largest tob icjo planter in the world, and tbie year, to a speeial from R xoro to the Dizain -un says, he iaised about l . " 1. : 1 1 . . L ...s A T at- ever two million nil's, and bis cp ttis year is nearly one third -r than last. Ho is well pleased, :ith -a r iter says, with th3 condition A writer in an exchange truthfully chat a farm paper musi 'cham fi-a the farmers' rights; to do this it Cicnc: ignore the discussion of eco -c c: editions and sociological q'ies ti--s, difference if the political par arc- involved. There are rascals in STery political party acd in all organ Uiona, and if these rascals defraud fce people, acd especially if they shut ierr nycs to the farmers' interests, it iuty of the farm prees to expose sa if 1 Were to eea an editorial in 4 f-r:;i paper severely roasting a '.'-i-ir friend of mine for his mis--sii id dishonest acts, I certaiDly -i nt refuse,' 03 many would, to J?5- ''.2 paper from theinie again." ; -40! d:ctrine Ltit spread. irji corn for hogs is unprcfit - .rding to Prcf. Cottrell, cf the 7' rlipcriment 8:ation. Prof. f: : : iide careful trials of steam this station with the result t:i ;ni it required 7 5 pounds ' .rned, to make 1 pound of : i oalj G 3 raw, dry corn to - n-:u-ad g-ain" with pigs. The --- iio per pig of the lot fed iT' 1 corn was 104 pounds and of 5 f -d dry, raw corn 151 pounds. pork; 1 bushel corn steamed aiQe Experiment Station made a test r cme years of cooked and raw corn v meal and in every case the raw meal gave best results. Wisconsin Experi ment Station found that raw feed gave best rceulcs in every case io ten trials 8oaking ccrn seems beneficial when the weather is warm enough so that the feed does not chill or freeza. In cold weather it is decidedly injurious. It is questionable which is the better, whole corn or corn meal for fattening pigs. Many tests show slightly in favor of the meal, but not enough to justify much expsnse in grinding. "I would recommend soaking corn 48 hours unless the weather is so warm that it sours," says Prof. Cottrell. The subject of frost t s it relates to the agricultural products of the coun try is one of great importance to farm ers, fruitgrowers, and gardenders. As a means of furnishing in popular form the necessary information in relation to methods of protecting crops from frost, the U. S. Department of Agricu! ture bas had prepared and will soon issue Farmers' Bulletin No. 104, entitled "Notes on Frost." This bulletin was prepared by E B. Qarriott, Professor of Meteorology at the Weather Bureau, and defines frost and the conditions which favor its for mation and states the methods of De tection which have been found prac ticable by actual experiments. It de scribes how frost is formed, the seasons of frost, tells when to expect it, dis cusses methods of protection, and do ecribes devices for preventing rapid radiation of heat, for charging the air with moisture, and for adding moisture to the air. Some facts regarding freezes, which are destructive alike to tender vegeta tion and to plants of hardier growth, are also given, The bulletin says that experiments and observation seem to cs ablish the following facts: The danger of dam age from fxost can bo materially les sened by placing early and tender plants on high grounds and crests, and hardier plants in low grounds and hoi lows. When ground can be selected in the lee, or to the south and east of considerable bodies of water, the dan ger will be further lessened. In the dry climate of the citrus fruis region of California and in the promis ing' fruit districts of Arizona small and numerous fires, preferably of coal burned in iron baskets, have been found to be the most eff ctiva device used for protection against frost; sec ond in point of utility may be placed irrigation; and the practicable process which all jrda the least protection in that reepect appears to be smudge fires. In the crange growing districts of the South irrigation affords the most efib3Cr.ive protection against frost, while in sections where this process cannot be emploved damp smudge fires prop erly handled are best adapted to gen eral use. FARM AFFAIRS. SEASONABLE FARMING NOTES. Bro. Cutchin, a Stanly County Farmer, WritesAs Usual --An Entertaining and Thoughtful Letter. Correspondence of the Progressive Farmer. We are busy pulling fodder. We all do that in tha face of all the experi ment station advice to the contrary. These experiment fnrmers don't eeem to be able to prove to us that we can do better. 8omo are picking cotton and giving 30 cents cvt. for picking. That is about all they can efbrd to pay. Ydt they say in South Dakota hands are scarce and hard to get at $1 50 psr day. The cotton crop is short bere about two thirds of a crop. Re port says it is Ehort throughout the world; yet it is bringing 5$ cents on the market here today. One-half a bale per cere i3 as good as any large tract will average. It cost to break 2 acres 12 00 To list and manure (cheapest) 3 00 44 plow five times 3 00 ' chep throo times 150 " gather 5 00 44 market 50 (It's worth the seed to haul and gin.) Seed to plant 2 acres 50 Interest on 2 aares at $15 1 80 Tax on same 20 A total expense (very lowest) 117 50 One bale cotton at 5 J 2750 A profit of.... $10.00 Whatl Ten dollars profit c a bale of cotton I Whew I The farmers are getting rich ! Anybody would get rich with such a profit I Yes, but you may count all this reasonable and possible, and yet no farmer can make aDy surplus money at it. For your own time must be given to see to this, or it will not be done and then with the means you can command and all your time given, you may count on 20 bales; and ten times 20 i3 $200. This for your ealary and to keep your wife and little ones. Yes, truly you look a millionaire, don't you? You can't figure percentages on a farm like money. No man will secure your farm as he will money. It's only safe by your constant and perpetual at tention. No farmer can live and give his family and himself the privileges and blessings other profeseicna enjoy at present prices. Tae hay crop is good this year. Eve1 y farmer should have plenty of hay. See that you have enough and to epare. If you havo no natural meadows, then make them. Plant clover or peas or rye. You are not a wise man if you fail to raiee enough hay for your own use. The cotton farmer has hurt him self as badly in failing to raiso plenty oi hay as in failing to raise his pork. We are beginning to turn land for "wheat. The crop this year was about as last year. This crop needs a good preparation of the soil. The land should be thoroughly broken and then rolled and harrowed several times. Toen drill in the wheat, three pecks to the acre with not less than 3C0 pounds per acre of eupcrphosphate Pea stubble and cotton land are about equal in pro ducing a wheat crop. Now is the time to make those pigs grow not less than a pound a day. All your winter wood should be up, ready cut, and piled in the dry. Don't impose unnecessary burdens on the women. Give them a good range, a good wash house, well equipped. See that your well is deep enough to give water the driest summer. II wo a garden chicken pro:f . Keep it filled with growing vegetables the year round. Look after the grape vine3 and fig bushes. Lot every farmer raiso his own fruit and nearly every kind. When the winter comes be pre pared. Then enjoy yourself and feast upon the fruit of your labors. Yours truly, W. T, Cutchin Stanly county, N C. Wine ton Times: Such a week of to bacco, Wilson has never had. Nearly 2.000.000 pounds of the yellow leaf has been sold by the farmers cf E istern Carolina cn the Wilson floors, and that means that about $140,000 was turned loose hero in Wilson to pay debts with. Think of i. ! TREE MURDER IN AMERICA. At a recent public banquet one of the cfiicsrs of one of our largest States el ghted the erljrts that have been made for the preservation of our woods by placing as first in importacca the development of wood pulp and other industries in the threatened districts, writes Ch&s. M. inner, in a recent issue cf the 8aturda E zoning Post. To give a passing wege to a passing population he would destroy forests that, intelligently protected, would furnish work and wages for centuries. Americans are the most wasteful of people. Tney have a big and fertile country, and they act as though it were impossible to exhaust its re source. But the immense increase in its growth, the constant enlargement of industries that require the destruc tion of naturU material, must bringus to a pause. Natural gas was burned without stint just after its discovery, with the result' that only enough re mains for three years. We are tcld that the anthracite supply in this country, cannot last much more than a hundred years longer. Already some of the prairie lands that were believed to be inexhaustible, requiring but one plowing a year to keep them fertile, are tired out, and demand to be fed. And most astonishing of our wastes is that of our woods, In which rests one of our beet sources cf wealth and on which we rely for wter. Whether we use timber for houses and ships cr not, we must drink, and in chopping off our forests we are reducing our spring, s: ergo, our brooks, rivers and ponds: ergo, the fertility of the land: ergo, the population thereof. Ic has been . explained again and again, yet seems ever to require new emphasis, that the trees act ai um brellas to protect the fallen rains from auick evaporation and give time to them to soak into the soil ; also, that they create, with their fallen leaves and decayed branches, the vegetable mould in which succeeding forms of plant life find their nutriment. Strip a hill of its timber, and the rain runs swiftly down, causing a freshet in the river at its foot, because there is noth ing to stay it. Worse still, it carries more or less soil with it, so that in a little time the hiil is bared of its rocky frame. The mischief is that it re quires years and years to repair a damage that a party of woodmen can indict in a day. Tae demes cf granite one sees in the Adirondacks and on Mount Desert show how difficult it is to persuade vegetation back again when rocks are bare of mould for rocthold. In other places that have been reforested, through a natural increase in the woods and consideration on the part of the lumbermen, the water has not come back with the trees. The mould that held the springs has been dried and washed away, and centuries must pass before a new sponge is created by the slow deposit of aged trunks and fallen leaves. This cutting is deplorable. It im plies not merely the destruction of beauty, which is cause enough for lamentation, but hardship, especially in the country districts ; it implies a lessening number of birds, our bright, tuneful, useful little friends, because they cannot secure nesting places; it implies a check on the fertility of the surrounding country; it implies disas trous fl )ods in spring, when the snows melt, there being no soil to hold the moisture and no sceen of limbs or leaves to shadow the drifts from the northing sun; it implies a lessening rainfall, with increasing drought; it implies the ultimate converson of de forested tracts into desert. The case of Spain is a familiar one. It was once well wooded and was capable of sustaining a large agricul tural population. Its trees were re lentlessly hewn down by greedy spoil ers, with the result that, in time, dis tricts once fertile became rainless and duswy, the vegetable mould disap peared, the streams dwindled, and the population was driven from the soil into the cities, where many became beggars, adventurers, or laborers at uncongenial tasks for wretched wages. To this day the arid districts remain as Nature's protest against man's destruc tiveness and selfishness. There is a remedy for thi3 and it is time it was 1 applied. Ic consists in scientific forestry. It is not necatsiry to restrict the cutting cf timber to a great extent. It needs only a little intelligence and a little after work in planting. A hill should never be de forested. The largest and oldest trees should be chosen for cutting. In piece of every one cut down a sapling should ba planted. In many of the trac's de vastated within recent years thousands and hundreds of thousands of trees have been destroyed and not a single one set out to replace them. Yot we have officials who can defend such proceedings 1 It is appalling. In the parts of the Old world that claim to bo enlightened the authorities have baen compelled to institute re forms, for there was a general alarm over the drying of the springs and the failure of the rivers. Tne Rhine, the Rhone, the Elbe, the Danube in fact, most of the important rivers of Europe have subsided by several feet, and not only the navigation, but the health, convenience and industries of the peo pie have been correspondingly affected. To stay this devastation, to restore, if possible, fatness to the soil and depth to the streams, boards have been created to guard the forests, prevent needless destruction by choppiog and by fire our own forests have suffered much from the carelessness of hunters and miners in leaving fires burning in the woods to study the effects of soil, climate and locality, and to plant lib erally. Tarough the beneficent opera tions of tha forestry boards districts have been redeemed, industries have been preserved and restored, and the beauty and prosperity of several lands favorably affected. We, who have more natural advantages, must be less wasteful or we shall not have them. Says the Durham correspondent R il eighPost: From the present outlook Durham will sell more leaf tobacco this year than ever before in her his tory. Already the warehousemen are handling a quantity of the weed, and several of the old leaf dealers have told me that fourteen or fifteen million pounds will be sold here this tobacco year, units 3 all signs fails. BROAD GAUGE REMEDIES SUG GBSTBD FOR BROAD GAUGE EVILS. The S juthern farmer is not happy. I do not propose to consider all the causes of this, but I am impressed with four features of the situation as deserv ing of more than a passing thought. These are : (1). Credit farming. 2). A lazy man's market. (3) . The plow and the loom too far apart. (4) . Bad transportation. CREDIT FARMING. ''Credit farming is the result of be ing compelled to farm without capital." This fallacy looks to be a plain truth ; it is a plain absurdity. Farming is not speculation. It is not play. It is not idle dreaming. It is business, and business is not done in this year of grace without capital money capital, brain capital, energy capital. The farmer who has these three forms of capital uses them in his businef s The farmer who lacks one or all of them hires what he has not. When you hire a workman you be come a master, he a servant. When you hire capital you acquire a master and become a slave. A clave may make a profit out of the business of being a slave, and in time may buy his free dom. Not many crop lien slaves, how ever, ever realiza this possibility. Most of those who do are those who hire only money capital. Those to whom the merchant must also "furnish" brains and energy eventually realize the boast of one of them who said: "When I can't make a living working six months in the year I will quit." He clearly meant he would q iit farming, as he had not made a living in years. The great barrier to the crop-lien slave's emancipation, however, is the fact that, in his case, the furnishing merchant is the real farmer. He does not plant according to his judgment, but according to his orders He culti vates also by order, gathers his crop by order, markets it by order, and by or ders from the same source arranges his plans for another crop. This man will never do his best farming till he can get the merchant out of the posi tion of boss, and the merchant will be boss till the slave is able to 'furnish" himself. A LAZY MAN'S MARKET Said a successful farmer to me re cently : 'The average farmer is bady diligent but brain lazy. He is willing to work with his hands, but not with his head. What crops he can make only by hard study and real thinking he will not plant." Cotton is a brain lazy crop. Brain lazy to plant, make, gather and sell. The merchant also is brain lazy. He is the farmer's middleman . Ha brings the farmer and his market together. Many times, most times, the farmer has neither time, money, information, experience, confidence, nor, possibly, ability to hunt a market. He must plaat for the merchant's market for a lazy-man's market. Cotton sells itself for money or a debt receipt. No other possible Southern farm crop does. Hence the more hziness the more cotton. PLOW AND LOOM TOO FAR APART. Som3 years ago the center of the iron industry of this country was at Pitts burg, Pa. The city was furnace gird led. The smoke of the smelter's fires was a curtain by day and a blanket by night. Tne town lost its name and was known as the Snoky City." Whoever would smelt iron built a fur nace there because it was orthodox business doctrine that the factory should be neighbor to its competitor. A mixture of iron and rock called ore, lime to flux it, coal to melt it, all were hauled from a dozen to a thousand miles that orthodoxy might preserve a business "center," and the pick and the furnace dwelt apart. O-ie day there appeared a heretic. He said the furnace ought to go to the field. He had the assurance to paint out that Pittsburg was paying long freights on five and more tons cf some thing for every ton of pig iron made. His heresy was to make a short haul of the ore, fiix and fuel and a long haul of the iron a short haul of the five tons acd put the long haul on the one ton. Iron orthodoxy laughed him to scorn. Capital, however conservative, is not reverent. Business heresy is good doc trine if it can show a profit. Away out near the end of one of Pittsburg's long hauls a furnace was built. The miner's pick was its nearest neighbor. From within rifleshot of its door came ore from one hand, lime from the other and coal from bat ween the two. Pittsburg was then putting on the market at Chicago a certain grade of iron at a cost of upwards of $20 per ton. The heretic's furnace soon sold better iron in Chicago at $16 and made a good profit. It was his derided short haul on the five tons and long haul on the one ton. He had saved the freight on what the furnace must handle but could not sell. Tc-day Pittsburg sees the sun every day and the stars every night, and the center of the iron industry of America is where Dixie is eung. South Pitts burg, Birmingham, a troop of the.lr nearest of kin are children of the mar riage the iron heretic negotiated; of the wedding at which the pick and the furnace exchanged vows while iron orthodoxy forbid the bans. Where the plow and the loom have set up housekeeping they are begetting a like healthy progeny. But many a South ern plow has not yet found many in deed have not yet sought a loom affinity, Southern iron has made heresy or thodox. The factory is seeking the farm. What is the farm doing? BAD TRANSPORTATION. The farmer pays a great many taxes. A few of them are levied by the law, some by nature, more by the farmer. Transportation is a tax that all three join in assessing. Nearness to market lessens this tax. II j w do you measure nearness, in miles or in dollars? I talked recently with a farmer who estimated that it cost him fifty cents a bale to haul his cotton the forty miles from his farm to the railroad. The next evening an other farmer figured out for me that he was paying 'eix bits," seventy -five cents, to haul his cotton twenty three miles to the same town. The man who was seventeen miles farther was twenty five cents a bale nearer. It costs $58 to get a hundred barrels of flour from a certain mill to its mar ket ; $98 to get a hundred barrels from another mill to the same market. The first mill is 27 per cent, nearer in miles and 41 per cent, nearer in dollars. Which measures the business distance, the miles or the dollars? Forty miles over a dirt road is a long way from market, whichever way it is measured. A large percentage of the crops and live stock of the Southern farmer is produced at some such dis tance from the railroad, while it is said that it is impossible for a man to get twenty miles, almost impossible to get ten miles, from a railroad town in large areas of the corn and wheat-growing sections of the United States. And when the Southern farmer gets to his railroad town he finds rail rates much higher than does the corn and wheat farmer. W. A. Parker, in Southern FarmMagezine. SOME BIRD AND SNAKE NOTES. An article on this sub j act by Mr. H. H B i mley, the efficient curator of the State Museum, recently appeared in the Raleigh Post. It contains informa tion of special Interest to farmers. The science of zoology as applied to economic conditions is yet but in its swaddling clothes, says Mr. Brimley, and until investigators have gone much more fully and deeply into the intri cacies of this interesting and economi cally valuable subject we shall still have to judge our bird and animal neighbors by appearances and surface indications only. Thus, most farmers will say that all hawks, owls, snakes, etc., are his enemies. It is of little use to tell one that the big "hen hawk" he shot this morning never killed a chick en in its life, but has destroyed hun dreds or even thousands of noxious (or to us noxious seeming) field rats acd mice and insects. Or that the large, black eyed 'hootowl" caught in the steel trap set on a pole was not the robber that had been devastating his hen roost for so long, but that it had helped him in his nightly q larterings of his fields after the numerous cotton rats and field mice that infested them. L?t us look a little deeper into this economic business, Here is a great horned owl (Bubo Virginianus), just killed. On dissecting his crop and stomach what do we find? Rabbit, chicken and field rat remains. Of course the chicken was a dead lo?s to the farmer, but the rabbit had been gnawing the bark off his young fruit trees and the rat had baen eating hia ooKTurrjizD cs pags 8
The Progressive Farmer (Raleigh, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
Sept. 26, 1899, edition 1
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