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J i' f I r THE INDUSTRIAL AM) EDUCATIONAL OTERESTB OF OUR PEOPLE PARAMOUNT TO ALL GIMME O0SBIDM&TI0IS 07 STATE POLICY. -3 ol. 16- Raleigh, N. C, January 14, 1902. . 3 , , t- " - 1 llo. 4ft I Agriculture. MB. COOLMAH'S SIJOIHDEE. I ..eknll Has Fot Yst Convinced Him . . i ... I. U.. las lpondeace of The Progressive Farmer, j j do not lite to rush into print for j argument with a gentleman and aoholar, and especially with one at can handle his subjeot so well cm Mr. Blaoknall ; but it is a sure 9 mma la tmifitin O Tl fbat has already been said may cause some man to terrace his land 'in the wrong manner. THE POINT AT ISSUE Let it bd understood that the only about which I beg to differ Trftn Mr Blacknall is this : He claims that a terrace to prevent land from washing should be laid off on a level, and I olalm that it should have at least three inches fall in flf ty feet. It is impossible to keep all the water on the field at the time of a tard rain, and if we do not fir a place to carry it off, it will fix one of Its own. Ana nis one oi us own will generally be straight down the hill across the rows, leaving a small gully at first that will get deeper every hard rain. Mr. Blaoknall surely knows that ten minutes of hard rain would over flow a level terrace of two feet bijb, while if it had some fall the water would be gradually carried off and the land below the terrace would be protocol. It is generally the water that cosies from far up the hill and gath er! strength, on it way that does the 'bad work. If you can control that i md carry it off where it should go, 'ton will proteot your land from .ashing. There is no one that hates I to see a field of good snii washed nv mnrfl than I do. It is often cheaper to buy other land than to restore badly washed away fields. After reading what Mr. Blacknall has raid, I am compelled to think that his Und is SOT SO HILLY OR SANDY nor so davoid of vegetable matter as the lands here. His system maybe all right for fresh or grass lands His instrument for lay ing off terraces ia cp to date I havo often wfshed that I had jast such a one, but have never had a chance to buy one. A. F. COOLMAN. Gaston Co . N. O. SASSY FARMER'S TALKS. LVIII. Oorretponienceof The Progressive Farmer. 1 wish t add something to my last -week's talk on eggs and poultry. Hens that cannot get bugs, worm aud fo d of that kind must have ome substitute in order that they may lay eges. The best substitute is BONE ASD MEAT SCRAPS. It does nos require a large amount but it mnst be given often enough to supply the demands of the hens. contain a large amount of bony material ia their legs and the coveriDj? that we call shells. Take the omimon grasshopper, and you ill find the bones of his legs on the outside while that of the hen is on the in-ide, but eoh has the bone ttost suited t ) ita life. We mention tbia to 8io w the necessity for sup plying this inject food in some other form. We have given red pepper in warm ma le from o orn meal in the morniC3 when tho weather was ver d. Anions tho grains whioh give themon satisfaction in the produo Non of ejgS i8 rouh rioe. We have B'e(i it very advantdgeonsly this Way. &aie claim tht if hens are fed on exclusively and have a large range ua on that they will lay all rouh the fall and winter. There is-one faot that every egg - Producer should keep in mind, and that U RKSS MUST TAKE EXERCISE & Sreat deal of it, in order to lay ; &Q'i vre are of the opinion that exer l9? has as much to do with the pro t ,a,)f eg-aasthe food. When fed KridU hk9 at9' rice et0 ' tt e i it makes the hen scratch mi re n when corn is fed. Give hens u the corn they will eat up clean vAr a few days and you will soon see mem Bitting sua xor nours. THE BREED has a great deal to do with egg pro duction. Show us any very active, restive hen and we will vouoh for her laying qualities, henoe let the very large breeds severely alone Any breed will lay in the spring when eggs are only worth 7 cents per dozen. We do not want any ohiokens with feathers on their legs. We like as far as we have tried them the following breeds and in the or der named : Brown Leghorn ; White Leghorn ; Plymouth Rock crossed on our native ohiokens. Mary Jane wanted some Buff Cochins, and with a little effort soon had a good number of hens. Bat after trying them a year or two she gave them up in disgust, after find ing she could not get any eggs dur ing the TTinter. If you want the best layers for winter, you must have pullets hatohed not later than the first of May. Old hens will not lay many eggs before they become broody. No hen that does not lay 100 eggs a year will be profitable. Harry Farmer. Columbus Co , N. C. GOOD 7 ASHING FAYS. The Wadesboro correspondent of the Charlotte Observer writes that paper under date of 25th ult. : 'In an interview witu Mr. W. E. Crosland last night, your correspond ent called some valuable lessons in farming. Mr. Crosland is the active member of the Everett and Crosland farm, looated in Richmond county, and Marlboro oounty, South Caro lina. He said that twenty-two years past, last January, Capt. W. E Everett and he invested $10,000 each in 1,600 acres of land and farm para phernalia. On the first of January last they took an inventory and found that, after having lived on the prooeeds of the farm, edoatea sev eral children, and each member drawing out $10,000during the twenty-two j ear, there yet remained, in cluding mo ieys on hand, real estate, farm products unsold, stock, cattle and personal effeots, over $110,000 in asset. They now have 8,000 acres ot land in a high state of cultivation with everything needful for success ful farming. These flgarea show a profit of 33 per cent, in round numbers ptr annum. "Mr. Crosland says there is no man living who can make a success farming who persists in planting any one crop, be it ootton, corn, to baoco, pinders or what it may. Tfce only practical way to make planting pay is to rotate your orops and diver sify your farming. "The success of these gentlemen only shows that a farm judioiously managed is profitable and that the laok of success among the majority of planter is due to mismanage ment." A profitable half acbb Prof. John W. Lloyd, of the Illi nois Agricultural College, plantei a one half acre farmer's garden. He reports Iiih experience as follows : "If nothing ia charged for the use of the land or tha manure, the total oo.t would be summarized as fol lows : Seeds and plants, $5 45 ; in secticides, 50 oents ; labor, $26 11; t )tal, $32 06. In return for the expenditure the garden furnished a continuous sop ply of fresh vegetables throughout the growing season, with enough sweet corn for drying, tomatoes for oanning, cucumbers, pepper,cabbase, string beans and green tomatoes for pickling ; onions, beets, carrots, par snips, balsify, winter radishes, cab bage and celery for winter use and parsnips, horseradish and salsify left in the ground for spring. These vegetable oould not have been bought in the usual way for less than $83 81. This leaves a balance of $51 78 in favor of the garden. What other half-acre on the farm pays as well?" It is aU but useless to. plant seeds when the springtime is gone ; the harvest of characters must depend in part upon planting the soil in the time of awakening. Ex. TIMELY FARM TOPICS. Correspondence or The Progressive Farmer. More grass for the oows and more beef, poultry and vegetables! This should be the war cry for the year 1902 Supplement your tobacco and ootton crops by growing all home supplies. Peas for table, for stook and as land improvers, also timothy and orchard grasses. Lands that you have TURK ED OUT TO BROOM SAGE try one more time by breaking to the depth of fifteen inohes with a coulter olose and fine as soon as you can get to it. Then sow to peas, turning the peas in with one horse turn plow and then harrow. The old lady said when there is plenty of oorn made there is plenty of everything else; where corn is scarce everything is scarce. She was about right. The foundation of success is in having enough home supplies. Anything poorly fed will show it in the returns they make. My land that gets the best feed and in great est quantity gives the best clear profit and holds a reserve profit after it has made the delivery. North Carolina lands are capable of produoing THIRTY BUSHELS OF WHEAT per acre. But some farmers say that land does not produce as in old times. Why so? A Mr. Hiatt said to me that he sowed twelve bushels of wheat and the following year threshed out six hundred bushels. Fifty ' bushels to the aore and that was a year of muoh oom plaint of poor wheat orops ! An old gentle man said to me to-day that a man oame and bought a traot of poor land and he himself said he was sorry that the man had come to starve so near him. Bat he made thirty buh els of wheat per acre and now has one of thb finest farms 'n all that seotlon. Cow peas was this man's manure crop. Again, I thoroughly agree with many of your writers for The Pro gressive Farmer in the faot that land properly cultivated does not get tired and worn out as an old horse Deepen the root bed and put it in proper shape for the chemical aotion of light and heat and old. Feed the plants from above as well as from below. BUYING WESTERN MEAT A. YD FEED. Another mistake is (his: Let sjme one make a great suooes in any line of business; the ru:h of others make what is called an over production ootton and tobacco, for instance. Now we are eating beef steak from the market at fifteen cents per pound and pork steak the same. In my boy days we sold beet at three and four cents per pound, and such a thing as eating Western meat was not known here. Baled hay was a curiosity. We have fine grass lands, good climate to grow stook. When a man is in a rut he con tinues until it is too late to pull out, or rather he is fearful it may be worte for him. The safe man grows all his surplus at home, muoh or little, if he makes farming a success. Wnen hay, corn, wheat and oats are plentiful it so easy to have Iresh beef, pork and fowls ; then the vege table garden full of a variety of all kinds of taole suppliers then home is something worth the name. Chick ens and eggs that sold in my boy dys at six and eight cents are m.w selling at twenty-five oents and hens at thirty-five cents. And yet some people ory hard times. When a mac makes his own hard titrea, why complain of the government making hard times? Home surplus make up muoh of home oomfotrs. MARKET FOR VEGETABLES. When our vegetable growers learn to grow suoh vegetables as may be shipped on quick time, they need not be afraid to grow in large quantities. No one need complain that he has no market. The celery used in our town, for instance, muoh of it prob ably comes over five hundred mile.'. Kraut will bear shipping a thousand miles; potatoes hundreds of miles, roast ng ear 4 and some others will bear shipping. Salads of the tender ttnl various kinds will not bear trans portation a long distance except in oool weather. We are delighted with growing and eating. THE SALSIFY OR OYSTER PLANT something that is not generally grown here in North Carolina. It is for winter use and served in differ ent ways. Good cooks make of it one of the finest of table dishes. Any person will soon become fond of suoh a dish. The plants stand in the ground all winter like the parsnip or carrot ; cold does not seem to hurt them. The vast root orops are o )m ing more into notice and the sooner the better. R. R. Moore. Guilford Co., N. C. TREATING A BABLY DRAINED SOIL. ttrrespondence of The Progressive Farmer. Drainage of a heavy, thick soil, in olined to be hilly and uneven, is something that is not always an easy matter, but if one has suoh a farm the sooner he begins to make the improvement the better. It is waste of time and money to attempt farm ing on a field that demands drainage badly, and it is wisdom to abandon the farm entirely or begin to drain it. 1 have suooeeded so well with a home system of drainage with stone that it may be worth recording. The soil was at first quite full of stones, whioh I first picked off and piled in one part of the field. A tew stones would work up to the surface every spring, and these I would also piok up. In the oourse of a fe v seasons had a fairly good soil without many stones to annoy me. But the drain age was bad. The water would settle in the soil and on the surface in the spring, and the land was always late in getting into tillable condition. It was oold and wet when most other soils were dry and warm. This made plowing late, or if done early a muddy and unpleasant task. The land sloped down in one general direction, but there were numerous depressions whioh collected the water all al ng I decided to drain. I planned the whole thing out on paper, noting the general direction of the slopes. 1 oould not afford tiles or any expen sive material, and so I decided to use the piles of stones. I plowed'deep ditohfs across the land, making them all run parallel with the main slope, and cutting cross-ditches in the op posite direotion. In this way the whole soil of the field was drained so that the surplus water would run into main ditches and thus down to swampy levels. Then I proceeded to fill in the ditches with the stones, using the large ones first, and plaoing them so that the largest pos sible spaces would be left between On top of these I paoked the smaller ones, and on top of them plaoed a !ayer of straw and corn stalks. Then I topped it off with six inohes of b dl, bringing the surface up to within h few inohes with the general level of In field. Now this drainage work perfectly. The soil is never clogged with surplus water I do not plow over the drains, but I have permitted a sod of grass to form on them te rn ark their course. The water fol lowing the line of the ditohen drain off below the surface, and there is a steady outpour in the main ditch in rainy weather. The cost was only T:at of my own personal iabor. C. W. Minners A NUT FAR 11 FOR FORSYTH Winston Journal : A nut farm is one of the latest endeavors in the way of enterprise by one of our citi zms Mr. Frnk Jenkin?, who has just returned from Texas, has pur chased a large quantity of plants and is arranging to go into the nut rais ing business on a large scale CiOt R A. Jenkins has a farm two miles northwest of Winston admirably suited for this business and Mr. G F. Jenkins is now having planted there six thousand plants of pecan, walnut and chestnut. It will require a number of years before these plant will grow sufficiently to bear There are now planted on this farm about two thousand fruit trees and it is expected to increase this num ber to five thousand. Horticulture. THE OUTLOOK FOB STRAWBERRY GROW ERS AT THE SOUTH. Correspondence of The Progressive Farmer. Although some editors have taken issue with an estimate printed by us that the total annual sales of the strawberry product of the United States are $ LOO, 000,000 a stupend ous sum it is true, but one whioh we do not consider far wide of the mark there can be no question that it is very large indeed. B jth supply and demand is increasing and in a health ier ratio than in many years past. In faot gluts in the large strawberry markets of the North and North west were not nearly so frequent in the past decade as in the one pre vious. The worst glut that we ever ran into was in Philadelphia in 1886. There are several reasons why these gluts have not been nearly so frequent or so disastrous as in the past, The wise distribution of ship ments by shipping associations, pre venting congestion in any one mar ket, has been a potent f aotor to this good end. Discrimination as to varieties and the growing of fine berries as well as such kinds as carry well has had great effect. Better pioking, packing and handling gen erally has surely done muoh. But probably the greatest faotor of all has been THE PERFECTION OF REFRIGERATOR TRANSPORTATION. Ten years ago strawberry ship ments went into market mostly with out refrigeration. They were like the manna that fell in the desert hey must be eaten, eaten quickly, or they were naught. They did not admit of very wide distribution from the point of receival, but must be sold and consumed comparatively near at hand. All this has be m ohanged by re frigerator transportation. The ber ries under proper management ar rive in market firm, fresh and oold. If they arrive too late for that day s ale the berry market on Pier 29, New York, where the oars aie un loaded on, being ferried over from Jersey City, the terminus of the road running from the South, open at 2 a. m. they can be kept fresh in the oars for the following day. If prices are better at any other market with . in a day's run by rail the oar oan be re-shipped to that place. If it is neoessary after opening the oar t distribute the shipment to small towns by express, the berries are of course far better able to stand this reshipment than if they had oome without refrigeration. Of course BETTER PRICES OAN BE OBTAINED under the new conditions than under the old. Besides the business admit of very wide expansion if wisely managed. There oan be no question thtt the strawberry is the most at tractive fruit that grow. Daring its season it comes nearer being a staple article of diet than any other fruit. Its color, its fragrance, its earliness all co-operate to draw buyers. It is surprising how many pep'e boy first rate strawberries even when psioes might seem to keep them above the range of the ordinary pocket. When they get lo w enough so rut il at 10 cents a quart-a price that still bears a profit to the grower the demand is almost without m t, provided the quality be fairly good All these things should give heTt to the progressive berry grower, the man who plants good varieties, cul tivates them well and handles thrn well. His business is no longor the haphazard, "liead on fire" cabling that it once was. These toward cir cumstances have elevated it into A STABLE BUSINESS and given more certainty to it, and made expansion practicable. There is no reason why it sho ld not be expanded in keeping with other interests of the country now booming with suoh a will, provide i fair business judgment is used. A novice should not expeot to make a fortune at it quite as fast as the average novice would like. Hard work and horse sense are uufortun- ately as requisite here as anywhere. Bat THE RETURNS ARE QUICKER than in other lines of frutt growing. A little over twelve months and at the far South a much shorter period intervenes between seed time and harvest. The returns to the acre are larger than in almost anything else, but the outlay of money and labor is also. . It is hardly necessary to reiterate the caution against a beginner being too greedy, trying to make all the money there is at one master stroke. Let the beginner begin at the bottom and work up as to aoreage. It beats beginning at the top and working down. Then too he might have to repeat the experience of the Irish man who said that a fall was noth ing; the trouble being there was a sudden stop at one end of the fall. O. W. Blaoknall. Vance Co., N. C. POTATOES FOB PROFIT. Otirrespondence of The Proeresslve Farmer. The difficulty of raising good pota toes is due as muoh to the soil, seed and olimate as to any method of cul ture, and it is often useless for farm ers in one section of the country to attempt to compete with those in more favorable plaoes to raise femoy potatoes. Yet I believe it is only the fancy stook that pays. Ordinary potatoes do not pay any more than ordinary yields of a or op prove profit able. We must be able to raise large, fancy potatoes, and extra large orops, to make this business pay. Then, indeed, we have a specialty that one oan depend on to prove very profitable. As I said at the beginning, pota toes are largely a matter of location, olimate and soil. If these are not naturally supplied I oonsider it profit less work to attempt to raise these produots for commercial purposes. It is far better to devote the time and attention to other farm crops. Bat supposing these to be supplied, it is then only neoessary to study the most approved methods of potato culture to find success. The first essential is to see what the market demands. So called fancy potatoes are always of a fair, uniform size. The abnormally large potato is neither profitable to raise, nor in great demand. It takes . too long to oook it, and housekeepers do not want it. A moderate size and uni form throughout is the most desir able crop that we oan desire. Plants that yield heavily of suoh potatoes are the best for commercial uses. Next to size, the color and oondition of the skin should be considered. The delicately-pink-tinted potato is the one that attracts attention, and invariably receives the prize. To obtain this the seed must first be selected with that in view. If one oan give the potatoes the right soil and fertilizer this tendency to a thin, pick tinted skin will beoome empha sized. Undoubtedly both the ap pearance and quality of the potatoes are greatly influenced by the soil and fertilizers. Some soils produce fine commercial potatoes without muoh effort on the part of the farmer. The potatoes require particularly an evenly-balanced fertilizer of nitro gen, sulphate of potash, and phos phoric acid. This should be supplied in the proportion of about 4 per cent, of the first, 18 per cent of the second and 6 per oent. or the third. Tfiis fertilizar is strong enough, ho wever, at first to burn the y ung sprouts of the seed, and consequently it must be put in t e t rench or hill lmg enough before planting to permit it to beco a dissolved and chemically mixed with trie scil. In any case the fertilizer hhould be mixed with the soil so that it will not come in direct contaot with the potatoes. Alight soil wih plenty of the right fertiliZ3r will keep the potatoes from grow in? muddy and soggy in appearance, and tinge it with the bright pink oolor that is so much desired by housewives and market men. W. O. Haverland. Long Island, N. Y Earth's noble-t thing, a woman perfected. Lowe'l.
The Progressive Farmer (Raleigh, N.C.)
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Jan. 14, 1902, edition 1
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