Newspapers / The Progressive Farmer (Raleigh, … / July 18, 1905, edition 1 / Page 2
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PROGRESSIVE FARMER AND COTTON PLANT. Tuesday, July 19Q. NOTES FROM DOUBLE OAKS FARM, About The Progressive Fanner Mecklenbug Crop Prospects Plant Turnips and Sorghum Bit of Dairy Experience. Messrs. Editors : The mail has ar rived; there are four agricultural weeklies in the lot. I have glanced over each one, and I am proud to see that our North Carolina Progres sive Farmer is as neat, clear-printed, and carries as entertaining and in structive reading as any of the pa pers have. I am proud of this be cause it is our own home paper; but there is another way to feel proud 'about it. If the farmers of our State were not intelligent, thought ful men, such a paper as we have could not exist. (I amN glad that young fellow Poe is away from home while I write about The Progressive Farmer. You see I do not want to swell his head by telling him what a good paper he sends out.) A twenty mile drive over a section of Mecklenburg shows the poorest prospects iur uur xtii.j-u.cio j. ctv seen in years. I saw acres and acres of cotton not ten inches tall, the corp is twisted and burned to an extent that means failure no matter how much rain- falls later. Truck patches are burned to dryness, millet and other forage crops have not grown an inch in weeks. I am not a cotton man can't tell what to do ahout the cotton crop, but I am sure there is a chance for us yet to make our corn and forage. Even if we get a plow season by July 20th we can plant various forage crops and make a fairly good yield from them, A few acres planted to sorghum this month will come in powerful handy to feed out next winter. I think it a good notion for all of us cattle feeders to get a hump on us can m forage plants. If there is no silo on vour farm, I would advise a good big turnip patch. Go at it right away. Sow in July, August and September. If you raise a big crop, the cattle, sheep, and hogs will fare better next winter. And boil a pot full for the chickens: -you will hear them cackle. At our cotton farmers' meeting last Saturday, Capt. S. B. Alexan der gave a very entertaining and in structive talk. There was a larger crowd than usual in attendance, and close attention was given to the Captain. I wish I could recall all I heard and give it to the readers, I think all would enjoy reading the Captain's speech, and be benefited by so doing. I am a young man again really -1 did not know I was such a nimble fellow as I am. Necessity limbers up old folks very often. Two weeks back the driver of one milk wagon got mashed on the streets about 3.30 a. m. Verv soon afterwards the 'phone rang old man Moore out of bed and told him there was a load of milk to be delivered by 7.30, and nobody to do it. So the old man got aboard that wagon and lit out. For two weeks I had to mount that vehi cle every morning at 3 o'clock, deliv er until 8, and again at 2 p. m., till 6 p. m. Oh, yes ; I did the work, but I confess it is just a little too lively work for my liking. Young man, if you go to dairying you can count on a like exnerience. You will never get so old but that you will have sometimes to feed, milk and deliver milk. And don't ever get above the work, let it be cleaning cow barn or any other job. C. C. MOORE, Mecklenburg Co., N. C. WHAT AN ACRE OF GROUND DOES. How an Industrious Ex-Confederate Makes It Grow Vegetables for a Fam ily of Fife and $175 Worth for Sale. Messrs. Editors: Visitors to the Charleston Exposition interested in agriculture were attracted by a large picture on exhibition in the North Carolina section. This picture rep resented an old Confederate soldier with his wife and two daughters in their garden gathering peas. This picture was made from a photo graph of !Mr. Lewis Grady's "Unique Truck Garden" in Kinston, N. C. A certain ' seed house has been widely advertising this garden as a specimen' of what can be done when their seeds are used. A fertilizer company has been announcing that the results attained by Mr. Grady were due to their fertilizers. The Department of Agriculture of North Carolina assures all visitors to the State Museum that the remarkable yield of vegetables from Mr. Grady's garden .is clearly due to the soil of Eastern North Carolina. Some of us who have watched the old man's methods of cultivation have gotten hold of the idea that the man has more to do with it than either of the above. Mr. Grady's garden occupies just an acre within the corporate limits of Kinston. From the windows of the train on the A. and N. C. Railroad his garden may be seen about a hun- juiaa tu tiic'nortu or uie rail way track, perhaps four yards east of the depot. There is nothing un usual about the soil. The fertilizer used is a brand commonly used by the truck growers in this section. After preparim? the land in early spring, about the only tools used by Mr. Grady are an ordinary hoe and a smaller hoe of his own manufac ture made from a buggy spring bent at a right angle and bolted to a hick ory hoe helve. Mr. Grady told me recently that he had something in his garden to sell every day in the year. He believes in intensive cultivation. He rents the acre of ground, paying $20 per year rent, and nearly every year raises radish enough in odd corners to pay the rent. One year he sold $23.20 worth of radishes, besides hav ing enough for his family and send ing quite a number of bunches to his friends. He has a great diver sity of crops. This year he planted his peas January 2nq and will con tinue to plant something ut to next January. Throughout the season as he removes one vegetable from the garden he immediatelv plants an other in its place. He grows in his garden radishes, turnips, mustard, garden peas, beans, corn, okra, lima beans, kale and collards. He keeps his ground highly fertilized and works it thoroughly. During the past three vears his in come from this one acre has been as follows : $147.70, $183.50, $181.05. This strikes me as being a fairly good showing for an old crippled Confederate soldier working for a few hours in the morning on one acre of land. He has produced enough vegetables to supply a family of five and then sell in three years $412.25 worth. R. W. SPILMAN. Lenoir Co., N. O. Believes Cow Peas Will Kill Nut Grass. Misers Editors: I see in the last issue of The Progressive Farmer an inquiry as to how to kill nut grass. WVn'lo mv tpta arA not yet conclu sive T believe that cow peas will kill it. Plow and harrow the land as thoroughly as possible; about June 90th harrow in at least two bushels of cowpeas per acre broadcast. .A plow covers too deep. Jrut them m TO;K AicAr harrow. If the soil is poor apply a liberal a quantity of stable manure or fertilizer ricn m amino nin ns vnu can afford. If the sea- son is fairly favorable for peas, and errowth of vines cover the land the nut grass will, I am con vinced, be killed. I smothered it out in several places last year that way, and can so far find none. But the o-rnwth of vines must be dense, and the summer not too dry or a second or even third crop must be grown m snhspnnpnt vears. I have proven beyond question that the densest growth of wire grass can be killed by one good crop o pea vines. But it must be a good one. If I had the choice of two farms of poual natural fertility, one free from wire grass, and one so densely matted with it that you could not nut a t)low in it except in winter when the ground was at its wettest, T should take the latter farm. 1 should take it because I know that the wire grass had greatly enriched it. and that I could kill it at will. In winter I should put in a two- horse plow and turn that wire grass sod bottom ud. This sod I should cut up well with disk harrow, and broadcast peas m June as stated. Then I should be pretty sure to have a good farm, for wire grass permits no washing and improves land rap idly. O. W. BLACKBALL. Vance Co., N. C. upon. A fruit injured by insect d. ecaoe w aiucut is not marketarjl and deserves a hard cut. Some old er judges disqualify such fruit fro the competition. Fairs should be educational in character. Those who attend should see only good specimens, such a? the world markets want, if they are to be benefited by their attendance. The grower should know what is wanted and if he does not, the fair may be a valuable school for him. ALBERT DICKERS. Manhattan, Kan., July 4, 1905. Preparing Fruits for Exhibition. Thr number of countv and district a1sk ocUroirtiaocL io oomlllf all eug- gests that fruit and vegetable grow ers should be getting the plans for horticultural exhibits under way. The exhibitor should study care fully the premium lists and note every class in which he can make en tries and then get his entries ready. Every fruit and vegetable that is to go on the exhibit tables should have the best possible opportunity for de velopment. This will usually require thinning, and sometimes a little pruning in order to give the fruits a chance to color. Every exhibitor must consider his exhibit from the judges' standpoint. While there are at present' no authoritative stancU ards, most expert judges have an outline they follow more or less closely. A general plan for all fruits, established by the Massachu setts State Board of Agriculture, is used m its present or a slightly mod ified form by many judges. It is as follows: Quality, 20 points: form. 15 points; color, 15 points; size, 10 points; unilormity in size, 20 points; freedom from imperfections, 20 points; total for perfection, 100 points. Nearly all points are considered from a commercial standpoint. The over-sized fruit is not wanted by the markets, and over-grown specimens are likely to be cut by the expert judge. Qualitv is ft Tmrrl 110111 r handle, especially with, fruit not yet ripe, ana in such cases is often dis regarded or estimated bv the form and general appearance of speci mens. In competitions of storage fruits, however, it is of special im portance. Uniformity of specimens is a most important matter. Fair sized fruits of even form and color of the proper type make good plates, lhey show to much better advantage than uneven specimens. Freedom from blemishes should be insisted A Serious Waste of Fertility. Permanent stable-yards and night runs for stock are sources of great waste of fertility on too many farms. The reader can doubtless think without effort of a dozen farms where the same yards and night runs have been in use for a genera tion or more. These fields if now broken and cropped would be about as valueless for a considerable time for production as if they had been systematically starved, instead of gorged with fertility for most crops. Where the same fields are neces sarily kept in use for yarding pur poses or driveways, they often can be scraped with profit after several years' use to the depth of two or three inches, the scrapings being used as a top-dressing to spread over fields robbed of their rightful share of this fertility. It is often possi ble to make use of a road-scraper which has outlived its usefulness for highway purposes for scraping the surface of yards and driveways, thereby saving much time and labor. The surface can be sheared off and shoved into windows convenient for. loading in a few hours, where hand labor would require days. A better method of preventing the fertility wastage alluded to is by means of a systematic rotation of yarding-lots often, but not always, possible. The wire fencing1 that is now so largely in use can be rapid ly and inexpensively moved, thus al lowing the space devoted to yards and fence-rows to be kept free from objectionable growths, and to yield in their turn bountiful crops. More busy farmers will adopt such a yard- rotation when once weaned of the permanent-yarding practice than will take measures to save the fer tility from being washed away into the streams. Many otherwise beautiful farm- homes are made sources of annoy ance to the traveling public and an actual menace to the health of the occupants by reason of too close and long continued yarding of stock near the home buildings. In the writer's opinion it is not an overstatement to assert that on not a few farms there is a fertility wastage from stable-yards, drive ways and night-runs fully equal m value to many loads of expensive commercial fertilizers. 13. -t. Thorpe, in Farm and Fireside. Farm work in this section is now in good shape. Wheat has been housed, and, while the crop is hghU pie. Corn and cotton look well and since the wet weather crops have been well cultivated. The only drawback we have had, has been om innhilit-o- tn nlnw fnr neas. bmcc harvest, the land has been too dry to plow. There have been a lew - been but there is much. plowing to do jei. The ground is being soaked to-u-j, and thA nlnws will run every aa- when it clears up until the crop J finished. Pea sowing is a big .lot this section. E. S. Milhaps, 1 Co., N. C.
The Progressive Farmer (Raleigh, N.C.)
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July 18, 1905, edition 1
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