The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1884-06-19
OUR RURAL TOPICS.
Some Practical Suggestions for Our
Agricultural Readers.

y
application of sulphur in manures to green
crops is to induce club-root disease He attrib-
uteS the widespread disease in turnip crops to
the extensive use of sulphuric acid in dissolv-
ing phosphates, which did not seem to have
been foreseen by Liebig or LaWes. The phos-
phate experiments on turnlps in 1881 showed
the efficacy of insoluble mineral phosphate as
only slightly under that OF soluble mineral
phosphate; in 1882 they showed that all the
phosphates used in the previous season con-
tinued to act beyond the first year, not except
ing soluble phosphate and last year they con-
funed the tendency of sulphuric acid to cause
! club-root disease. and hence farmers were
warned TO avoid soluble phosphates, as well as
most trade mixtures which almost invariably
contained much sulphuric acid The results of
potash experiments on turnips showed that
! potash is essential: that its place cannot be
/ taken by soda; that provided a sutficiency OF
nitrogen and phosphate be given practically
| indentical results may be expected from all the
/ following forms of potash, viz, phosphate OF
! potash, nitrate of potash, carbonate OF potash,
! sulphate of potash, and chloride OF potash;
| that however, potash salts whose acids are not
required by plants (such as the sulphate and
/ chloride) positively injure or even kills the
/ plants and that such injurious action may be
/ avoided-for instance, by soda tset free from
nitrate of soda or by a suliciency of organic
/ matter contained in the soil.
teach the same lessons, viz that urine and
/ guano are hurtfui until certain of their ingre-
I dents probably organic acids are corrected
/ by the soil that sulphuric acid is not so hurt
/ full TO grain crops as to root crops.
PROFITS IN POULTRY.
/ IIy object in writing is to assist amateurs in
/ the most profitable branch OF the poultry BUSH
ness. Hens that are properly cared for and
managed will pay very large profit in eggs
but if you neglect them they will eat up all
| the profits II you want the best results in
eggs, too many hens must not be kept together
! Here is just the place where most farmers make
/ big mistake. They try to keep 100 head in
q small poultry house that is hardly large
enough to accommodate comfortably twenty
birds. The first thing you will hear these
! farmers say is, +" Ny poultry have the cholera"
| and after that disease has swept OFF seventy
five head out of the 100 they become diseour-
aged and say poultry don't pay"
Give poultry all the room you can; the less
room you give the greater care you must take
! OF them. Make suitable boxes for them TO lay
/ In and change the hay and straw in them every
month. Whitewash the poultry house several
times during the year; if little carbolic acid
is put in the whitewash so much the better.
Keep plenty of fresh water before the birds at
all times great deal depends on the water
1 ing of laying hens; little lime in the water
.
dry and properly ventilated and clean il every
week. Suspend cabbage from the ceiling by
! cord and leave it there until the hens eat it
up. Hash onions once a week and mix
| with the soft feed in the morning; it will keep
! your fowls very healthy. Cracked oyster
/ shell, ground bone and gravel should be within
reach Of the hens at ali times. Feed rye oats,
! wheat, buekwheat and corn, and the hens will
always supply plenty Of eggs. My twenty head
of Poland hens laid within the last thirty days
$50 eggs.-D n. Kern, SIimersriHe, Pa, IN
FarMers' World.
GROWING cABBAGEs AND TOMATOES.
We have probably more than once referred
/ TO the method of growing cabbages and some
other crops by sowing the seed where the crop
/ is intended 10 be grown, instead of transplant
ing from seed bed, which checks the plants
more or less, and causes loss of time On this
subject a correspondent Of the Germdnto1cll 1ele-
graph writes as follows: For late cabbages
like the plan much better than to sow ia bed
and then transplant; and also with tomatoes.
Ny plan is to thoroughly prepare the land, get
ting it into rs fine condition as possible; then
| / mark off into rows whatever distance is nee
essary With cabbage, three feet apart will
be wide enough, and then plant three or four
seed every two feet. With tomatoes / mark
off the rows three feet apart and plant the seed
every three feet. Both should be covered
lightly and the soil pressed firmly down upon
the seed. / cultivate as soon as the plants are
up sufficiently to see the rows, and as soon as
the plants are two or three inches high thin
to one plant in each hill, always leaving the
best plants TO stand. These should not always
be the tallest plants; prefer short, stocky
plants If they are strong and healthy. The
best of those pulled up can be used to fill up
whatever vacant places there may be. / am
satisfied from my experience that the plants
themselves are much better growing right
along without any disturbance, and will, in
the case of tomatoes, produce ripened fruit a
few days earlier than if transplanted. Oh
course, this plan is only suitable for the out
door or late crops"
MAKING HAY ARTIFIcIALLY.
In Britain an apparatus has been put in
operation for drying all kinds of fodder, which
is said TO accomplish its object at cost which
makes its use profitable This apparatus. in
or furnace for burning coke, to which is at
tached fan for blowing the hot air through
the wet grass The inventor provides for a
temperature that may rise TO $40 degrees. An
exposure of from four to six minutes is suffi
Gent 10 convert each lot of grass-the proportion
of which is adapted to the force of the blast
into hay. His latest development is machine
which converts twenty large loads of wet
rubbish into good stack hay in single days
work. The perfected machine has system oil
giant forks and fiat iron plates, kept in rapid
action, through which the wet grass is shaken
! down in successive stages while it is perlneated
| through and through with the hot air
Another process is for cooling hay in the
stack, the heat which is developed in the natu-
raj process of heating being used TO dry the
whole. hole six inches in diameter is bored
through the stack to the point at which the
greatest heat is developed, and ian fixed al
the outlet of the hole is made to draw off the
heat from that point and promote the ventila-
ton aud drying of the whole mass.
system of hot-air tubes is also devised
upon in which sheaves Of grain are placed and
dried all of which may be useful in climates
where sunlight and dry weather prevents
curing IN the natural manner.
THE POOR MANS BIRD
The duck is peculiarly the poor mans bird
Its hardness renders it entirely independent
of that care which fowls perpetually require
Indeed for all those classes of humble life who
have sloppy ofIal of some sort left from their
meals and who do not keep pig TO consume
it, ducks are the best saye-waste for them
Even the refuse of potatoes or any other vege,
table viii, with little bran meal, satisfy a
duck, which it thankfully accepts, and with q
, degree of good nature which it is pleasant &c
contemplate, swallows whatever is presented tc
it and very rarely occasions trouble. Though
; fowls must be provided with roof and decent
habitation, and supplied with corn, which il
costly, the cottage garden waste and the snails
and slugs which are generated there with the
! kitchen scraps and oiial, furnish the hardy