The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1886-04-07
Farm and Garden Notes.

WE believe that the fertilizing power
of one hundred pounds of bone-meal
is equal to the fertilizing power of a
cord of average stable dressing.
THE poultry business will not run it.
self. On the contrary, it requires the
utmost watchfulness and care on the
part of the owner from first to last.
GOOD seed is at the bottom of all
good farming. No matter how well the
ground may be MANFRED and prepared,
if the seed is poor there can be no
success.
THIS weather reminds the tardy
farmer that springs work will soon be
upon him. Indeed, it is already here,
and it is the alert farmer who is pre-
pared for it.
The average composition of thirty
samples of ground bone analysed at the
Connecticut station last year has 377
per cent of nitrogen and 21.6 per cent
of phosphoric acid.
THERE are two classes of men en-
gagged in dairying, viz. One makes
money, no matter what the prices are,
and the other never makes money I'M
less the prices are high.
MARKET-GARDENI has not maid
big profits, but during the past few
years of depression in wool and dairy
products it has made better returns
than either of those lines.
THE New York Tribune says: " As
time rolls on the evidence accumulates
that the estimates of DIR. Collier as to
the coming Importance of the sorghum
sugar industry were none too sanguine. I"
CULTIvAToRs generally can purchase
seed to better advantage than they can
bestow sufficient care to grow it. The
trouble is mainly with the buyers-they
are unwilling to pay what good seeds
are worth.
A LOAN agent who has had thirty
five years experience in Iowa says he
has never know mortgage to be fore
closed on a dairy or stock farm. That
may be true in Iowa, but it is far from
being true in Vermont.
The hive is but a small means of sue
cess in Bookkeeping. If the man is at
tentive to his business, and has learned
it well and thoroughly, he will succeed
WIN iliOob any llNC, IL lC 10 HIlcu Nv
nature for the business.
THERE is a growing sentiment in
favor of the winter application of yard
manures, but this must not be care
lessly done. When our hillsides are
frozen hard, and melting SHOWS cause
them to wash, the manure will be likely
to benefit some lower ground or go
down stream.
THE Hon. E. B. Washburne SAYS that
the general land office, during fifteen or
twenty years, has been 4" the most cor
rupt department that ever existed in
any government on the face of the
earth" Jobbers and grabbers have
had full sway, and the loss to the peo-
pie aggregates hundreds of millions
of acres.
AN agricultural society that lets its
own members and their families all in
free, and depends chiefly upon the gate
fees collected from factory employees
and the ground rent of eating, blinking
and gambling booths, is not FIST the
kind of society to look to for promoting
the interests of agriculture or of agri-
culturists.
AS the honey-gathering season is fast
approaching, it behooves the bee-keeper
to be ready for the harvest. Hives
should be fitted for new swarms; old
hives cleared out, repaired and painted
when needed, frames and sections filed
with foundation, and fitted in their
cases; in fact, everything necessary
should be done, and done at once.
BEE-KEEPERs are apt, like other peo-
pie, to be taken with new things. This
won't do in an apiary as with other
lines of business. The fewer changes
made the better. Get, in the first in
stance, what are considered the best
goods, and then stick to them until
is not only advised, but also
proved, by careful tests, to be better
than those in use.
" AGRICULTURE with us in the past
has meant merely the sowing of seed
and the reaping of harvests. But the
time is rapidly approaching when with
the decrease of natural fertility and the
increase of insect enemies and diseases
of animals and plants, agriculture will
mean a great deal of study, close inves-
tigation and experiment, and more
money for these purposes than individ-
ual effort can command" So says the
New England Farmer.
AN exchange says: Washing the
trunks of fruit-trees prevents them
from becoming hide-bound. Such
in trees is often started bv
poverty or unsuitable soil. Few soils
can be too rich for fruit-trees." This
is rather contradictory talk. If the
hide-bound condition is produced by
poor or unsuitable soil, it is folly to try
and cure the evil by washing the
trunks of the trees. AS well scratch a
mans back to cure hunger.
A HIRED man who receives SIS per
month costs the farmer, counting board
and washing, dollar day. The feed
and care of the team, depreciation of
horses, wagon and harnesses, together
with shoeing, repairs and interest on
The capital, is worth Sl50per year. This
is the estimate of the most careful
farmers. Therefore a hired hand and
team must produce $500 worth of crops
before the farmer has one cent for him
self, or for taxes and interest on the
and.
"THE farmer should know at the be-
ginning of the season Just what crops
he will plant, where he will plant them,
and make his calculations as to what he
may expect from them. The more
clearly he can have the seasons plan in