The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1889-05-01

wrinkled varieties are not usually the
earliest, and also require supports"
Now, as a fact, there is but one smooth
pea that is dwarf enough not to need
support; while there are dozen dwarf
wrinkled sorts at least
A STIRRING SUBJECT.-The Vinni-
peg Farmer Ohink of farming on Lake
WinnipegD has the following ." A. l..
Crosby says, stir cream, and stir it fire.
quently; John Boyd says, dou't stir it
at all after mixing the two skimmings
of each day with his famous starter;
John Gould says, stir the cream while
it is ripening; Hiram Smith does not
believe in stirring cream. Strange how
dairy doctors differ, and stranger,
withal, that each and all of these gen.
tlemen can make prime gilt-edged but
ter.''
PROFITS FROM BERRIES" Straw
berries should yield 1000 quarts per
acre, raspberries 5000, blackberries a
little more than raspberries, and cur
rants should yield l 900 to 1000 quarts
per acre." So says an exchange, but we
will bet bun that the writer of it
never succeeded in growing 125 bush
els of strawberries on one acre in
single season. 1t has been done, but
the men who do it are scarce. 1t is
like those 1000 bushel crops of po-
tatoes-done at the rate of so much,
on small plot. In our experience,
currants will outyield any other berry
with the same soil and care, and yet
they are put last in the above list.
IMPROVED PIGS.-Farmer Congress-
man Burnett of Massachusetts, who is
a great pig man, says: " Our improved
modern pigs are the result of the in
fusion of Chinese and Siamese blood
with the pigs of England and Ireland
of 100 years ago. The Chester Whites
and Poland Chinas of this country are
not thoroughbred in the strict sense of
the term-that is, they do not always
reproduce their ancestors. The Poland
China is the best one for the practical
farmer" Probably, however, there is
no essential difference in the fixedness
of the best strains of American breeds
and the foreign ones. We have so
long believed that foreigners can do
things in the way of breeding that we
can not that we overrate them. But
if American farmers could create the
Vermont Merino sheep and the Morgan
horse, nothing else is beyond them in
that way.
DISTANCE OF APPLE TREES. We
are informed that IAN Illinois fruit
grower is said to have forwarded the
apple production of young orchard
very much by planting only sixteen feet
apart, requiring four times the usual
number of trees. The redundant ones
are girdled when large enough to bear;
this both checks their growth and
hastens fruitfulness, and they give a
good return of eXtra-fne specimens be-
fore it becomes necessary to remove
them out of the way of the large per-
manent trees, then only beginning their
yield" This close planting has been a
practice of ours for many years, and
the past season we could show a yield
of 1000 bushels on six acres, with no
tree over six inches in diameter, and
with crops grown between the rows
sufficient to more than pay for cost of
manuring and cultivation. This is " in
tensive orcharding," as compared with
the slow method of planting at wide
distances in sod land and waiting half
lifetime for returns. In sections
where fruit-trees are short-lived, a large
yield may be got out of them when
closely planted and well MANFRED and
cultivated, provided varieties are
planted which come to fruitage young.
For this purpose the " iron-clads " are
well adapted, as the majority of them
bear young, and if well cultivated will
produce large crops of handsome fruit
in from four to six years from setting
Perhaps some may ask, "Did you gel
anything for them?" Yes; we averaged
about forty cents bushel for the crop
No number ones were sold for less thar
$2per barrel. The principal varieties in
their order of maturity were: yellow
Transparent, Tetofsky, Peach of Mont
real, Duchess of Oldenburgh, Prolific
Sweeting, Fameuse, Wealthy and SCOTS
Winter. The Transparents, coming
the first half of August, averaged 81 {
bushel, even for windfalls; Tetofsky, {
little later, seventy-five cents; Duchess
and Peach, forty to seventy-fv'
cents; Sweetings, 81; No. Fameuse
Wealthy and Scott So to $3.50 pc