The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-10-29
Farm Miscellany.
A PLAN FOR THE BOYS.

erB' Voice.
Now, boys, i want TO talk TO you a
few minutes. It is about something
that will interest you. You like
blackberries and Strawberries and
raspberries, and jam, and all the
nice things that grow in a market
garden. Besides this, you like pin
money, don't youP Of course you
do. Now / am going 60 tell you how
you can have all those goodies, and
the pin money, and lots of fun, too.
I take it for granted that you are
living on q farm. Some times you
like the farm and some times you
do not. When your back aches pull
ing weeds out of that interminable
onion patch, where you have TO get
down on all tours, then you don't
like the farm and the garden par
ticularly we'll. / don't blame you
either / have been there myself. I
have seen onion seed sown early in the
spring, but before the young plants
got the crook out Of their backs up
came four hundred and seventy-eight
weeds TO an onion, and they kept
coming up all summer. Had I been
paid so cents q day for my labor the
onions would have cost that bargain
price we read so much about-S2. SO
Q bushel. But I wasn't paid any
thing, 80 the onions were free gratis,
for nothing.
Now, boys, / want to make q bar
gain with your father contract with
him for one acre of ground the con-
tract price being all the vegetables
and berries the family want TO use
He will do it if you explain what you
propose to do. I'll wager doughnuts
against cobs that not one farmer in
fifty has a really nice variety of
vegetables and berries. Don't they
like EN-? Well, I guess yes; but
they have so much farm work TO do,
and the weeds grow so tormented
fast that the first thing he knows
his strawberry patch is overrun, his
.raspberries are chOked, his parsnips
and carrots are forever lost. But
you saved the onion bed, not because
you wanted to. It was the good
mother who urged you on and helped
a little, too. Who ever saw a wo
man who did not like onions? I
know from experience, for l have a
wife and daughters. But never
mind, a bushel of onions is worth "a
ten. dollar DOCTORS bill.
But I'm getting off the subject. l
take it for granted you have engaged
the acre. Now this fall cover it over
with good, well-rotted manure. Put
on big loads, for the good father
wants to cover over the back lot for
corn next year and will be a little
stingy IN manure. But he always
likes TO see the sideboards raise when
a load goes out, so he won't mind.
On one side put it q little thicker.
Why? Because I am going so have
you plant some early cabhages for
market. 1t will help on the pin
money. l will tell you how next
week. The reasO why I want the
manure put on this fall is that is
makes the ground more pliable, easier
TO work and then the rains lead the
goodness down through the top soil.
Now we are ready for d little plan
ming. Take your pencil and paper
and Ue will build a garden in imagi-
nation. / do not know what shape
your acre is in, but it doesn't matter
very much. We will suppose it is
ten rods by sixteen. We will com
menoe on the ten-rod side and set
out berry bushes first. Suppose we
say three r o VS. of blackberries, two
rows of red r~aspberrles, two rows of
black ~ragpberries, one row of red,
white and black ~currants, with about
six or eight g~ooseberries. Six black
%currants is enough for that delicious
jam and jelly which your mo5her can
make. I guess six gooseberries ;s
enough, come TO think of it. I set
out a dozen once and the older they
get the bigger the bushes are and
the more berries they bear and the
more we have to give away. There
ism any pin money in gooseberries.
But then your garden wouldn't be
complete without them.
Next in order comes a row of as
paragus then five rows of strawber-
ries. Set the bushes out sever feet