Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1901-08-08

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It is of little use to plant a strawber.
ry bed any time save in the spring.
The problem of whether it will pay
to feed 40 cent corn will confront feed.
ers all over the west the coming win.
ter.
The man with the wet farm can drain
it much easier than the man on the hill
lands can keep his fields from washing
and losing their fertility.
1 1t is the good work which clover does
underground rather than what it does
above ground which makes it of such
inestinable value to the farmer.
The habit which cattle have of
punching up during hot weather to get
rid of flies is largely responsible for
the number killed by a single discharge
of electricity.
1t is better to fire the hired man who
persists in smoking around the barns
and sheds than it is to have to share a
big fire loss with your farmers mutual
insurance company.
We noticed q very unusual sight up
In northern Minnesota recently-a 100
acre wheattield and in the midst of the
growing crop the stacks containing last
years crop of wheat still unthrashed.
We notice that the most pous people
enjoy square meal just as well as
the sinners, but that is no reason why
a goodwife should stay at home all day
Sunday to get up big Sunday dinner.
We saw q field OF wheat recently
which the owner had dskcd in. the
field not having been plowed for six
years, and each year in wheat at that.
He had just the sort of crop one might
expect.
The laws Of Wisconsin require the
gasoline can to be painted red and the
word ''gasoline" to be painted in black
thereon. Now, We would like to know
what color the woman SHOULD be paint
ed who will take this can to ill light
ed stove.
We noticed 40 acre field recently
on which poor seed had been used, re-
sulting in less than one-half of a stand.
If it had been our field, We would have
plowed it all up and sowed it to millet
rather than have tried to cultivate
what little corn was left.
While corn is semitropical plant by
nature. it still has developed such an
infinite variety Of type adapted. to
changing latitude that almost any
where where 90 days of semitropical
summer conditions prevail there may
be some variety of corn grown.
Conditions are more favorable for
80 cent corn during 1902 than TO,
many years past. The cribs of the
country are empty. and the crop of this
year is bound to be shortened mate
rally by the July drought which pre-
vailed all over the corn belt.
A genius now comes forward will
: the claim that he can make tough
meats tender by submitting them to III
} electrical treatment. The writer quit.
: often comes across old farrow COW
heefsteak which would require n treat
ment of l.500 volts to do it any good.
A farm in Minnesota containing 36t
F acres of average good land. in which
the owner has the sum of $4,000 in
vested and which is operated by ten
ant on the share plan as a stock ant
dairy farm, has paid the owner an an
nual dividend on the investment TO
the past four years of 10 per cent ant
will do better than that this year.
! The cost to build. maintain and keel
, in repair the snow fences along til,
railway lines in the northwest prairi,
: country is far greater than would b,
involved in the planting Of trees alons
the cuts where such protection is nee
essary. Some day the roads will taxi
up this matter of tree culture as {;
snow protection in a practical way.
We saw large fields of speltz growing
, in the state Of North Dakota recently
!. This is n cereal imported by the Rus
: slams from the semiarid sections Of tina
t country. and it is proving a valuable
grain where similar conditions exis
here. Ii is 81 sort of cross between bar
ley and oats, stands drought well ant
is a valuable stock food. 1t yields from
30 tc 40 bushels per acre.
We drove around a half section farm
recently with the owner and noted tina
he had moved his side of the publi
: highway for hay. he telling us that TIL