The Savannah morning news., 1902-07-28
THE FARM AND THE GARDEN.
MATTERS OF INTEREST TO AGRI-
CULTURALIST AND HOUSEWIFE.

Farm and Garden Notes.-The Har-
row and the RoIIer-CuItiVating
Wheat-The Dutch MuIch-The
Georgia Collard-TestinE Seed.
A man need not live to be fifty years
old to realize that the growth of what
is excellent may be exceedingly slow
Resolution of one kind or another may
sometimes be very rapid in its growth
and DEVELOPMENT, but as a rule. most
all good things are slow in their prog
ress towards a general acceptation.
Especially in matters pertaining 10
agriculture is progress or innovation
slow. Farmers are conservative about
all others perhaps. They farm gen
orally just as their fathers did. They
are governed by rules and practices as
inviolable almost as a Medean law. II
require sa generation to effect very
slight change in their methods-such,
for instance, as adding to their store
of necessary implements a harrow and
q roller.
Forty years ago there were not
probably dozen Of these implements
in use among the farmers of Georgia.
At any rate, it was the rarest thing
that one would be seen or heard men
ton of. Even now the vast majority
of Georgia farmers have neither har-
row nor roller, regarding them as of
little value.
And yet it is impossible to seed down
crops in garden or field satisfactorily
without the aid of both of them.
1 said satisfactorily, a better word
would have been perfectly or scientih-
cally even. 1 always avoid the latter
word, however, as it is not in good
repute with very many farmers.
But l can say this no farmer or
trucker or gardener that has made
use of the harrow and roller year
or two would feel that ne had done
his seeding satisfactorily if it had
been done without the aid of them.
1t is just impossible to do the work
of farming or gardening perfectly
without them in any dry, hot climate
like that of ours.
In no other way can the evil effect
of dry weather be mitigated as with
the proper use of harrow and roller
one being a complement OF the other.
The only mulch that the gardener or
farmer can economically use is a
mulch of soil or dust mulch" as the
Yankee terms it. Two or three inches
of surface soil kept constantly loose
and frequently stirred is practically
the only mulch that the cultvator
may make any extensive use of. He
may make use of straw, leaves, etc,
in small way on the strawberry
patch, the potato patch and for a linn
tied number oil choice vines or trees
that are exceptionally valuable. The
use of such a mulch must always be
limited.
The dust mulch alone is of uni
versal adaptability. The harrow is the
most available implement for making
it, and an alternate use of harrow ana
roller is the best means for making the
best use of the soil moisture to keep
crops steadily growing in the long in
teryals that frequently occur between
rains. For securing a fine seed bed
there is no other implement equal to
the harrow, and for creating cOndi-
tons favorable to termination OF the
SEEDS there is no other tool that can
take the place of the roller.
These implements are far more es-
sential to US than to the farmers OF
the North and yet we make far less
use of them than they do. In the seed
ing of cotton even. how few of our
farmers ever firm the soil to the seeds
with a roller, thereby insuring speedy
termination in the dryest weather,
likely to occur any time in April or
May.
Fan sown grain, especially in our
climate. where dry autumns are the
rule, can not be properly seeded down
without harrow and roller They are
almost equally essential with the
spring sOWings. At that season the
firnling of the soil after sowing fire.
from late freeze, while fastening
termination if the weather should be
dry at the time which is not uncom-
mon. Altogether it would be very easy
to prove that the harrow and the roll
er are indispensable implements where
we would make the best of our farm
ing or gardening.