The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1916-07-14
BETTER FARMS DEPARTMENT
The Republican Pays 81 Each Week for an Idea
on What You Have Planned to Increase
Your Crop Yield or Make Home More
Beautiful---City Lot or Farm

acres in what Is known as the Big
Bend and Is making some interesting
experiments raising wheat. He thinks
most people use too much seed. He
says that the drill when shut down
to its lowest capacity sows 80 pounds
per acre and that is too much. When
he sowed last he beat the drill by
using formaldehyde and then drilling
the seed while it was swollen from
the soaking. This he thinks cut down
the capacity of the drill to about 20
pounds per acre of wheat in its ordi-
nary condition. He will report upon
his wheat crop soon.
Mr.. Hale considers that he reason
why many people do not get results
from fertilizer is that they let it
heat and burn itself out, lying in
large piles or stacks, or that they
scatter it on the ground and let it
dry up before blowing it under. Dur
ing the winter, as he removes the
manure from the stables, he wheels
it out in the corral where the loose
stock run and spreads it evenly over
the surface, then he puts a coat of
straw all over it. The stock lie on
the straw and have a dry bed, and
they tramp it down and it soaks up
the fluids from below and these fluids
aid in the decomposition of the straw
making more fertilizer. Manure
treated in this way keeps wet and
keeps rOtting, but does not heat dur
ing the winter or spring up to the
time when it should be placed upon
the field. AS it is hauled out and
spread he plows it under, as we said,
before it has time to dry out and the
soil gets the full benefit of it. He
says a coat of straw spread yer
everything in the corral keeps a COM
Portable bed for the stock and it pro-
notes the formation of the straw into
fertilizer.
John and George Drew are farming
the old Drew homestead this year.
it contains 211 acres and they have
IT'S acres in crops. They have some
very fine alfalfa and timothy. On
the farms above them, along the foot
hills, the hay is unusually good;
much better than it is out in the fiat
country. Everybody in that COM
munity is haying this week.
York brothers have the old Schu-
maker ranch of 800 acres which they
purchased in 1909, and they have
made many improvements by the
erection of buildings. They have a
blacksmith shop, a large machine
shop, a good barn, an ice house, and
a gasoline pumping plant. Mr.. York
says that when they took the farm
tharo ha1 ANNA onflu onuor ham INV
manure hauled away from the feed
grounds and it was so deep that they
have been removing it On the install
ment plan ever since and still have
deep banks of it remaining.
Mr.. Twitchell has recently built a
large machine shed on his farm at
Presto.
Higher brothers sunk a well during
the winter to supply water for their
stock. They built a cement curbing
three feet in diameter and six inches
thick, reinforcing with steel and
wire. 1t weighs 1000 pounds per
vertical foot and is AZ feet deep max
ing a total weight of about 20 tons
in the curbing. They built. it in
rings three feet deep and lowered
it as they sunk the we'll, the same
as is usually done with a lumber
curbing. Mr.. Higher states that the
cement curb cost about the same as
lumber.
S. E. Christoffersen, whose house
was burned down last fall, lived in
the granary during the winter while
he built d new house.
/ j. J. Conway, of Presto, has been
farming about 80 miles west of Boise
the last few years, and has made
quite a study of alfalfa. He has
raised as high as eight and one-sixth
tons per acre per season, and says
he does not cut the hay until the
lower branches are well budded, or
out in bloom. He calls the attention
of alfalfa growers to the fact that
when the top branches of the alfalfa
plant blooms the whole plant is not
matured and blooming; there are a
lot of the lower branches that are
not grown and as the bloom appears
on the top branches the growth of
the lower branches proceeds rapidly
and in the course of a week or ten
days a large amount of hay is pro-
duced in these lower branches. When
the most of them are in bloom and
the rest are budding is the time he
recommends for cutting the hay. Mr..
Conway says the starting Of the new
from the bottom has little re-
lation to the maturity of the older
plant. He thinks the starting Of the
new shoots depends upon conditions
Of moisture. II the ground gets, a
little too dry when the hay is near
ing maturity, and water is then ap-
Piled, these tender shoots start from
The bottom whether the other plants
ire matured or not. He recommends
watering often, but never letting the
water remain long on the field. Mr.. .