The Neshoba Democrat., 1921-08-04
FARM AND GARDEN HINTS
GULL YOUR FLOCK NOW

Gull your early Matched pullets in
September and October for your next
winter layers, as winter eggs pay the
best. Gull all the hens that start I'm
moulting in August, as the poorest
hen will lay few eggs in the spring
and summer-from so to Is.
FEED LAYING HENS
Experiments costing much time and
money have proved that skinned
milk, buttermilk and clabber are the
best possible protein foods for lay
ing hens.
SOW COVER CROPS IN ORCHARD
NOW
The season of the year is rapidly
approaching when the gro wer should
give some attention to the question
OF cover crops for the orchard. Cover
crops properly handled furnish or
ganic matter for the soil and also
prevent soil washing during the win
ter months.
Experiments have long ago estab-
lished the fact that to get the best
results from the use of fertilizers the
soil must be supplied with liberal
quantity OF organic matter either
rotted or In the last stages of decay,
Where the orchard has been clean
cultivated throughout the summer
the grower should by all means
plant some crop that will furnish q
good growth over winter and come
on early enough in the spring to fur
nish large quantity OF organic
matter to be plowed under according
to G. Woolsey, horticuIturist of the
agricultural extension division, Uni
versity OF Arkansas.
Taking the state as a whole rye is
used for a winter cover crop more
than any OF the above named crops.
Winter or hairy vetch is rapidly
gaining favor as a cover crop and is
being used to some extent by success
full growers In Benton County. But
clover is also rapidly coming into fa-
vor as a winter cover crop, especial
ly in the south This crop will do
well over the entire state If properly
handled.
PULLING FODDER
The old method of saving corn
leaves for feed by pulling them from
xpif hn hou hn, a.,
still practiced by some farmers. This
method OF saving roughage for live
stock Is not only back breaking
drudgery, but it really defeats the
purpose for which it is intended, be-
cause the removal OF the unripe leaves
from the stalks reduces the yield of
grain and as result the field pro-
| duces less food nutrients than would
have been the case II the leaves were
left untouched.
The leaves of q corn stalk cores
pond to the stomach of an animal;
there the food products for the
growth of the ear are worked up
and transferred to the cob and from
it to the grain. When the leaves are
pulled before The grains are filed out
and mature, their food supply is cut
OFF and the ear necessarily shrivels
and weighs less when harvested.
The best way to save the entire
corn plant is to. cut it when the
leaves turn yellow and the ear is in
the hard dough stage, bordering on
maturity. At this stage the greatest
amount of nutritive roughage can
be saved consistent with normal
yield OF grain. AS a matter OF fact,
corn can be cut at this stage of ma
turity without materially lowering
the yield of grain because the elabo-
ration OF plant food goes on in the
! leaves after the corn is in the shock,
and the ear fills out and weighs
practically as much as 1t would IL
the stalks were left standing in the
| field until complete maturity and
harvested in the usual way.
This is the method successfully fol-
lowed in our corn-growing sections.