Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

"Put your thumb down there," said an experienced orchardist to me the other day. We were talking about the recently started theory that the best bearing orchards are to be found on the low lands of the prairies. "You just wait and see if these brag orchards ever bear another crop! It will be as it was after the severe winter of 1874 and '75, when the following autumn many of our orchards bore so profusely. The succeeding year the majority of the trees were as dead as smelts, and the balance never had vigor enough afterward to produce a decent crop. Once before," said he, "we had a similar experience in Illinois. Put your thumb down at this place and watch for results. Do not say anything about this in your Wayside Blusterings, at least as coming from me," and of course I don't. But I wanted the readers of THE PRAIRIE FARMER to help me watch with fear and trembling for the fulfillment of this horticultural prophesy, so I straightway make a note of it and ask you all to "put your thumbs down here" and wait. My friend's theory is that the severe cold of last winter destroyed a large portion of the roots of these trees; that the root pruning caused the extra fruitfulness, but proved too severe for the vitality of the trees to withstand, and that next year the bulk of the trees will not leaf out at all; and further that the old theory as taught by Kennecott, Whitney, Edwards, and the rest of the "fathers," that apple trees cannot thrive with wet feet, was the correct theory then and is the correct theory now. He would still plant on high, well drained land.

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My neighbor up at the "Corners" has a large flock of grade Cotswold sheep--Cotswolds crossed on large native Merinos. He keeps them to produce early lambs for the Chicago market. For the last three or four years he has received, on an average, four dollars per head for his lambs, taken at his farm. It is a profitable and pleasant sort of farming. Some day I may tell how he manages, in detail.

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REMEMBER _that_ $2.00 _pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year, and the subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

POULTRY NOTES.

Poultry-Raisers. Write for Your Paper.

CHICKEN CHAT.

Let me see--it was sometime during the month of December that the "Man of the Prairie" went wandering all over the village, and even scoured the country round about the village in search of an extra dozen eggs, and went home mad, and, man fashion, threatened to kill off every hen on the place if they didn't proceed to do their duty like hens and fellow citizens. It was also during that same December that the fifty Plymouth Rock hens that we are wintering in the barn cellar, laid, regardless of the weather, 736 eggs--an average of nearly fifteen eggs apiece.

"Is it a fact that the corn is too poor for manufacture into eggs?"

I don't know anything about the corn in your locality, but I do know that our Plymouth Rocks had whole corn for supper exactly thirty-one nights during the month of December--not Western corn, but sound, well-ripened, Northern corn, that sells in our market for twenty cents more per bushel than Western corn. I also know that hens fed through the winter on corn alone will not lay enough to pay for the corn, but in our climate the poultry-raiser may feed corn profitably fully one-half the time. When the morning feed consists of cooked vegetable and bran or shorts, and the noon meal of oats or buckwheat, the supper may be of corn. I believe the analytical fellows tell us that corn won't make eggs, and I am sure I don't know whether it will or not, and I don't much care; but I know that hens will eat corn, when they can get it, in preference to any other grain, and I know that it "stands by" better than anything else, and that it is a heat-producing grain, and consequently just the thing to feed when the days are short and the nights long, and the mercury fooling around 30 degrees below zero. Hens need something besides egg material; they must have food to keep up the body heat, and the poultry-raiser who feeds no corn in winter blunders just as badly as the one who feeds all corn.

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Talking about corn for fowls reminds me that the agricultural papers are full of wails from farmers who were taken in last season on seed corn. If they had followed the plan of an old farmer of my acquaintance they would not now be obliged to mourn a corn crop cut off by frost. When this old chap went to farming forty years ago he bought a peck of seed corn of the Northern yellow flint variety, and as he "don't believe in running after all the new seeds that are advertised in the papers," he is still raising the same variety--only it ripens some three weeks earlier than it did then. Every fall he does through his field and selects his seed corn from the best of the earliest ripened ears; when these ears are husked one or two husks are left on each ear, and then the husks, with the ears attached, are braided together until there are fifteen or twenty ears in a string. These strings of seed corn are hung up in the sun for a fortnight or so, and then hung from the rafters in a cool, dry loft over the wood-shed; there it remains till seed time comes again, and it never fails to grow.

FANNY FIELD.

BUSINESS STILL RUNNING.

"My own hens closed out business six weeks ago," not long since said "Man of the Prairie." He mentioned also, that he had not much faith in pure bred poultry. Now he severely complains that no eggs can be found among the farmers nor in village stores. I will not say that pure strains of poultry are better layers than common, but, when one pays a good price for poultry, it is an incentive to provide good shelter and bestow upon them some manifestations of interest which would not be done with the common fowls. Herein may lay in part the secret of better returns from pure strains.

Years ago our chickens 'closed out business' for several months. Of late this procedure is unknown. We crossed our best common hens with Plymouth Rock stock, paying a good price. We furnished comfortable quarters, gave variety of feed, and at present writing the lady-like biddies furnish enough eggs for our own use and some to sell to stores and neighbors.

We still have a few common hens (not caring to have all pure) yet we find that with same care and attention, the purer strains give best returns.

Skeptical, like a good many others, we were loth to experiment. Thanks to Fanny Field for her wise and instructive poultry writings. In a recent number she seemed to be in doubt whether her writings were heeded or doing any one good. Let me say in behalf of myself and a few others, that a few married ladies now have pin money by following her instructions, who, before, had to go to their lords (husbands) when they wanted a little money, which was sometimes begrudgingly given, and often times not at all.

BACHELOR & MAID.
COUNCIL BLUFFS, IOWA.

THE APIARY.

THE BEST HIVE.

In answer to many inquiries as to the best hive, we will here state that is a mere matter of choice. Many good movable frame hives are now in use, free from patents, and while we prefer the Langstroth, there may be others just as good.

Apiarists differ as to what constitutes the best hive. Novices in bee culture generally think that they can invent a better hive than any in use, but after trying their invention for awhile, conclude that they are not as wise as they thought they were. Many hives are patented yearly by persons ignorant of the nature of the honey-bee, and few, if any, are received with favor by intelligent apiarists.

The requisites for a good hive are durability, simplicity, ease of construction and of working, and pleasing to the eye. We think the Langstroth embodies these. It was invented by the father of modern bee-culture. He gave to the world the movable frame; without its use, we might as well keep our bees in hollow logs, as our fathers did. Different sizes of movable frames are now in use, but two-thirds of the apiarists prefer the Langstroth.

Upon many farms, bees may be found in salt barrels, nail-kegs, etc., doing little good for their owner, while if they were put into hives, where the surplus could be obtained in good shape, they would become a source of income. Specialists either manufacture their own hives, or buy them in the flat, in the lumber region. As the farmer may need but a few hives, he may find leisure in winter to make them.

Every farmer needs a workshop, and if he has none, should provide himself with one. It need not be large, and can be made quite inexpensively. In his barn, if it is large, partition off a room for a workshop 12 × 14 feet, and if he not be blessed with a good large barn, why a thousand feet of common boards, and a load of good stout saplings, with a little mechanical skill and some muscle, will provide a very good farm workshop.

Get a few tools, such as a saw, square, plane, hatchet, a brace, and a few bits, and before twelve months pass away you will wonder how you ever managed to do without one before; many a singletree or doubletree can be made, or broken implements repaired during leisure, or the rainy days of late winter or spring, and the boys will go there to try their hands, and develop their mechanical skill; exercising both brain and muscle. Remember that the school of industry is second to no university in the land.

Now for the hives; in the first place you need a pattern. Purchase of some dealer or manufacturer of apiarian supplies, a good Langstroth hive complete with section boxes. Then get a couple of hundred feet (more or less) of ten inch stock boards, mill dressed on both sides, then with your pattern hive, workshop, and tools, you are master of the situation. After your hives are made, don't forget to paint them; it is economy to paint hives as well as dwelling houses.

LANGSTROTH HIVE.

For the benefit of those who may not be able to obtain a pattern hive, or frame, we will give the dimensions. The sides of the Langstroth hive are 10 inches wide, by 23 inches long, the ends are 12 inches long, the back end the same width as the sides; front end, 3/8 inches narrower, and recesses or sets back 3-3/8 inches from portico, all 7/8 inches thick. The Langstroth frame is 17-1/4 × 9-1/4 inches outside measure. The length of top bar of frame is 19-1/4 inches, the frame stuff is all 7/8 wide, the top bar is 5/8 × 7/8, and is V shaped on the under side for a comb guide--the upright pieces 1/2 × 7/8, the bottom pieces 1/4 × 7/8.

The above are the dimensions of an eight frame hive. Strips 1/4 × 7/8 inches are nailed on the outside of the hive 1/4 inch from the upper edge, and the cap or upper hive rests upon them. We make the cap 22-1/8 inches long by 13-7/8 inches wide in the clear, and ten inches high.

Some apiarists omit the porticos, but we like them, and the bees appear to enjoy them. Right angled triangle blocks, made right and left, are used to regulate the entrance. By changing the position of these blocks on the alighting board the size of the entrance may be varied, and the bees always directed to it by the shape of the block, without any loss of time in searching for it--in case of robbing the hive, the hive can be entirely closed with them. A board was formerly used to cover the frames, but is now generally abandoned, apiarists preferring duck, enameled cloth, or heavy muslin.

MRS. L. HARRISON.

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NO SAFER REMEDY can be had for Coughs and Colds, or any trouble of the Throat, than "_Brown's Bronchial Troches_." Price 25 cents. _Sold only in boxes._

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MISCELLANEOUS.

ARM & HAMMER BRAND

TO FARMERS.--It is important that the SODA OR SALERATUS they use should be _white_ and _pure_, in common with all similar substances used for food.

In making bread with yeast, it is well to use about half a teaspoonful of the "ARM AND HAMMER" BRAND SODA or SALERATUS at the same time, and thus make the bread rise better and prevent it becoming sour by correcting the natural acidity of the yeast.

DAIRYMEN

AND

FARMERS

should use only the "ARM AND HAMMER" brand for cleaning and keeping milk-pans sweet and clean.

_To insure obtaining only the_ "ARM AND HAMMER" _brand Soda or Saleratus, buy it in_ "POUND _or_ HALF-POUND PACKAGES," _which bear our name and trade-mark, as inferior goods are sometimes substituted for the_ "ARM AND HAMMER" _brand when bought in bulk._

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"THE BEST IS THE CHEAPEST."

ENGINES SAW MILLS, THRESHERS, HORSE POWERS,

(For all sections and purposes.) Write for FREE Pamphlet and Prices to The Aultman & Taylor Co., Mansfield, Ohio.

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THE FAMOUS EASY-RUNNING

Monarch Lightning Sawing Machine

IT BEATS THE WORLD FOR SAWING LOGS OR FAMILY STOVE WOOD.

SENT ON 30 DAYS' TEST TRIAL.

The boy in the picture on the left is sawing up logs into 20-inch lengths, to be split into stovewood for family use. This is much the BEST and CHEAPEST way to get out your firewood, because the 20-inch blocks are VERY EASILY split up, a good deal easier and quicker than the old-fashioned way of cutting the logs into 4-feet lengths, splitting it into cordwood, and from that sawing it up with a buck saw into stovewood. We sell a large number of machines to farmers and others for just this purpose. A great many persons who had formerly burned coal have stopped that useless expense since getting our Machine. Most families have one or two boys, 16 years of age and up, who can employ their spare time in sawing up wood just as well as not. The

MONARCH LIGHTNING SAWING MACHINE

will save your paying money and board to ONE hired man and perhaps TWO men.

The boy at the right in the picture is sawing up cordwood in a buck frame. You can very easily use our machine in this way if you have cordwood on hand that you wish to saw up into suitable lengths for firewood.

A boy sixteen years old can work the machine all day and not get any more tired than he would raking hay. The machine runs VERY EASILY, so easily, in fact, that after giving the crank half a dozen turns, the operator may let go and the machine will run itself for THREE OR FOUR REVOLUTIONS. Farmers owning standing timber cannot fail to see the many advantages of this great LABOR-SAVING AND MONEY-SAVING MACHINE. If you prefer, you can easily go directly into the woods and easily saw the logs into 20-inch lengths for your family use, or you can saw them into 4-foot lengths, to be split into cordwood, when it can be readily hauled off to the village market. Many farmers are making a good deal of money with this Machine in employing the dull months of the year in selling cordwood.

It makes a great difference in LABOR AND MONEY both in using our machine, because you get away with a second man. It takes two men to run the old-fashioned cross-cut saw, and it makes two backs ache every day they use it. Not so with our saw.

We offer $1,000 for a sawing machine that is EASIER OPERATED and FASTER RUNNING than ours. Every farmer should own our machine. It will pay for itself in one season. Easily operated by a sixteen-year-old boy.

Lumbermen and farmers should GET THE BEST--GET THE CHEAPEST--GET THE MONARCH LIGHTNING SAWING MACHINE.

E. DUTTER, Hicksville, O., writes:--It runs so easy that it is JUST FUN to saw wood.