Tbe Louisiana Experiment Station and its
Work.
To the Indiana Farmer
The farming season of Louisiana and
Mississippi is about two weeks late this
year on account of frequent rains. The
large area to cotton is giving away from
year to year to more corn, grass and other
crops, and so diversified farming is increasing, to the betterment of the country.
Alfalfa and the other clovers flourish
here, and this means more and more live
stock, and especially dairying. Just
now strawberries and early vegetables are
in great quantities, and it is interesting
to visit the old French markets of New
Orleans, and the wholesale fruit and vegetable houses in that vicinity. The rich
muck  lands,      reclaimed  by    dykes  and
drainage    around      lake	
Pontchartrain are large- —
ly devoted to early vegetables, but the earliest
strawberries are grown
on the dryer pine lands
further out. The latter
crop is large this season.
The  Louisiana   experiment    station       located
"Instead of uO cents, by long hauls from
the north, will enable the south to produce her other staple crop, cotton, profitably at <> or 7 cents a pound; whereas her
corn for home support, at 50 cents, makes
it necessary to obtain 10 to 11 cents for '
cotton to make ends meet. In talking
to thoughtful southern men, this is the
view they are taking of the matter, and
therefore the tendency to more corn and
alfalfa ond less cotton. The corn and
alfalfa will produce milk and butter, beef
and pork, and so here is where greater
diversified farming comes in, and stimulates the value of the other staples.
It is interesting here in New Orleans to
see the strong spirit of improvment in the
way of buildings of the first class. Until recently it was not believed that cellars and basements could be constructed,
because  the water was so near  the  sur-
rootlets.
Sow the seed quite thick'; of course
there will need to lie thinning done, but
better tli.it than scant rows; the weak
seeds would be too feeble to break through
tlie soil by themselves, but if sown thickly all will pull together.
Protect the transplanted plants from
strong winds; wind is harder ou plants
than sun; there isn't much danger from
sun hurting any except the very tenderest
cues,    this early in the season.
The protection may be bottomless cans
or boxes, if tall enough to extend above
the plants, or cloth kept from bending the
plants with stakes. Boxes or cans are
best and handiest. If frost threatens, it
is quick work to throw a cloth over the
protection. Have the permanent beds
spaded deep; a better tool is the grubbing
hoe,    as this goes deep and makes small
than    the other
nity is doing some very
excellent work fbr the
South. Here the various
kinds of alfalfa are cultivated to determine the
best. That from the
North is doing finely,
but seed from Europe
and South American
countries are being tested. The successful
growth of this plant is
opening the way to
greater dairy and live
stock pursuits. The tests
thus far show that
alfalfa has a much
greater nutritive value
clovers  and   grasses.
It is a new thing to the south to grow
Btigatr cane from seed, but the station here
is doing that successfully. Propagation
from buds of the plant has been the rule
heretofore. The plants this year grown
from the seed give great promise, and
planters begin to find that sugar cane has
seed as well as other plants, and if what
now promises to be a great success in this
line proves true, as seems now assured,
the sugar planters will be greatly helped in their work.
The station here is also growing olives
for the first time. The Pendulina variety brought from southern California,
Prof. Blouin, director of the station, says
grown here, the first of which is being
fathered, is a decided improvement upon
'he same variety grown in California. He
haa shown that the trees are hardy and
may be grown generally with profit, as
the olive is very salable.
This station is also trying to solve the
Paper pulp question in growing the Japan-
,s<* paper plant, known as mitsumata.
Otheo state stations are trying various
plants to find a substitute for wood pulp
for paper, as the native forests are being
rapidly  consumed. It has  been  shown
here already that the mitsumata plant will
flourished in this part of Louisiana.
These experiments of the station are attracting much attention in the south and
must soon he of very great benefit, not
the least being that of paving the way to
creater diversity in farm production. The
tendency to growing enough corn for home
MlPply at a cost of about 25 cents a bush-
Alfalfa  Field  on  the  Fresno  Irrisrnted Farms.    Fresno. California.
face. But the Armour Co., of Chicago,
built one ten or more feet in depth with
heavy concrete walls, and thus paved the
way, and now hotels and other business
houses are building them, and find it can
readily be done, though it is much more
expensive than we find it in dry ground.
Xew Orleans, La. J. B. C.
FLOWERS AND OTHER PLANTS.
Editors  Indiana  Farmer
Some springs, and this seems to be one
of them, it is very hard to grow seedlings,
or get small plants started where one
sows all the seed at once there is danger of
a dearth of plants:better to save back half
of the seed for a later sowing. Complaint of the smaller seeds failing to germinate are common, partly.owing to unfavorable weather, and partly to poor vitality of the seed, no doubt; so it will
be necessary to take greater care of the
seed bed, and to give longer time also,
for seed that is pronounced a failure will
sometimes germinate several days after
the allotted time. Prepare fine soil in
seed beds that are protected from the prevailing winds with buildings, or else with
a board frame, or if seed boxes are used,
place them in sheltered places.
Cover seed a little deeper than usual,
•nd keep the soil moist, not wet, keep a
gunny sack or other coarse cloth over the
soil until seedlings appear; then remove at
night  for  the  first. If  the   soil  is  in
clined to be very loose, press very firmly
over the seeds, and do not transplant
seedlings while too small; there is more
danger of losing the seedling than if they
are large enough to have quite a nest of
cuts each time, so being much easier pulverized than when large chunks are turned
up.
Use sand, and if needed apply well
rotted barn yard manure; but be sure to
mix nnd pulverize the mass as fine as possible. The better the bed is prepared,
the less work in cultivating through the
summer.
Transplant carefully, watering and
fuming line soil over the roots; then cover
the damp soil with dry to prevent soil hardening. This sounds tedious, but plants
well set are much more satisfactory in
every way. and will be less bother all
summer,    than ones carelessly stuck out.
Don't be disheartened if the first sowings failed, it is early yet, and the May
sown seeds often outgrow the earlier
weaklings; some seasons more work is re-
'quired to obtain results thau is necessary
of other years. E.
ONLY FOUR INCHES TO DROP.
In terrible mental agony lest he should
drop to the bottom of an excavation and
be killed, John Leonard, a laborer at the
Navy Yard, Washington, D. C, clung
nearly nl! night to the edge of a hole into
which he had fallen while crossing a vacant lot in the dark.
Unable to pul! himself out he prevented
himself rom falling all the way down by
kicking furiously the side of the pit to relieve somewhat the strain on his arms.
His cries brought help wheu he was nearly exhausted. He then found that
throughout the ordeal his feet had been
within four inches of the bottom.
Suggestions for Improving Institute.Work,
t-tiuura Indiana  fanner
The Stnte of Indiana spends each year
between $12 and $14 for the education
of each of her citizens who are under 21
years of age, and we are proud ofl the
fact that we are spending this vast sum
of money annually for the education of
our youth. The majority of the parents
of this mighty host of young people did
not have tlie advantage in an educational
line that their children enjoy, and especially those in the rural districts.
A few years ago a few farmers in the
State, among the number our noble Ex-
Governor Mount, conceived the idea that
the farmer should have some kind of
school or place of training where he could
learn better how to cultivate the soil in
 __   order to get better    re-
— suits from his labors. A
bill was presented to the
legislature, and being
favorably considered, an
appropriation of $5,000
was set aside for the
experiment. Results
were beyond expectation, and the demands of
the farmers were so
strong that the legislature set apart $10,000
for  the   work.
With the present appropriation of $10,000
the farmer is allowed
(basing calculations on
the census of 1900) eight
and one-half cents per
head, counting father 08
a family the only one
represented as a farmer.
But it is not right to
count the farmers in
this way because his
wife and children have
as much right to
n as the husband has. This
we   only   have   one   and
be counted
being the case,
three-eighths cents per capita set aside
by the state for the special education of
the farmer in the line of his calling. Every
business of the country is dependent on
the farmer and as he learns how to cultivate the soil, and from it produce many
times three-fold or even greater crops, in
the snme proportion will other line of
business  prosper.
With the experience of years, the men
and women who have so nobly taken hold
of the work and many sacrifices brought
it to the place which it now occupies, we
are ready ami fully able to take an advance step.
Our appropriation for institute work is
entirely too small. Our next legislature
sliould be impressed with the fact that the
needs of the institute work demand a
much more liberal appropriation annually
than we now have. But how can this
be spent? Under the present sum allowed,
there can be an- institute held two days
for every two hundred square miles. This
puts the institute so far from many farmers in the different counties that it is out
of the question for them to attend. What
we need is to have the state divided Into
districts of from four to six counties, have
workers assigned to a district and work
all the district before leaving it. The
meetings coming in close succession there
need be font little time lost. By so doing almost every township might have nn
institute each year. The best workers
—men and women—who could give all
their time, or nearly so, conld be secured