Garden
W
VOL. LVII.
INDIANAPOLIS, NOV. 8, 1902.
NO. 45
Editors Indiana Farmer:
I. D. O'Donnell, from Hillio-jja, Montana,
brought 11 dozen enormous potatoes to the
recent Irrigation Congress, at Denver,
each enough for a meal for a moderate
sized family. Mr. O'Donnell is a famous
irrigator of alfalfa for sheep and cattle
feeding on the Yellowstone Valley of
Montana. The soil of the Montana valleys, lie says, is very deep and rich and the
alfalfa roots run down to the incredible
depth of 40 and 50 feet. "There is nothing like personal attention to farming" he
iemarke.1 to me. "No matter how good
a man my foreman may be, the moment
I get on the place myself I see where
something needs doing that will save me
dollars. My personal direction may mean
$10, $25 or $30 a day. And yet, a man
must not stay on his farm all the time.
It is by getting around that I can improve
my methods." G. E.  M.
 .    .	
Immense. Yields From Irrigation,
■dltor. Indiana Farmer:
The State of Utah has three prosperous
beet sugar communities. The farmers
get in the neighborhood of $5 a ton for
their beets, varying according to the percentage of sugar they contain. They
raise 12, lo, 20 and even 30 tons of
beets to the acre, irrigating usually three
times. An intresting feature of one of the
sugar factories, the Utah Company plant
is two pipe lines used to carry the beet
juice to the refinery. Of course the
question of transportation of the beets is
an important one. The slicing of the
beets and extracting the sugar juice is
comparatively simple and in this case machines for this purpose are located one 18
and one 25 miles from the factory and the
juice piped that distance to the refinery,
thus bringing a largo additional territory
tributary to the factory. Thirty or forty
bushels of wheat to the acre in Utah is
common and 80 or 90 bushels per acre has
been raised. There is one prize plot ot
ten acres in the suburbs of Salt Lake City
which raised by actual weight, 1.000-4
bushels, or over 100 bushels per acre. Another acre patch of ground near the city
raised over 1,000 bushels of potatoes. Six
hundred bushels per acre is not unusual.
Nature Study.
[Abstract of an addrefs delivered by Frofesafor
Stanley M. Coulter, at the Conference of Institute Workers, held at Purdue I'niversity, Oct.
14 and 15,1902.
One of the important problems oU the
age is that whieh arises from the concentration of population in the cities, and the
consequent depopulation of country communities. Taken from any view point
this is an extremely serious condition, and
one which thoughtful men, in various lines
of work, have endeavored to remedy. Such
movement is probably due to many CSas-S.
One of the most important of which is the
fact that the farm life seems without >n-
terest and full of nothing save hard labor.
It seemed nothing of immediate development for future achievement. That such
an idea was a mistaken one was the view
of many educators who believed that the
solution of the problem lay in bringing
the children of rural communities into
more immediate and vital contact with nature study. Believing this it was sought
to introduce Nature Study into the
schools.
The movement arose independently in
Indiana, in New York and California ami
has been worked out with much care iu
each of these States. In New York
upon the presentation of the facts, the
Legislature placed under the control of the
Agricultural College, Cornell Universitv,
$30,000 annually to be  expended  in  tho
promotion of the interest of agriculture
and specified that of this amount $10,000
annually should be devoted to work iimum;
the children. Since 1896 this work has
been carried on under these auspices i-
New York, with t!ieresultthatevery2.">,<Hs(l
teachers are, at their own request, receiving leaflets outlining work in Nature
Study, and that one hundred and twenty-
five thousand children are organized in
Naturalist's Clubs, working under the direction of the Bureau of Nature Study.
In addition to these direct means, ths.
cause is further advanced by frequent
addresses at teachers' institutes, by a
summer school for Nature Study at Cornell University, aud by personal correspondence.
To further stimulate the interest of the
children there have been offered premiums
for the best gardens, for the best displayn
of flowers, for the best collection of insect
and for the best essays upon various subjects bearing upon farm life. The result
of the work, taken as a whole, has been
merely to stimulate the agricultural
communities of New York, or to increase
the interest of the young in agricultural
and horticultural pursuits.
In Indiana, without an appropriation,
the organized work has been under the
auspices of Purdue University, and has
consisted chiefly in the publication of leaflets which have been distributed in largo
editions, throughout the state and, indeed,
throughout the country. Some 25 such
leaflets have been issued by the University, suggesting work covering a wide
range of subjects. Further work has
been done before teachers' institutes and
in the organization of a summer school
of Nature Study at Winona Lake. The
results, so far, show wide-spread acceptance of the subject in the schools of
cities and small villages, though as a rule
in rural communities, to which it is most
vital, but little progress has been made.
The main purpose is not so much to give
instruction in any branch of science as tn
train the perceptive powers ofl the child
to bring him into more intelligent relation
to his life work.
Briefly put, Nature Study cultivates the
art of seeing what one looks at, and the
ilrawing of correct conclusions from the
things seen. Such power is absoliftely
necessary to the systematic development
of the child. Without development along
such lines, he is seriously handicapped iu
his life work.
Nature Study is a plan for improving
agriculture through the improvement of tbe
children, because of the broader outlook
upon life which comes from this pursuit.
to dignify and uplift the standard of manhood and womanhood throughout the
state. No subject is more vital to the
rural community, no subject contains more
promise.
with 160 Seres can STOW 800 steers. The
soil is of volcanic origin, very rich with the
stored fertility of centuries and 200 and
300 feet deep. No man knows how far
down the alfalfa roots go. "Men," said
Mr. Barge, "ate doing well and makiug
money M twenty, ten and even five acres
of land, and supporting their families. But
the ordinary' Eastern farmer has much to
learn about irrigation when he comes
out AVest. There enn be no hard and fast
rules for irrigating. Bach man must to a
large extent, work out the problem for
himself. There is no class of farming
that requires the exercise of brain power
like irrigation farming." G. E. M.
Editor. Indian. Farmer:
Some delegates to the Denver Irrigation
('on*_:ress, from the Yakima Valley, in
Washington, thought they had the finest
farming land in the United States. On
a visit to the Cripple Creek gold fields I
talked with B. F. Barge who has an irrigated farm along the celebrated Sunnyside Canal, North Yakima, nnd he said
he has seen wheat yield 100 bushels per
acre in the Palouse region, but that thei*
irrigated land is too valuable to grow
wheat even at this rate of yield. They
grow fruit—apples and pears—and make
from $300 to $500 per acre. They spny
regularly, and give two irrigations. Their
aimnal rainfall is bnt 6 or 7 inches. Alfalfa is the great forage crop.     A man
Supplementary Topics.
Is there any excuse for any officer not
having   the   ritual   w.irk   memorised?
An* literary exercises primarily for
the entertainment of the Grange or for
the mental development of those participating?
Should a subordinate Orange designate
certain meetings during the year when
degrees will be conferred, leaving other
meetings  for  other  exercises'.'
GRANGE TOPICS FOR 1002.
First  Quarter—General   Topic—
Legislation.
January.—What national legislation has
*1., Xational Grange endorsed and what
are the members of this Grange doing to
secure it?
February.—How can the Grange best
secure such state legislation as the interests of agriculture justly demand?
March.—How  can   we    secure   greater
equality  in the matter of taxation?
Supplementary   Topics.
What are the provisions of the Tawney
bill and wherein does it differ from the
Grout bill of the previous congress?
What are the provisions of our state
law regulating the sale of oleomargarine
and is the law enforced?-
What can this Grange do to aid the
movement for good roads?
Second   Quarter—General   Topic—
Education.
April.—What constitutes a good education?
May.—Of what advantage is a good education?
June.—Does the farmer need special education?
Supplementary Topics.
What are the requirements for admission to our agricultural college and the expense for attendance?
What experiments is our experiment
station conducting and what bulletins has
it issued during the year?
What are the advantages of a normal
school training for rural school teachers?
Third  Quarter—General  Topic—Farm
Management.
July.—To what extent are dements
of fertility removed from the soil by
growing crops?
August.—What form of purchasable
fertility is the most economical with
which to restore that appropriated from
the soil by growing crops?
September.—Why does cultivation of
the soil promote plant growth an.l to
what extent can cultivation contribute
to  such  growth ?
Supplementary  Topics.
What are the cheapest sources of protein available to the farmer?
What fruit is most profitable in this
section?
What are the relative advantages of
selling the product of the dairy in the
form of milk, cream and butter?
Fourth   Quarter.—General    Topic.—
Grange  Education.
October.—What Grange exercises are
the most productive of mental development among the members?
November.—To what extent is the
Grange fitting its members to hold public
effice,   and   why?
December.—What systematic effort can
be made in this Grange the coming year
that will increase th- efficiency of its educational work?
POPULAR ERRORS.
That man as an individual or in the aggregate is prone to believe all kinds of
Statements without the slightest evident"-!
as to their correctness is a well-known
psychological fact of every-day obser\ a-
tion. There is au amusing illustration of
tliis in "The Life of Charles Darwin."
A gentleman, who, it appeared later, was
a good local botanist, wrote to Darwin
from tho eastern colonies that the seeds
or beans of the common field bean had
that year grown everywhere on the wrong
side of the pod. Darwin wrote back asking for further information, as hie did
not understand what was meant, but he
received no answer for a very long time.
"I then saw," Darwin goes on to say,
"in two other newspapers, one published .
in Kent and the other in Yorkshire, para-
agraphs stating that it was a most remarkable, fact that the 'beans this year
had all grown on the wroug side,' so I
thought there must be some foundation
for so general a subject. Accordingly I
went to my gardener, an old Kentish man,
and asked him whether he had heard anything about it, and he answered, 'Oh, no
sir, it must be a mistake, for the beans
grow on the wrong side only in leap year.'
I then asked him how they grew in common years, and how in leap years, but
soon found out that he knew absolutely
nothing of how they grew at any time,
but he stuck to his belief. After a time
I heard from my first informant, who,
with many apologies, said that he should
not have written to me had he not heard
the statement from several intelligent
farmers, but that he had since spoken
again to every one of them and not one
knew ill- the least what he himself had
meant. So that here a belief—if, indeed,
a statement with no definite idea attached
to it can be called a belief—had spread
over altr.est the whole of England, without  a  vestige  of evidence."
Dr. Poore records an interesting instance of the same kind of thing in "Medical Jurisprudence." While dining with
five or six military gentlemen, all men of
standing in the army, and one of them a
colonel in the engineers, the conversation
turned on the growth of hair after death.
Dr. Poore expressed the opinion that, theoretically, such growth might proceed for
a few moments after death, but that was
all. Tne engineer colonel turned around
an.l said: "You are perfectly wrong.
Thero is no doubt whatever that in Crt
men the beards of the soldiers grew
through the collars of their greatcoats."
Further ouestioning showed that his estimable officer, who was incapable of a
joke, especially on such a subject, had
got it from a lieutenant who had got it
from a captain; the captain had been told
by somebody who had himself been told
by Tommy Atkins. Of course the notion
that the beard could grow through the collar of a greatcoat is wildly absurd, yet
here were educated people thoroughly lie-
believing in it. And the worst of it is that,
like tho old Kentish gardener, they no
doubt, stick to the belief.—British Medical Journal.