./OL. XXXI.
*      •:
INDIANAPOLIS, IND., MARCH 14, 1896.
NO. 11
THE SOUTHERN COLONY.
*ome Additional Productions and Their
Profits.
\ former Indiana acquaintance who is
iow farming successfully on the Florida
Highlands, in the vicinity of the colony
inds, told us while there recently that
his section has two great advantages
ver the Georgia peach belt country.
'ir.-t it has the delightful gulf breeze in
lie hot summer season, and second ita
. armer soil matures peaches a week to
days earlier and gave us this incident
homing the latter advantage. He said
i-t season one cf the first shipments of
eaches was to the city of Jacksonville,
'hi., just on the edge of the Georgia peach
elt, but before Georgia peaches were
ipe, and the Florida shipment sold at
I'O a bushel. In a week later and after
eorgia peaches began to come in the
nit was selling in Jacksonville at only
per bushel. Several young peach
rcliards two years and a half after set-
nft, grew fruit that sold at $2 48 per tree,
le set 110 peach trees to the acre. The
.iches grown there are very high in
uality, much more so than in many
er warm sections of the country.
The Florida Farmer and Fruit Grower
ivs of the profitableness of the tobacco
', -,ip: "One large crop sold for $30,000.
v w ere shown a sample of tobacco from
i acre  which   Mr.  Owens  grev  1,000
Jsimds without any fertilizing whatever
ii. **;j*er's pronounce it good."  .... *     . .
4 It. F. Moodie, one of the olde»_-iobacco
' lanters, has  produced  fine tobacco for
i igar wrappers which sold at $1 a pound.
le says lt costs him 5 to 0 cents a pound
•; ' raise and harvest it.   A northern man
iree years ago bought  40  acres  of im-
roved land at  $8 per acre, and one acre
le first year in tobacco netted him $325,
lore than paying for the whole 40 acres.
1 liis was a fine grade of wrapper tobacco.
; A forage plant introduced a few years
i _;o called  Beggar  Weed, has  proven a
onderful restorer of the land, far more
1 alnable as a fertilizer than either peas
i r clover, and superior to either for tors'-e; besides, it has the great advantage
. ver both the above  in  that it does not
1 ave to be planted  each  year, for when
'< nee established  in   the soil it comes up
i mually without any further attention.
3 ! interferes with no crop that you may
j !ant, being easily kept under by culti-
i Uion, and it can easily ba totally eradi-
< itod from the soil by two* years success-
- e pasturing.   This feature, too, adds to
i _ great value, for some valuable forage
Bants become actually the worst of pests
(Is bad as Cocoa), when you wish to de-
"f to the land on  which  they are estab-
i hed to the cultivation  of  some  other
* ops. This plant is a rank feeder—with
d ep feeding roots—and brings up from
* e sub-soil the dormant fertilizing ele-
■* ants deposited there for years, and de-
P .it them on the surface when they shed
* eir foliage  in  the  fall.   Land in the
* ndy sections of Florida which six years
J o would not yield more than eight
o -hels of corn per acre, and actually too
P or to cultivate, now seeded in this Giant
B ggar Weed, readily yields 20 to 25
™ ~hels per acre with never an ounce of
« tilizer used on it.   For forage it has no
* 'al. Hogs, cows, horses and mules fat-
** i on it when nothing else will bring
*■ -ta out, and they will refuse any other
™ d when they  can  get  Beggar Weed.
* e seed are very small and light. About
® = pounds will thoroughly seed an acre.
'■> referring to this valuable plant, United
a! tes Senator Pasco says of it:
• [t has certainly been a blessing to the
* ners of Florida. It has enriched their
-5 '-land furnished at the same time tbe
i_ ;, °IR&e known in the South for all
ho L. ?.-,ock- H°SS* cattle, mules and
U I «. e tnri~~*-" and fatten on it, and
hcffpii ^?v.T_?r. -.een  kP0Wn  l?  produce
a
tta
If* Woat in cattle  as  clover, peas
»«n».     *?  are  B0  apt  t0  d°-    Kvery
-hS?m a.nd stock grower  in   -      "     v
"I"-! give this valuable plai
the  South
ant a trial."
EXPERIENCE DEPARTMENT.
How Can You Tell When  Ground is
too "Wet to Plow?      "What is
the   Effect   of   Plowing
and Working the
Ground -Wet?
No definite answer can be given to
query Xo. 4. Experience is the best Judge
to "tell when ground is too wet to plow."
If soil pressed in the hand retains a distinct impress of the mold, it is ordinarily
too wet to work.
The pressure of mold-board and cultivator shovels when plowing ground too
wet compacts the soil too much, excluding the air, locking up the natural fertility and retarding development of plant
roots, which will only bo remedied by the
disintegrating effects of the next winter's
frosts. You can only partly remedy the
damage by much after cultivation the
same season.
With calm and cloudy, or moist weather,
plowing may often be safely done when
the ground is so wet as would be disastrous if sunshine and dry winds prevailed.
Clover and blue grass sod may be plowed sooner and wetter than ground bare,
or devoid of living vegetable matter.
Ground plowed wet should be harrowed
as soon as possible. I believe more damage is done by plowing too dry than too
wet. ."' '    ...--. *,-*..      _■■'. ^--im.■■■ ~ «
The When and How to plow are essential to successful farming, and each must
be learned by|experience.
Kosciusko Co. E. F. Diehl.
granular and work so nice and remain all
summer so mellow?
Naturo is fully onto this secret.
In this climate she plows with ice and
roots. In warmer zones ranker growth
supplies more root, and a more abundant
mulch of plant growth.
Did you ever think that nature does
more effective plowing than we do? She
picks the soil to pieces as fine as dust, and
then as the frost leaves, the wet soil
settled into granular particles. She
shields it from puddling' rain by trash
and doesn't tramp it.
We work the opposite way, wo break
the firm soil, often puddled by exposure
and dried into lumps, and then proceed to
break the lumps. Last spring no heavy
rains had puddled it, and we worked a
natural granular seed bed. Can we take
the hint? E. 11. Collins.
No.2. A wet soil is one that contains
more water than a merely moist or humid
soil. Appearance will practically determine the amount of water any soil contains. A soil surcharged with water is
readily discernible from one void of water. So also will the intervening degrees
be known by observation and experience.
Increasing shades of darkness accompany
the changes from dry to saturated. A
dry soil has a dry appearance and a wet
soil has a wet appearance.
The soil's conduct under physical force
is also a guide. The pressure of the foot
scarcely disturbs the surface particles of
a dry soil. The same pressure slightly
displaces vertically downward the surface
particles of a merely moist soil. With a
wet soil there is a displacement laterally
of both surface and sub-particles. Thero
is a spewing up about the foot and the
foot itself mires. Usually a wet soil is
tenacious and always heavy.
The effect of plowing soil wet is decidedly injurious. Early rains will diminish
the injury. Without these tlie soil will
become hard, lifeless and void of moisture
Good soils habitually broken and tilled
will lose their vitality and become unproductive. .Soils broken merely moist and
afterwards thoroughly tilled even gain in
moisture, and crops thereon thrive during
continued drouths. If soils be broken
and tilled wet, and drouth follow, crops
thereon will perish for want of moisture
to set free fertility. Besides the soil will
suffer a permanent physical injury.   X.
REVIEW.
The proper condition of a seed bed is
expressed by the word llocculent. Not
fine, not coarse. Not slick and pasty like
over worked butter but granular. Dig
up some soil in nature's seed bed and see
if it don't crumble into coarse bits of dirt
not into powder.   Not into clods.
Air can pass freely through it, roots can
readily penetrate it, and yet it is close
enough to make good capillary action of
soil moisture.
Here was the secret of our great surprise, even astonishment at securing a
bumper crop of corn last year. A perfect
seed bed.   Did you ever see soil break so
No.5. March 21.—Dopotatoesdobeston
high eround or low? How do you like
bur oak bottoms? What variety is best
suited to your soil and what suits high or
low soil best? *
No. G. March 28.—How do you cut and
plant potatoes?
No. 7. April 4.—Have you been successful in buying family supplies and farm
machinery at wholesale, and how is it
done?
No. 8. April 11 —How do you prepare a
seed bed for corn?—Selection and care of
['-.-ejcLt... . . -__»..---
No. 9. April 18. How do you plant and
cultivate corn?
No. April 25.—How doyou light drouth?
year or even winter '<00 lbs Kaintt (or 200
lbs Muriate Potash) and 400 His Phosphate
on the sod, and he will find, that already
in thc lirst summer an entirely different
vegetation haa taken possession of the
soil. Clover, which heretofore was not
seen will start in plenty, grasses will
follow suit and if such top dressing is repeated the next fall a rich nutritious hay
crop will recompense thc progressive
farmer for his outlay and labor.- The
trial ha. been made not by one man but
by hundreds, and in every instance the
result has been highly satisfactory, provided the land had tlie necessary drainage and could not be classed amongst
swamp land.
But not only to clover and rlher leguminous plants nitrogen can be fed by absorption from tlie air to other plants just as
well—indirectly however. If we have
grown clover and plow itunder, thenltro-
en which this clover has taken from the
air and which is held by thc soil as organic nitrogen, is generally sullicient to
nourish the grain, potatoes, corn etc.
which arc sown on this inverted clover
sod.
Buckwheat as a green manure cannot
be mucli recommended. If now and then
a good croj) of grain is harvested where
Buckwheat had been plowed under, it is
more than likely, that sullicient nitrogen
was still stored'in the ground to feed the
grain, as Buckwheat is not classed
amongst the nitrogen gatherers.
•—fttisa&sbum,?*•*.—       J-*-*-*. V: vw._r.
This Department is under the editorial
charge of E.lf.Coliins, Carmel, Hamilton
county, to whom all copy should be addressed.
Notes About Fertilizers.
Editoks Indiana Fai-meb:
Nitrogen, as i.s well known, can lie purchased in tlie form of Nitrate of Soda,
sulphate of amonia, dried blood, lish
guano etc., but we have to pay at tlie rate
of 15 cents per hundred pounds for the
same—rather a high price and it is well
worth while to look around for a cheaper
way of getting it.
Chemistry teaches us that four-fifths of
the atmospheric air, surrounding us is
composed of nitrogen, the analysis of humus and of peat soils, shows us large
stores of nitrogen, but how are we to
get at what is offered to us so freely?
Years ago the idea prevailed that the
free nitrogen of the air could not be
absorbed by cultivated plants, but whilst
this is true in some respects it is not so
with a variety of plants—so called leguminous plants—such as beans, peas, vetches,
clover and others. When these leguminous plants are hungry for nitrogen, a
microscopic fungus growth takes possession of the roots, producing a small wart
like ffrowth at the roots and from that
time on the free nitrogen of thc air commences to feed the nitrogen hungry
plants. %
But how* is it that there are so many
fields on which we see peas, clover etc ,
make such a poor showing? How is it
that meadows become poor and yield
such scanty crops of hay, if the nitrogen,
so much needed for leaf growth can be
drawn in abundant quantities from the
air?
The reply is easy enough. Those
meadows, those clover fields are not
hungry for nitrogen but for phosphoric
acid and potash and perhaps also for lime.
Nitrogen is offered to them in any quantity but they cannot absorb it so long as
the soil is lacking in phosphoric acid,
potash and lime.
Suppose the farmer owns a hungry
meadow, a meadow which hardly does
produce anv nutritious grasses, nothing
perhaps but weeds, moss and sour grass
Let him spread during the fall, of the
Is it Safe to  Pay  Six  Dollars  an  Acre
Rent?
nv -.. a. noniN.soN*.
"I live six miles from tho county seat
and have to travel the greater portion of
the distance on mud roads. Now, can I
afford to pay .{...00 per acre rent for land
at the outskirts of the town. There isa
flourishing creamery at the town and
there is usually a good market for farm
produce, and butter and eggs."
Monroe Co. W. H. P.
This is a difficult question to answer
for everything depends upon the capacity, the industry and the health of the individual, (ienerally speaking, however,
a farmer cannot afford to pay six dollars
per acre rent for land. In fact there is
so much good land that can be secured
by good farmers at a lower rate that it
would seem needless to pay such prices.
Being personally acquainted with the
enquirer, and knowing the hustling
qualities of himself and wife and all the
children, I am persuaded that he can
come as near making his way on six dollar rent for land as any man I know of.
There are other features in the case besides the mere matter of making money.
The question of the education of children
is a very important one, and no doubt
the facilities offered by the city schools
are superior to those of the district
school, which his children now attend.
The opportunity of sending tliem through
the Slate university at a low cost is not'to
be lost sight of. It is a matter of very
great moment and the rental value of
land in thatparticularlocalityisinfluenc-
ed in part by these social, religious and
educational adyantages.
Viewing tho matter from a purely
financial standpoint, it cannot be denied
that near such a city as Bloomington, a
farmer who is a hustler can make a farm
bring him in a greater income, acre for
acre, than he can six miles out on a hilly,
muddy road, and since there is a good
creamery near, it would seem that a person having a faculty for handling cows,
and getting the most out of them could
secure a good profit on a well managed
dairy. If, in addition to all the above
features he can secure a ready sale for
his market gardening product, he might
make a comfortable living and more on
a fifty acre farm, the size of the one he
speaks of.
(TO  HE CONTINUED.)
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