and delivered onto cars.

At this figure there is comparatively little profit, especially where land and labor are dear. Long ago I pointed out that this would be the sure result in every alfalfa raising country, and that the solution of the difficulty was to be found in feeding the alfalfa to stock.

Alfalfa is an excellent basis of food, both for milch cows and fattening, steers, but in other cases it must be supplemented with other food, containing an excess of carbohydrates, that is heating and fattening ingredients, in which the alfalfa is deficient. In the case of cows, bran is most generally used, while for fattening others, corn and sorghum fodder has given the best results when mixed with an equal quantity of alfalfa.

For growing animals, however, alfalfa is an ideal food, without the addition of any other matter. It is on this account that young pigs do so well on alfalfa pasture. Many of these will get to over 150 pounds in seven months, with nothing but alfalfa, except during the last three weeks when it is advisable to add wheat shorts to their food, mixing 100 pounds of shorts to 500 pounds of alfalfa hay, which should be chopped up with a cutter and fed wet and well mixed up. Of course, corn or corn meal might take the place of the shorts.

To pasture hogs on alfalfa successfully, it is necessary to observe certain precautions. In the first place you need two pastures, so that one may be fed while the other is being irrigated. Be careful to have a good border between the two pastures, for if water comes into the patch where the hogs are feeding they cannot resist the temptation to root in the cool, moist earth.

The best means of preventing the hogs from rooting up and eating the alfalfa roots is to cut the hard gristle of their shorts. No amount of rings will prevent them.

One of the most important points is to see that the hogs have a constant supply of fresh drinking water. Hogs will not thrive if the water emits a stench. Even

the pools they wallow in must be changed every week, and they should have a little coal oil and sulphur put in daily, so as to keep off vermin. It is a good plan to nail slats about six inches apart over the feeding and drinking troughs. This pre

vents the hogs from getting into the troughs and wallowing in them. Cleanliness is all-important in bog raising.

Quarters should be provided in separate pens, should the pasture become wet with rains, as they will tramp out and ruin the alfalfa if the land is very wet. It is also very desirable that sunshades be provided.

While kept in the pens a little sulphur should be put in their feed, and also sulphur and coal oil and a solution of carbolic acid sprinkled over where they sleep. They should also have access to charcoal.

Under the above treatment our hogs in this vicinity are kept perfectly free of disease.

If the sows farrow in March or April the young pigs can, in this climate, be put upon the pasture at once and they will be fit to market in November or December, and the pastures will supply enough green food for the brood sows during the winter.

I have not said anything about the fences; but, of course, these must be hogproof.

By the bye, the alfalfa in a hog pasture should be mowed once or twice during the summer, or whenever it begins to get hard and woody. This will provide plenty of young and tender herbage, which is more nutritious than forage from other plants.

As regards the number of pigs that may be allowed to run on each acre of pasture, of course this will depend upon circumstances. The best authorities say from ten to twenty head per acre; but at a conservative estimate of ten hogs to the acre it will be seen at a glance that the alfalfa will produce far more money, with less labor, than if the alfalfa is sold, baled, at $6 per ton.

Hog raising on alfalfa will be one of the staple industries of the irrigated West, and I believe that in no part of the world can pork be raised so cheaply, or the animals be kept as free from disease.

HOW ΤΟ GROW WINTER GRAIN WHERE HARD WINDS BLOW.

BY CLINTON C. HUTCHINSON.

THE subject of this article is one which

has interested the writer many years. In my "Resources of Kansas or Fifteen Years' Experience" published 1891, there is a description of the soils of the region. known as "The Plains," which includes a

large proportion of the vast area between the Missouri River and the Rocky Moun tains. Of this country, including Southern Nebraska and southward into Texas, I said: "With deep plowing and deep and early drilling of the seed, this is to be the great winter wheat storehouse of the nation."

The crops of several succeeding years confirmed this prediction, as the people were favored with what are known as "good years." Such seasons are to a certain extent detrimental to the permanent prosperity of any new country, because whatever is planted grows and thrives, whether properly plowed and tilled or not. The consequence is that farmers cease to study their new conditions, and ignore all suggestions looking to better methods, or the introduction of new crops suited to their new soil and climate.

The practice of harrowing or drilling winter wheat between corn rows is often so sucessful that many said deep plowing was unnecessary, and others who plowed deep said this only loosened their soil to a greater depth for the wind to blow away, cutting off the wheat leaves, and perhaps leaving the roots exposed to wind, sun and frost.

The theory which I would urge for trial -for it has never been tried to my knowledge is based upon certain well-known facts. Winter wheat which is protected by corn stalks, high weeds, fences, hedges or groves, often yields a fair crop, while unprotected fields, under otherwise similar conditions yield little or nothing.

What I urge for trial, not only in Kansas but in all open countries where winds blow, is as follows:

Early in the fall plow deep and harrow fine. Neither hard ground nor lumps and clods furnish proper conditions for tender plant growth. Into this seed bed drill or harrow winter wheat, barley, oats or rye, and with it, or immediately thereafter put in one or two bushels per acre of any

quick growing variety of Indian corn. The latter will quickly outgrow the small grain and if sown early enough will thoroughly protect the crop. Being cut down by frosts it cannot sprout again the following spring, and it will mulch and save the growing grain. Its broad smooth leaves will present a surface to the wind, which may be compared in its effects to the pouring of oil upon water in a storm at sea.

If this theory is correct, its value can hardly be estimated. In almost every portion of the United States there is always. rain and sunshine enough in the fall of the year to insure a growth of small grain and of the corn, and the mulch of the latter will not only protect the grain but benefit the soil, when plowed under the next year. Just what amount of corn should be sown can only be determined by experiment, and it might be better to have a dropper attached to the plow beam and turn under the corn unless the plow runs too deep. There is not much likelihood of the plow covering the corn too deep; and putting in the grain afterward, even if the corn had come up, will help rather than hinder its growth.

WINDMILL CAPACITIES.

A CAUTION BY H. V. HINCKLEY.

the June AGE; I cannot allow such a EFERRING to the table on page 245 of table to go out to prospective pump irrigators without cautioning them on the following points: The average wind velocity in Western Kansas, for example, is eleven miles an hour giving about one-half the power of a fifteen mile wind. A successful irrigator will need one foot of water in 60 or 90 days instead of in 300 days. In other words, the areas given in column

'Amount of land covered," if divided by ten, will be approximately the areas successfully irrigable. Thus a fourteen foot mill, lifting water 175 feet, will irrigate 2.3 acres instead of 23 acres. The actual results will depend upon the man, the layout of the plant, succession of crops and the like. It will be possible to double the acreages given by my rule but the result will oftener fall under my figures. I speak from the compiled experience of many irrigators.

ASHES AS A FERTILIZER.

HARDWOOD ashes make excellent fer

tilizing material, chiefly for the potash which they contain. Such ashes also contain lime, which is valuable on some soils, but hardly necessary as yet in very many fruit orchards. In buying ashes then, the main question is that of the potash they contain, and if the cost be more than that of potash in some other form, there is little or no profit in the purchase of ashes

for a field or orchard fertilizer. Professor Massey has shown in the "Canadian Horticulturist" that the great trade between Canada and the United States in Canadian ashes is profitable only to the transportation companies and the dealers. There is no profit in the business to the farmer who sells the ashes from his farm in Canada, or to the farmer who buys it for use as a fertilizer in the United States.

He found that ashes costing about $5 per ton in Canada were sold at certain points in the. United States at $15, the difference of $10 per ton being largely made up of freight charges. In such cases Professor Massey found that the Canadian farmer was selling potash from his land at two cents a pound, and that the United States farmer was paying more than six cents a pound, whereas he could get the same substance in other forms at from four and a half to five cents a pound. The business may be thus summed up: At the prices named the Canadian farmer cannot afford to sell ashes, and the United States farmer cannot afford to buy.

We sometimes see advertisements of hardwood ashes guaranteed to contain five per cent of potash, and a good many tons have been bought for use in American orchards. Of that grade of ashes, a ton would contain 100 pounds of potash, worth not to exceed $5. From this it will be seen that he who pays much more than $5 for a ton of ashes for fertilizing purposes pays too much.

The amount of muriate of potash imported in 1894, was 101,597,074 pounds, valued at $1,540,081. All other forms of potash, except chlorate and nitrate, 28,623,629 pounds, worth $702, 269.

Of nitrate of soda (Chili saltpeter) the importations in 1894, were 98,136 tons, valued at $3,189,084.

Composition of Fruit.-Like other vegetable products, fruits are mostly composed of oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, potash, soda, magnesia, lime, phosphoric acid and sulphuric acid. With the exception of nitrogen, potash, and phosphoric acid, all these elements are abundantly supplied by the air or the soil. A deficiency of one or more of these three substances impairs the fertility of the soil, which must be restored and maintained by compounds containing one or more of these three elements. Each crop taken off the land carries with it a certain amount of these three elements, and lessens by so much the raw material at the command of the farmer.

Let us apply these principles in reckoning the cost of producing large and small fruit of the same variety. An apple three inches in diameter contains twenty-seven times as much substance as one only one inch in diameter, but the skins, cores, and seeds form a much larger percentage of entire substance of the smaller apple than of the larger one.

By a chemical analysis of the apple we find that the seeds, skins, and cores contain about twice as large a percentage of ash, and five times as large a percentage of nitrogen, as the flesh of the apple does. Not only is the ash of the refuse in greater abundance, but it is also richer in phosphoric acid. These facts show that the soil is more rapidly exhausted by the production of small fruit.

Injurious to the Tree. The tree is more injured by a large crop of small fruit than by an equal weight of large fruit. The fruit tree which bears a heavy crop of small fruit makes of very little growth wood, while one which bears the same weight of large fruit makes sufficient wood-growth. Both the growth of the tree is retarded and its health is much impaired by an undue amount of seed. Besides this, the raising of large fruit is more profitable, because, it commands a higher price in the market.

An Ingenious Safeguard.-George A. Fleming, a fruit grower of Visalia, Cal., has devised so ingenious, simple and efficacious a scheme for protecting orchards from frost that it should be known as widely as possible, says the Call. It should be borne in mind that frost occurs only when the air is still. Hence fires built around an orchard will send their heat and vapors straight up into the air, while building them among the trees would be dangerous.

Mr. Fleming, after various experiments, hit on the following plan. He thus describes it: "We built wire frames on our low truck wagons, stretching them from four wagon stakes and heaping wet manure over them. Dirt was thrown on the wagon beds to protect them, and pots of burning tar were set underneath the straw roof. A barrel of water on the wagon was used to keep the straw wet. These

Pear Blight in Texas.-Mr. H. M. Stringfellow some years ago planted an extensive pear orchard at Hitchcock, between Houston and Galveston, Texas, and for some years it was reported to be absolutely free from blight and the most profitable orchard of the kind in the country. But all that has changed. It has been found that what Mr. Stringfellow believed was an ideal location for pears was so only for a short time, and that now the trees in that locality of which great numbers have been planted, are subject to the disorders which affect such trees elsewhere. From a letter in the Texas Farm and Ranch we take the following:

"I am just in from Houston and while there took a run down to Hitchcock to see the Stringfellow pear orchard. I was anxious to see how that fine pear orchard had fared, while blight was everywhere playing havoc with pear orchards. I found the old original orchard badly affected; the Kieffer worse than I have ever seen it here-which so far has been almost clear of blight. Le Conte was as badly affected as here. I was exceedingly sorry to see this. Thousands of trees of these varieties are planted and being planted around Hitchcock, Loma and Alvin. It is a grand sight to a fruit man, but when we think of the blackened ruin that it must come to in a few years, it makes us sad. We also saw the Satsuma orchard set out by Mr. Stringfellow, dead to the ground, on the trifoliate stock. But when we think of eighteen inches of snow lying on the ground for several days it is no wonder that orange trees, even of the most hardy type died.

Calomel for Pear Blight.-The question of administering calomel to cure pear blight is attracting some attention in the Eastern States, and in this connection we give the gist of the claim made for this prescription by Dr. Hensley before the

Missouri State Horticultural Society some three years ago. The doctor alleged that the remedy had been successfully tried for twenty-two years, and he regarded it as practically infallible. He alleged that it had invariably cured the disease whenever tried. The dose recommended is five to ten grains administered by cutting the bark across the trunk and longitudinally, as in the operation of budding, turning back the bark, inserting the calomel, then closing the wound and tying it in place by means of a bandage.

While the lay mind may possibly be inclined to skepticism regarding the efficacy of this treatment, it can be easily tried by any one and the matter fully tested. The medicine should be applied in the spring when the sap is flowing freely.

Copper Sulphate as a Fungicide.Professor Taft, of the Michigan Experiment Station, has much faith in copper sulphate as a winter spray for fungous growths of various kinds.

He says:

"It is now about three years since a strong solution of copper sulphate first came into use as a fungicide upon the bare branches of trees before the buds opened, and the results obtained from its application have been so favorable that it is recommended by nearly, if not all, of the spraying calendars. When used at the rate of one pound to fifteen or twenty-five gallons of water, it destroys the mycelium of such fungi as winter upon the branches, and prevents the germination of such spores as may come in contact with it; but at this strength it will destroy the foliage, hence it cannot be used later in the season."

Prune Acreage in the Pacific Northwest. In its splendid "Prune Edition,' the "Rural Northwest" gave valuable statistics of the industry in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. From careful investigation the "Rural" has learned that prunes are grown in 20 counties of Oregon, in acreages ranging from 20 acres in Curry county to 5,000 acres in Douglass county. The total for the State is given at 28,370 acres. Washington produces prunes in twenty-seven counties, and the smallest acreage in any county is fifty acres in both Columbia and Kittitas. The total acreage is 11,500 acres. Six counties in Idaho produce prunes in quantity, and the total acreage is 6,450 acres, of which Ada and Canyon counties have 4,500 acres. Total for the three States, 46,320 acres of prune orchards.

Crops of Russia 1894.-Russia is a formidable competitor of the United States in the grain markets of the world, and a wide area is there devoted to the cultivation of cereals. Although too far north to yield Indian corn in great quantity, Russia's wheat fields are extending rapidly, and the early completion of the trans-Siberian railway will no doubt stimulate wheat production very materially to the disadvantage of the United States, for the wheat produced on cheaper land than ours, and with the ex-serf labor of Russia, can certainly be sold cheaper in the world's markets than any that can be grown in the United States under civilized conditions. Last year's Russian crops follow.

Condition of Crops in Spain.-During eight months previous to May 1, Spain had suffered from severe drouth. In March and April there were but two days of rainfall. Crops were threatened with almost total failure, and the poor with prolonged distress. But in May the drouth was broken with copious rains, accompanied by a windstorm something less than the St. Louis variety. Farmers feel encouraged, but there will be a short crop of wheat. The American consul at Denia, Andrew F. Fay, suggests that this is an opportunity for the United States to increase its exports of wheat to Spain, which has purchased abroad during the past seventeen years 126,666,600 bushels, or an average of 7,450,900 bushels per year.

Make Careful Selection.-A fruit tree that produces one dollar per annum is easily worth five dollars, making all due allowance for care and depreciation. If the same tree produces two dollars worth it is equally as well worth ten dollars. If there are sixty trees on an acre the difference in the value of that acre is as between $300 and $600. If there are one hundred trees to the acre the difference is as between $500 and $1,000. A due appreciation of this difference will cause every tree planter

to be exceedingly careful in the selection of varieties. We hear of single acres yielding enormous returns; it is generally due to the superior quality, and consequent fancy price of its fruit. It costs but little, if any, more to plant and care for the choicest varieties of any fruit, which have standing in the market and a ready sale, than for those which are only fit for stock feeding, and of trifling value for that.

Overproduction.-Commenting on the advice sent out from the Department of Agriculture, at Washington, that "the American farmer must change his way of doing business and put more brains into his work," the Denver Field and Farm says: "The American farmer has put so much brains into his work that he has, according to his political guardians, brought on universal distress throughout the coun-try by producing too much. Overproduction is what ails the country, he is told, and yet he must put his brains to work to produce more. Our opinion is that he should put his brains to finding out just who it is that is robbing him of the fruits of his toil. He had better watch the money changers; the temple is full of them."

Feeding Alfalfa.-An experiment, carefully conducted at the Utah agricultural station in feeding alfalfa cut at different stages of its growth, has shown that steers fed on that which was cut just before coming into bloom made a gain of threefourths of a pound a day. A second lot fed when the grass had been cut in the early bloom made a gain of only one-half a pound, while a third lot fed on late cut hay, after it was out of bloom made an average gain of only one-fourth of a pound per day. There is a lesson worth heeding in this. If you neglect your haying when the grass is just fit to cut, you are letting the dollars run away from you.

Hog Raising. At the present low price for hogs the raising of them can only be profitable where most favorable conditions exist. Those who can make anything now, or who can make most when the market conditions are normal, are those who are in position to produce suitable hog feed at the least cost and where the attendance of the animals is least expensive. It is here that the irrigated farm has a de