A. & M. <C©L1LE<SE EEFEUES TO QHJESTKOHS
CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN OKLAHOMA CITIZENS AND
CERTAIN DEPARTMENTS OF STATE A. & M. COLLEGE.
Persons interested in scientific, industrial, agricultural, and educational matters will have
inquiries answered promptly without charge i residents of Oklahoma and stamp is enclosed
Real name and postoffice address are required. Write A. & M. College, Stillwater Okla
 
Selection of Seed.
(Excerpts from a letter written to an Oklahoma
seed house in reply to a statement that the Lee
turers on the Agricultural Trains were "knock-
ing” on the seed houses.)
Our speakers have simply urged the farmers to
grow certain crops and to begin the selection of
seed from their own seei products, thereby secur-
ing a strain that was well adapted to their own
special locality, soil, etc. The speakers on seed
corn have advised against buying shelled seed
corn promiscuously. As the manager of a large
seed concern, you of course know what abuses
creep through the channel of seed corn that has
been shelled and sacked. I do not know of any
special cases in this State, but I have known crib
corn to be bought up of the farmers at about 50
cents per bushel and shelled, and sacked, and sold
on the market at from $2.50 to $3.00. The in-
crease in price in these cases was not the worst
feature of the deal. That crib corn had nubbins
and such a variety of type of kernel that no
planter would give an even drop. You know of
these abuses so that it is not necessary for me to
explain further to you what the speakers were
trying to warn against.
Experiments show that every ear of corn has
a certain individuality outside a certain type of
kernel which make it very desirable that each ear
may be tested for germination power as well as
giving an opportunity to plant ears having uni-
form kernel, thereby knowing of this individuality
the same as a farmer may know of the merits of
certain animals in his flock or herd. If you could
adopt this plan of selling ear corn instead of
shelled, you would be helping us to do a great
work in building up the corn yield of Oklahoma -
J A. Wilson, Director Experiment Station.
Pea Hullers.
1 live in the black jack sandy region of Caddo County.
Would like to raise cowpeas and thresh them so I could
have my own seed, but can not get a machine near enough
t« do the work. Is there a hand holler manufactured that
would not be so high as to be prohibitive, and one that you
could recommend? If so please let me know who to write
to about it.—C. E. McCormick, Cado County.
We know of no company manufacturing Pea
Hullers of light enough draft to be run by hand
No such machine is listed in the Buyer’s Guide,
and this lists all of the principal manufacturers
and types of machinery produced in the United
States. The J. L. Owens Co., of St. Paul, Minn.,
lists a machine which can be run by one or two
horsepower and comes nearer the type you in
quire about than any we are acquainted with
You can secure their catalog and other descrip
tive material by simply dropping them a card —
O. O. ( hurchill, Department of Agronomy.
Grafting Wax.
Will you kindly send me the formula for making grafting
wax. Also instructions as to the proper time for grafting
plums in this part of the State?—I. S. Crawford, Jefferson
County, Oklahoma.
The best formula for grafting wax to be used
outside is: Seven pounds rosin, 2 pounds bees-
wax, 1 pound tallow. It should be pulled some-
thing like molasses candy in order to make it
more tenacious. For use it has to be heated. If
you wish to cleft graft your plums, that is graft
them on trees growing outside, they should be
grafted late in the spring. Keep the scions in a
cool cellar, and as soon as the buds start outside
law off the trees, or the limbs of the trees you
desire to graft and insert the grafts. This can
be done in July if the scions can be kept dormant
that long. However, it would require cold stor
age to keep them from growing.— N. O. Booth,
Department of Horticulture and Botany
Cows Poisoned?
I send you parts of two of the stomachs, spleen and
lungs of a cow that we think was poisoned, perhaps with
croton oil or some other drug having the same action. We
lost one cow two weeks ago and two cows t lay, all with
severe cases of scours. Will be glad to have you analize
these parts and see it you can find any trace of poison, and
what poison used. We used treatment indicated in supeiga
tion, but failed to relieve them.—B. F. Craddock, Carter
County, Oklahoma.
I have received the samples mentioned tn your
letter of the nth, but find no evidence of croton
oil or similar substances. If you will describe
the symptoms in detail to Dr. L. L. Lewis, our
Veterinarian, he will no doubt diagnose the case
for you.
Occasionally certain feed, especially frosted
cane and corn, will cause fermentation in the
stomach and result in the death of the animal.
Cows seem to be especially liable to such at-
tacks, perhaps because they eat more.
It has been reported that corn stalks some-
times contain enough prussic acid (a very pow-
erful poison) to cause the death of an animal
when eaten in large quantities. Certain bacteria
and the enzymes are blamed for such work. May
your trouble not have resulted from some enzy-
mes instead of some poison?
I may add for your information that enzymes
are known by the products they form; being quite
unlike bacteria, which do good or harm, as the
case may be, by reproducing themselves. Proba-
bly the best illustration of enzyme action that I
can give you is the action of the clotting enzyme
rennet.—Chas. II Francis, Experiment Station
Chemist
To Make Firm Butter.
I have seen your butter on the market in nice, firm
bricks when other butter was soft and oily. 1 am interested
in the making of good butter, and 1 would like to know how
to make butter that will be nice and firm like yours in the
hot weather of summer.—James Keho, Pawnee County
Oklahoma.
In making butter that will remain firm and not
become oily, the main point to keep in mind is to
always handle the cream and butter as cold as
possible. By this I mean that the cream should
be ripened at a temperature of between 7c0 and
8o&, and as soon as it has soured sufficiently then
cool it as low as possible and let stand at least
six hours before churning. The churning tem-
perature should be such that the butter comes in
a firm condition in from 2o to 30 minutes when
the churn is from one-third to one-half full of
cream. The churning should be stopped w’hen
the granules of butter are the size of kernels of
corn to hickorynuts, and the buttermilk drained
off. Cold water should be added to wash the but-
ter and remove the excess buttermilk. The but-
ter should handle firm during the salting and
working, and should be kept as cold as possible
up to the time of marketing.—Roy C. Potts, De-
partment of Dairy Husbandry.

Cultivating Sandy Soil.
Please advise best method to till sandy soil to keep it from
blowing.—C. E. Williams, Hydro, Oklahoma.
I he best method to till sandy soil where the
winds blow it during the springtime is to use just
as highly' diversified system of farming as you
can possibly carry on—the only salvation for
that kind of soil. By plowing in the late fall or
winter you create a soil condition which when
harrowed frequently will help to compact the
seed bed. It is especially desirable that fall
grains be sown to cover the soil during the win-
ter and spring. Those fields that are to be
planted to cotton and corn or other cultivated
crops should be plowed deep and compacted per-
fectly with a heavy planker or corrugated roller.
Of course, any addition of barnyard manure or
plowing under of green vegetable material helps
to bind the soil together and makes it hold water
better and stops the blowing.
To put the whole thing in a word, you have
just the kind of soil that demands good farming,
and if this is followed you will reap good har-
vests.—J. A Wilsoh, Director of Experiment
Station.
To Grow Osage Orange.
Lan you tell me where 1 can obtain Osage orange seed
and how to plant them for a hedge?—bred F. Cook, Lincoln
County, .Oklahoma.
We have no Osage orange seed on the College
farm. 1 think you will find it advisable to buy
your Osage orange plants of the nearest nursery-
man. Unless one desires them in a very large
quantity it does not pay to grow them.
The seed should be planted in the early
spring. It is usually raised close together in
rows until one or two years old, and then trans-
planting out into the hedge row.
The Osage orange hedge is not nearly so popu
lar in this country as it was twenty-five years
ago. They will sap the ground for from twenty-
live to fifty feet, so that corn or wheat growing
along beside the hedge will be dwarfed and un-
satisfactory to that distance into the field. This
makes the Osage orange fence more expensive
than a wire fence.—N. O. Booth. Department of
Horticulture and Botany.
Glanders in Horses and Man.
Please inform me in regard to farcy in horses. Is it con-
tagious or infectious? Js it as readily transmitted as gland-
ers that affect the air passages?—R. L. Burns, Blaine
County, Oklahoma.
Farcy is a form of glanders, as both diseases
are due to the same organism. Farcy affects the
superficial lymphatic system while glanders af-
fects the respiratory passages. It is generally
admitted that in pronounced cases of glanders,
where there is an abundant discharge from the
nostrils, that infection is more likely than in
cases of farcy. If the latter disease is present
over the body to any extent, harness, blankets,
etc., may become infected and serve to carry the
infection to other animals. Man is not as sus-
ceptible to glanders infection as horses, as evi-
denced by the fact that the disease is not very
common in man, although there are many cases
where glandered horses are cared for.—L. L.
Lewis, Department of Veterinary Science.
Cultivation for Orchards.
1 have a young peach orchard and would like to know
the best cultural method for same. -Oliver C. Black, Okla-
homa County, Oklahoma.
Yon will find it advisable to give your peach
orchard clean culture during the early part of the
season. If we have a wet season seed down to
cowpeas some time during the first half of July.
If tlie season remains dry, keep on cultivating
but do not plant anything in amongst the trees.
The only object in planting cowpeas is to enrich
the soil. On dry years the moisture which the
cowpeas take from the trees does more damage
than the enriching will do good. On wet years
this is not the case. Always cultivate early and
late in drougthy seasons. In wet seasons this is
not so important.—N. O. Booth, Department of
Horticulture and Botany.
THE KANSAS AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE
AND THE LEGISLATURE.

The Kansas A. & M. looked for larger appro-
priations this year—$970,000 was secured. This
is about $100,000 more than for the current
period.
The Mail and Breeze of Topeka, Kan., sums up
the appropriations and makes the following
comments:
The Extension and Farmers’ Institute Depart-
ments have $35,000 appropriated to their use for
ipn-i- and $40,000 for 1912*13. The Kansas sta-
tion r.eceive? 544,500 for the two years; and the
branch station at Hays, where is located the
state's immense experimental farm, gets $46,300
the Hays station is to expend $27,500 of this
amount the first year.
It is to be regretted more liberality could not
m i .n shown the Animal Husbandry, Dairy
Husbandry, poultry and Domestic Science De-
partments. The first two are alotted $5,000 a year
each and the last two $2,000 per year respect-
ively Chickens and homemakers are apparently
placed on a par.
In 1910 Kansas had over 234 million dollars in-
vested in hve stock. The value of the animals
sold or slaughtered within the State last year was
/» million dollars. The amount of dairy products
soid more than i2 million dollars. The total sum
ot the pou try and eggs marketed was nearly 11
million dollars.                                 J
To inculcate better methods in the production
of these products which aggregate 335 million
dollars in value, $i2.ooo is to be expended each
year tor the next two years plus the work of the
Extension Department; $3,000 for hog cholera
serum: $7,500 for live stock experiments, and
$-,000 for a poultry house. In other words Kan-
sas is to expend thirty-five ten-thousandths of 1
per cent of the value of its live stock business in
the laudable endeavor to improve its methods of
animal husbandry.
In the matter of poultry, New York’s assembly
has just voted Cornell $90,000 for a poultry build-
ing and equipment. Kansas asked for $5,000 a
year for two years to enlarge the College poultry
plant and provide properly for the large number
of students who are asking for instruction in that
industry. The Kansas Legislators appropriated
$2,000, or a total of $4,000 for the biennial period
Forestry got the same sum, and the needed phys-
ics laboratory was struck out altogether.
General Appropriations.
75,000
purpo-
50,000
22,000
Maintenance ..................................... <
Eor the purchase of books . 
Experiment Station 
Extension Department and State Farmers’
Institute...............
For increased equipment and bet
following departments:
Domestic Science..                      .
Animal Husbandry
Dairy Husbandry
Agronomy........                    

Poultry 
Horticulture 
Veterinary 
Printing..                   

Engineering Laboratory.
Heat and power equipment
For new wells and pumps... bb'U.'b
 
1* ire protection and escapes.
Poultry house 
Repair and improvement of buildings and

grounds...................................
Milling industry 
Forestry .’......................
Dodge City forest station 
Dairy Commissioner 
Hays branch Experiment Station b CL b
Garden City station ................... 

Contingent fund tor president.
For coal..............................................  
Heat tunnels.......................................
Wing of Agricultural Building, to accom-
modate departments of Animal Hus-
bandry, plant production, grain pro-
ducts, and farm mechanics, and for the
equipment of same (including a de-
tached laboratory for the cutting and
curing of meats) 
Io complete Armory and Gymnasium 
Special Appropriations.
The Legislature appropriated for special
ses, by separate bills:
Per diem and traveling expenses, board of regents, $1,750
a year for two years.                             ■           1/3
Emergency appropriation for hog chrlera serum produc-
tion, $3,000.                                                 *
Experiments in irrigation in western part of State, co-
operating with United States Government,. $2,000 each year.
Lor soil surveys, in cooperation with United States Gov-
ernment, $5,000 each year.
For experiments in production of improved seed—wheat
corn, and other agricultural crops, $7,500 each year.
1 he $7,500 revolving fund for live stock experiments and
demonstrations appropriated by the last Legislature was re-
appropriated.
1911- 12
$215,000
3.500
22,500
I9i2-‘i3
$235,000
3,5«o
22,50s
35,ooo
40,000
.ter >vo 1
x m the
$  2,000
$ 2,000
5,000
5,000
5,000
5,000
5,000
5,000
2,000
2,000
2,000
2,000
1,500
1,500
1,000
1,000
5,000
5,000
7,5oo
7,50*
3,000
4,000
4,000
2,000
1
10,000
1 o,ooe
2,000
2,000
2,000
2,000
3,000
2,200
7,5oo
7,500
27,500
l8,800
5,000
2,500
500
500
12,000
I 2,000
3,000
3.000
The law relating to the inspection of feeding
stuffs was entirely revised and the fees increased
Hie income to the College from this source will
be materially larger than in former years.
The appropriation for the completion of the
armory and gymnasium is immediately available,
and it is expected that all work will be completed
on this building by June 1.

Sec announcement of summer work at the A. &
M. College, which opens June 6, on pages 4 and 5
of this issue.

Can You Beat It?
‘Oh. yes, we have a wonderful climate," said the
man from southern Texas. “Why, only last sea-
son we raised a pumpkin so large that, after saw-
ing it in two, my wife used the halven as cradles
in which to rock the babies.”
“Yes.” replied the man from New York; “but
in my State it’s a common thing to find three full-
grown policemen asleep on one beat.”—Lippin-
cott’s Magazine.