The oasis. [volume], August 10, 1893, Image 1

About The oasis. [volume] (Arizola, Ariz.) 1893-1920

Image provided by: Arizona State Library, Archives and Public Records; Phoenix, AZ

                
Vol. I.
A R I ZOLA, ARIZONA, THURSDAY, AUGUST 10, 1893.
No. 14.
AN i:.l'KKniKT IN HOKSI.M.r.sll.
lint hii Old nc, In 1,1, h i hoodore Wliilvrn
'OtD'crnlril.
A reporter for the New York Sun.
at. Mngdahna. X. M. sends his paper
tin' following interesting article on
(in experiment to bo tried in t In
Mognllon m' tj iitnins of s d o county.
Mr Eugene Pearson, of Ihookl.yi),
lias arrived hero, bringing eleven
thoroughbred ceils with which ho
proposes to t ry an interest ing experi
ment. Mr. Pearson has bought a
ranch at the Junction of the San
Francisco ami Negrita crci ks. Plb
miles west of her-. The ranche in
cludes .T.M ncresof patented land, "ly
ing in a pocki t in the valley" as Mr.
lYarin puis it. Except for t he wa-
iiiuch,' said I, and th.cn happened to
think of some! hing.
" 'How far do you want him to go-'
isa 1.
" "Only a quarter.'
And how soon do you want lilnt to
step ir
" "In s-cond".' he said.
In L'.'i Ioyou know what you are
talking about."
"I guess I lo. We have plenty
that step a qwai ler in 21. and sonic in
That set me thinking. If these
short bred ponies art." - j n:i I to J.'!
what, could not a I borough bred do in
these all it nde. I determined to lind
out. what, it could do.
"'At the Haggiu sale, recently I
bought -ix yearlings, and I have pur-
AI.IALIA IX KOI' 1COTATION.
In treat lug of the rotation of crops
the Kansas Farmer gives its readers
some very good advice in the follow
ing article:
Mot fanners look iinii their alfalfa
fields as little less than permanent hi
st itut ions, to be past art d or mowed as
long as the return is profitable, and
after that point is pased. possibly
plowed up and planted to -nine other
crop, t he select ion of which is in no
way inlliienced by its lit m to follow
alfalfa. In pursuit of this policy a
great deal of t he possible proiit in the
cult i vat ion of alfalfa is ot . No ot her
crop, with the jtossible exception of
red clover, is as valuable a fert ili;:-r nf
land as alfalfa. In common with all
tcr of tie-st reiitns and t lie irrigating ! eha-ed tivc ot hers. One of the fillies I leguminous plants, it has the power
elTectsof the rains that are hoped for ; is related to Sal vat or. and t hey are all j "f extracting nitrogen from the air
luring July ami August. Use ranrdie jsjof good stock. I have a place for a ! and storing it in the soil, for the Iten-
u small part of the great de-ert that
desert fhiit stretches away from the
Kio fiiiinde to the Colorado iher. It
Is not alone a d--crt of dust, and sand,
track not over a half mile. I guess
but it 'll be a good one. and I mean 1o
give t he colts 1 he best possible care."
oiue 01 tlie local hor-cmou were i
but It is a regular
desert of lava bed'
desert w hich lies ne;i! y c.iiiKi feet above J develop phenomenal racers. Two were
t he level of the sea. It is a lofty table j of cent rarv opinion. ( )ne said:
"There is plenty of horses in Colo-
land surrounded by mountains. How
ever there js grass a-penty wherever
there is water.
Fntil it came into the hands of Mr.
IVarson the ranche was known as Dil
lon's, and it was the propel ty of Ed
billon, a typical New Mexican cow loy
On this plot of ground,, with the aid
of I tilloii and such other cowUiys as
can be found there, Mr. Pearson will
build ample stables and corrals for his
colts, and a good half-mile track as
well, for wni king them, and will then
settle down to develop a futurity
winner for the year ls'H. He is confi
dent, in the (irst place, that working
the colts iu that alt it tide will develop
extraordinary lung ovvcr. AVhcrc
the air is as light, as it is li.iNin feet
above the sea, a greater amount must
be inhaled t o do t he work of t he lungs
the lungs must be expanded further,
itiid at the same time worked more
rapidly t ban in a sea level altitude.
Then the colts will have a rocky
road ts t ravil on the range, and they
will have to travel it a good deal when
"rustling for feed", especially if the
present, prolonged drouth continues.
Mr. Pearson thinks this traveling
will toughen and improve the feet, as
well as t lie muscles of loconiot ion. I n
short, Mr. Pearson hopes that the
"Warm spring'' ranch of New Mexico,
as In' calls his place, will do some
thing even bet I er for hor-ellesli than
the Palo Alto ranch did for it iu Cali
fornia. When talked to on the subject, by a
Sun reporter. Mr. Pearson said:
"The way I came in get the notion
of bringing colts to New Mexico was
about as follows: I was out here, last
winter, looking over tin; count v. . and
happened to see a scrub race among
t he cow boy.-. It was a good race, and
it
rado good horses too,- where the al
titude is as high, and even higher,
than this. I have never known one to
be extraordinary, however."'
The ot her one said t hat he 1 bought
that once the colts were acclimated
to t he high and dry air of New Mex
ico, they would be enervated by a
return to the Atlantic exist, and so
would not be able to do anything"
Mr. Pearson replied to this, that he
hoped to develop big lungs anil big
muscles, just as big lungs and big
muscles as were developed en the covv-lMiys-M)iiie.s
if he did that, he would
tiike chances of being able to re-accli-
inatc the annuals on the Atlantic
coast.
Mr. Pearson's cxpei ini 'iit is not new
in regard to breeding in high alt it tides.
Theodore Winters made the same ex
periment when he transferred his
breeding farm from the Sacramento
Valley to the Washoe Valley in Ne
vada. From the latter place he sent
to the racing stable Fl Rio Pcy. Ion
Juan, King Norfolk and several more
equine stars. Hut w hile depending on
the light air to develop their lung
power, Mr. "Winters fed his colts lil
erally, and did not stunt, their capaci
ties iu other directions by making
them "rustle the range" for a living.
There is the point where Mr. Pearson's
experiment will likely fail. His range
bred thoroughbreds will probably re
duce the time of the quarter horse,
but it is doubtful whether longdis
tance racers can be made in the way
contemplated by Mr. Pearson. Tin:
O.wsl
w jri.h seeing. Pt t Ivy were
f r blood. W !:e.) r, vv.ls I'V
t !i- ...vs bis name is Lee
')!'.i,:;;i i:ors.' inai
would !e e snub stock out of
siirhi". and Ibi'on told him 1 could
get him auyl hing he wanted. So he
came t o me i I old him I could do it .
" 'How much will ii cost-- he
said.
" "Ah ml or i.t'u,' I .aid.
-I wouldn't mind -:J ,r.' be . aid.
" Jt i-n t necessary to pay
elit of future generations of plant
growth, and it has also the advantage,
peculiar to itself.of penetrat ing tothe
deeper layers of the soil and bringing
ad land region, a j quest iomd on the subject. Most of up from the depths cleiucntsof fertil
Moieover it. is a I them thouirht the exDeriment. would Ity which are out of reach of most
plants.
Where alfalfa is allowed to. succeed
itself, year after year, a large propor
tion of the benefit which might be
derived from its power to enrich t he
soil is lost. Alfalfa, itself has little
use for the at mosphcric nit rogcii which
it stores in t lie soil, or for t he surplus
of a-h elements which it draws from
the sub-soil, for it can gather more
from t he same sources when they are
needed. I'lih-ssjiltalfa is soon followed
by t he crop which need and can make
use of the fertility which it has ren
dered available, this fertility is iu a
ureal measure wasted.
The only met hod of growing alfaifa
so that the most benefit may be de
rived from it is to make it. part of a
rotation, just as red clover is used
where it is a possible crop. A non-le-guminoiis
crop, following a few sea
son's growth of alfalfa, will make use
of the fert i lit y gat heied. tothe marked
profit of the proprietor.
In Colorado, .where alfalfa is very
extensively grown, it is the common
practice to grow it in rotation with
other crops. There few alfalfa fields
stand more than four or live years,
and it may be observed that as a usual
thing, tin farmers who do grow alfalfa
on the same land without any breaks,
arc of the same general class as the
Kansas farmers who crop their hind to
wheat successively for ten or a dozen
years. Colorado fanners are firmly
convinced, by long experience and re
peated trials, that it pays much better
to break up tbeallalfa fields, every few
years, than it does to allow them to
stand. One of I lie most extensive and
successful alfalfa growers of Arapahoe
county was recently asked: "Can you
"afford to plow up your alfalfa fields
after getting the crops id" but two
"seasons from them lMes not the
"heavy expense of seeding, involving
"aliuost tin; total loss of tbr u.-c of the
! "Sai-d for a year, m.'ke it necessary
I "that you should allow to remain in
I "alfalfa ! mg'T than two ve;:rs, to
i . . ' .
-"make r propt awe j iv reply was:
"We certainly cannot a;Tord t l.'l al
"fall'a stand much longer than two
"seasos. We must have laud on which
"to sow oats and plant corn and pota
toes, and we i ('' e f ll ll I there is no
'olher half so d a . aPall'a sod. It
ti- '( cm.'. .i!ino..t too had to plow alt.ula
tui'1-rso j irui nfttr it ha-oo-t it.- a
! I!
ill
I". 'Me of
aid he'd
The Las Vegas Stock (J rower says:
Keccm ly an issue of irrigation bonds
wasseiit to New York to be tloated
through a well known banking house
which had never hvfo:v handled such
sec tl fit ies. Tin-r.i -u. hers of the linn
tho.-ougii'.v investigated the enter
prise and wile so mrch taken with
its merits that they purchased the
em ire amount of I he ImuhIs for their
ow n account. The arid west presents
many other equally meritorious in
vestments for (astern capital.
to
The t, t ol iM!l..at.hu P. the e
mate of woman.-!". W. Cuttis,
year's time to get it established, but,
"it is the !n'sf. we can do. We lose,
"perhaps. P an acre, through not,
"having any return from the land
"during the season the alfalfa is sown,
"hut the same amount expended
"in manuring would not benefit suc
"ceeediug crops nearly so mdeh as
"growing t hem on alfalfa si, sown
feel justitied in turning under the
"alfalfa and seeding other fields."
There is not a crop which will not
make good and profitable use of the
fertility stored by alfalfa, providing
it i propeily handled. It would not
be t he thing to turn under alfalfa in
Sept ember and October, and sow at
nice to wheat, for the ground would
Ibe so loose that it would drv out
rapidly, and render the outcome of
the crop very problematic: but alfalfa
may be turned under in July, after
I the first crop has been cut. and the
I laud sown to whe.it at the proper
I season with a good chance for success.
! Wheat however, is far from being
jthe best crop to follow alfalfa as
' far as it is from being t he best crop t"
which to apply manure. Corn or po
tatoes are as good successors to alfalfa
as any crops, and are more often
planted as such than any other two
(Tops, a lavonie ana sat isiaciory
rotation iu Colorado is alfalfa three
years, corn one year, potatoes and
millet or oats one year, and spring
wheat one year. This leaves the
j ground free for fall seeding of alfalfa
again, which saves nearly a year's
crops. .
A grower of apples in Sidney. New
South Wales, has just made an inter
est ing experiment. He wanted to
find out which was the shortest route
to Chicago. etsi or west. So he
p:u ked a barrel of yellow tipples and a
barrel of red apples and start 'd one
each way around half the world. The
barrel of yellow apples passed through
the canal, through the Mediterranean
sea, up the English channel, and
linally reached London. Here it was
taken fiomthe loat and sent by rail
road to LiverjMiol. Then the barrel
of New South Wales fruit was loaded,
into an ocean racer, and started on its
way across the Atlantic to New York,
whence it went to Chicago by rail
road. It was just sixty-six days to an
hour w hen t hey arrived at Chicago.
In the meant ime the red apples hail
crossed the Pacific ocean to San i'ran
sisco in twenty days. Then they
were sent by freight to Chicago.
After numerous delays along the road
the apples arrived. They had been
fifty-two days on the way. Now the
glorrr-trotting apples sit side by sida
at the World's Fair.
The Pacific Rural Press says it doe
not pay to sell drying fruit green. The
experience of the past teaches that
the hot returns have been yielded to
those who cure their own fruit, or
through a co-operative, community or
other dryer. There is no argument,
better than the money argument, and
the best ca-h return-an1 as a rule with
those growers who are i:i no great
hurry to get the money out of their
green fruit. We are convinced that
it is i he part of wi.-dom tin year, as
it has been in others, for growers to
cure ;:s much fruit as possible, thus
placing ii in form where it, is not ne-ccs.-arv
todisposeof it at a given time,
regai, ties- of thccoiulii ion of the mar
Ul. The i pi riencc of a majority of
Ca.'i:, i nia grower- confirms thi- state
nit nt.