The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884

The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No.
2, January 12, 1884

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January
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Title: The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884 A Weekly
Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside
Author: Various
Release Date: February 5, 2006 [EBook #17683]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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PRAIRIE FARMER

A Weekly Journal for
THE FARM, ORCHARD, AND FIRESIDE.
ESTABLISHED IN 1841. ENTIRE SERIES: VOL. 56--NO. 2.
CHICAGO, SATURDAY, JANUARY 12, 1884.
PRICE, $2.00 PER YEAR, IN ADVANCE.

[Transcriber's Note: The Table of Contents was originally located on
page 24 of the periodical. It has been moved here for ease of use.]
THE CONTENTS OF THIS NUMBER.
AGRICULTURE--Dew and Soil Moisture, Page 17; Specialty in
Farming, 17; Public Squares in Small Cities, 17-18; Farm Names, 18;
Diogenes In His Tub, 18; Field and Furrow, 18-19; Agricultural
Organizations, 19; Didn't No. 38 Die Hard, 19; A Grange Temple, 19.
LIVE STOCK--Items, Page 20; Swine Statistics, 20; Iowa Stock
Breeders, 20; The Horse and His Treatment, 20; Items, 20-21.
THE DAIRY--Winter Feed for Cows, Page 21; Churning Temperature,
21; Seas of Milk, 21.
VETERINARY--About Soundness, Page 21; Questions Answered, 21.
HORTICULTURE--The Hedge Question, Page 22; Young Men
Wanted, 22; Possibilities of Iowa Cherry Growing, 22-23; Prunings,
23.
FLORICULTURE--Gleanings by an Old Florist, Page 23.
EDITORIAL--Items, Page 24; Illinois State Board, 24-25; Sorghum at
Washington, 25; The Cold Spell, 25; American Ash, 25; Wayside
Notes, 25; Letter from Champaign, 25.

POULTRY NOTES--A Duck Farm, Page 26.
THE APIARY--Apiary Appliances, Page 26; What Should be Worked
For, 26.
SCIENTIFIC--The Star of Bethlehem, Page 27.
HOUSEHOLD--How the Robin Came, Poem, Page 28; After Twenty
Years, 28; Will Readers Try It, 28; The Secret of Longevity, 28; How
the Inventor Plagues His Wife, 28; Recipes, 28; Pamphlets, etc.,
Received, 28.
YOUNG FOLKS--The City Cat, Poem, Page 29; Amusing Tricks, 29;
Bright Sayings, 29; Compiled Correspondence, 29.
LITERATURE--The Wrong Pew, Poem, Page 30; Yik Kee, 30-31.
HUMOROUS--"A Leedle Mistakes," Page 31; Sharper Than a Razor,
31; A Coming Dividend, 31.
NEWS OF THE WEEK--Page 31.
MARKETS--Page 32.

DEW AND SOIL MOISTURE.
Bulletin No. 6 of Missouri Agricultural College Farm is devoted to an
account of experiments intended to demonstrate the relation of dew to
soil moisture. Prof. Sanborn has prosecuted his work with that patience
and faithfulness characteristic of him, and the result is of a most
interesting and useful nature.
The Professor begins by saying that many works on physics, directly or
by implication, assert that the soil, by a well-known physical law, gains
moisture from the air by night. One author says "Cultivated soils, on
the contrary (being loose and porous), very freely radiate by night the
heat which they absorb by day; in consequence of which they are much

cooled down and plentifully condense the vapor of air into dew." Not
all scientific works, however, make this incautious application of the
fact that dew results from the condensation of moisture of the air in
contact with cooler bodies. Farmers have quite universally accepted the
view quoted, and believe that soils gain moisture by night from the air.
This gain is considered of very great importance in periods of droughts,
and is used in arguments favoring certain methods of tillage.
Professor Stockbridge, in 1879, at the Massachusetts Agricultural
College, carried on very valuable and full experiments in test of this
general belief, and arrived at results contradictory of this belief. He
found, in a multitude of tests, that in every instance, save one, for the
months from May to November, that the surface soil from one to five
inches deep, was warmer than the air instead of cooler, as the law
requires for condensation of moisture from the air. That exception was
in the center of a dense forest, under peculiar atmospheric conditions.
After noting these facts, ingenious methods were employed to test more
directly the proposition that soil gains moisture from the air by night,
with the result that he announced that soils lose moisture by night.
Professor Stockbridge's efforts met with some criticism, and his
conclusions did not receive the wide acceptance that his view of the
question justifies. In reasoning from observation, Professor Stockbridge
noted that the bottom of a heap of hay, during harvesting, would be wet
in the morning, the under side of