160 



of Ceresco was commenced by an association or joint stock company; and in the 

 same, and succeeding season, settlements were commenced in the other towns; 

 since which they have rapidly improved, and yet there is abundant room for 

 good practical farmers. Most of the farmers are natives of New England and 

 New Yoik, and have adopted mostly the eastern mode of cultivation. Of the 

 various grains, our past experience would indicate Indian corn as occupying the 

 first rank; in seven seasons, six have given good crops yielding from forty to 

 eighty bushels per acre, and averaging about fifty bushels to the acre. Oats 

 "would, perhaps, come next in order as the crop never fails to grow, and yields 

 ■well, in most cases ranging from thirty to seventy bushels per acre; but the straw 

 is often too weak for the head. And one season (1849) the crop was much 

 injured by a worm which attacked it in swarms, twining up the straw and 

 heads before the crop was ripe. This singular phenomena was to me entirely 

 new, and is now nearly forgotten except by those who suffered mostly by 

 them. 



The Oat Crop is not esteemed as highly as the maize, in consequence of its 

 limited use, and as its price usually ranges lower; corn ranging from twenty-five 

 cents to fifty cents per bushel, and oats from fifteen to forty cents per bushel, 

 for the last five years. Barley has not been much raised, but has yielded well 

 when tried, and finds a ready market at from twenty-five cents to fifty cents per 

 bushel. Flax has only been tried for experiment, and never fails to do well, and 

 many believe it will soon be ranked among our most impoitant crops. 



Wheat, which many suppose to stand first among our cereals, has been relied 

 on by most of our fiirmers as their principal crop, until the partial failure for 

 several years has called their attention to other crops. In the harvest of 1845-6, 

 winter wheat yielded about half a crop, say from ten to fifteen bushels per acre; 

 1847 turned out a great yield, from thirty to forty bushels per acre. The Wis- 

 consin Phalanx in Ceresco that year harvested twelve thousand bushels from three 

 hundred and ninety acres of land ; and this was not above but rather below the 

 average in the distinct. In 1848 the ci'op was small, say about fifteen bushels 

 per acre; in 1849 a little better, coming up to perhaps twenty bushels per acre; 

 in 1850 and 1851 almosta total failure. Several varieties have been tried with no 

 settled preference for any one; in good seasons all do well, and in poor seasons 

 all fail about ahke. The failure is by no means attributable to the soil, but to our 

 winters, which have been cold and dry, with light snows soon gone, and frequent 

 thaws ; the ground does not heave, but the root seems rather to die from con- 

 stant freezing and thawing. Spring wheat has yielded better, but is not so nmch 

 esteemed as a crop. The last two seasons this too has suffered, or at least some 

 varieties, (the hedge-row most,) from what the farmers call rot. Spring Vi'heat 

 may be estimated to yield, on an aveiage for the last six years, one-third more 



