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ties used for seed is the common gourd seed, yellow and 

 white — the former preferred for fattening animals, and the 

 latter for table use. The yield is about the same. It was 

 selling last fall for twenty-five cents per bushel. From the 

 great scarcity I should think the price in the spring would be 

 about thirty-seven cents. We have no particular place of 

 market for this grain. 



3. Oats, Rye and Barley. — Our oats crop is considerable, 

 being estimated at ninety-nine thousand two hundred and 

 ninety-nine bushels, excelled by only seven other counties in 

 the State. We prefer sowing after corn, from one and a-half 

 to two bushels to the acre. I tried ten acres with two bush- 

 els and a-half and harvested'a dwarfish, spindling crop, which 

 satisfied me I had sown half a bushel too much. This crop 

 we put in early in April ; if we don't, we run the risk of a 

 poor yield. Last season owing to causes in the weather, I 

 have already stated, there was a short crop — in some locali- 

 ties a great deal of straw and but little oats ; I should think 

 the average yield not over twenty-five bushels to the acre. 

 There is no particular mode for putting in this crop, other 

 than the one followed from the beginning; the ground is 

 plowed and the oats harrowed in, and harvested and thrashed 

 like our wheat, except that instead of curing it in the shock, 

 it is suffered to lie in the swath until cured, before shocking. 

 The price ranges from eighteen to twenty-five cents per 

 bushel. There is but little rye and still less barley raised in 

 the county — of the former but about fifteen thousand bushels 

 and of the latter little less than three hundred. 



4. Grass. — In the first settlement of the county the opin- 

 ion predominated among farmers, that the chief reliance for 

 hay would be upon the wet marshes which skirt the small 

 streams and lakes in various parts of the county. Those 

 contiguous to the first settlements were therefore eagerly 

 entered, and their heavy, and to a considerable degree, nutri- 

 cious crops of wild grass converted into hay. For years no 

 other kind of hay was thought of, except " wild hay." It 



