No. 105.] 181 



Sulphate of lime, I use in large quantities : fourteen tons this year. 

 It is sown on all the wheat, corn, barley, and oats, and on the pas- 

 tures and meadows in quantities varying from one to three bushels 

 to the acre. All the ashes made by my fires is used as a manure, 

 and I think that it is worth as much as the same bulk of sulphate of 

 lime to use on corn. Sulphate of lime has been used on the farm 

 for many years, and in large quantities, and I think it essential in 

 my system of farming. I have not used salt or guano as manure. 



I raised this year, about 

 77 acres of wheat, yielding 1,616 bushels, averaging per acre, 20,99 

 15 i " corn, '' 821 " 52,96 



18 " barley, " 665 " 36,94 



38 " oats, " 2,249 '' 56,55 



2^ '• potatoes, " 292 " 116,80 



5,643 

 50 acres of pasture and 30 of meadow. 



12. I sow at the rate of two bushels to the acre, about the fifteenth 

 day of September. I summer fallow but little, and only to kill foul 

 stuff, and to bring the land into a good state of cultivation. A part 

 of my wheat is sown on land that has been pastured, or mowed, — 

 plowing it but once, but that done with great care, and as deep as I 

 can. The oat and barley stubble, as a general rule, is sown to wheat, 

 plowing only once, having previously fed off the stubble with sheep 

 so close as to have most of the scattered grain picked up. The 

 plowing is done as near the time of sowing the wheat as is practica- 

 ble, and the wheat is sown upon the fresh furrows, and harrowed in. 

 I have tried various modes of treating stubble, but none of them has 

 answered as well as this. What little grain of the spring crop is left 

 on the ground is turned deep under, and the wheat being on the top 

 gets the start of it. The harvesting is done with a cradle. Corn, is 

 generally planted by the tenth day of May, on sod land ; most of 

 the manure is put upon this crop. The corn is planted in hills three 

 feet apart each way ; from four to six kernels in a hill, and no thin- 

 ning out is practised. Sulphate of lime, or ashes is put on the corn 

 as soon as it comes up. Two effectual hoeings is given to it_, and a 

 cultivator with steel teeth, is run twice each way of the field between 

 the rows, to prepare it for the hoe. Corn plows and cast iron culti- 

 vator teeth are entirely discarded. 



