No. 85.J 155 



and Niagara river has not, for the last three or four years, exceeded 

 the low average of eleven or twelve bushels per acre I Indeed, he had 

 authority for declaring that, in reference to a single county (Seneca,) 

 possessing unsurpassed natural capacity for producing wheat, " the 

 average yield is now not over ten bushels per acre on lands which, 

 twenty years ago, freely yielded twenty." Is the wheat crop better 

 any where in Western New-York than in Seneca 1 And such being 

 the remarkable depreciation in one of the finest wheat growing regions 

 of the world, how strongly does the simple fact proclaim the great 

 necessity of renovating the soil so as to restore its pristine vigor, and 

 to produce increased crops while enriching rather than impoverishing 

 the land. The average of the wheat crop in England may be stated 

 at twenty-eight or thirty American bushels per acre for a series of 

 years. With a soil of unsurpassed natural qualities, requiring compa- 

 ratively little labor and expense for its renovation — with the flood of 

 light which modern science and English perseverance have shed upon 

 the culture of wheat and other grains, as well as [the improvement 

 of domestic animals — with all the incitements possessed by the Ame- 

 rican farmer, and all the advantages within his reach — it cannot be 

 doubted that the intelligent wheat growers of the state of New-York 

 will soon repair themischiefs which slovenly cultivation has produced 

 — will soon restore the land to primeval fertility capable of producing 

 at least double the amount of the present crops — if not crops rivaling 

 the generaLaverage|of British wheat husbandry. Even the average 

 of thirty bushels, taken for a series of years, is not a fair criterion of 

 what can be produced on lands of like natural quality with those of 

 Western New-York when well cultivated. Forty, fifty, aye sixty 

 bushels of good wheat have been produced on some acres in Genesee 

 Valley* — still larger crops sometimes occur in England. Though 

 such results may not readily be reached by all farmers, no farmer can 

 suffer by taking for his example a high standard in agriculture any 

 more than in morality. Complaints of " hard times" would soon be 

 rendered less prevalent, were the twelve millions of bushels of wheat 

 now ordinarily produced annually in our State, increased even thirty 

 per cent — and they might be increased a hundred per cent without 

 surpassing the annual average per acre in the Genesee country ten or 

 twenty years ago — yet even then fall thirty per cent below the low- 

 est average of the British wheat crops. Gen. Harmon, of Wheat- 

 land, deserves the thanks of the community for the efforts made on 

 his experimental farm for improving the quality of our great staple; 

 and the Wadsworths, and other large land proprietors of the west, 

 now find ample scope for enlightened enterprise in stimulating atten- 

 tion to the importance and practicability of increasing largely the 



• In 1803, Peter Shseffer, one ofthe veteran pioneers of Western New-York, raised forty 

 acres of white-chaffwheat on the Genesee flats— (where was gr-^wn in 1788, the first wheat 

 crop ever cultivated in Western NevvYorIf) — which crop ol 40 acres averaged sixty-two 

 and a half bushels per acre. In 1833, Gen. Harmon, a neighbor of Mr. Shaefifer, (from 

 wliom Mr. O'R. had his information,) raised sixty-seven and a quartei bushels of the 

 same wheat on an acre and a quarter. [Gen. Harmon is the well-known experimenter 

 in cultivating varieliesof wheat. 1 Instances might be multiplied, were not the knowledge 

 ofthe former large crops of the Genesee country well known, and were not large crops 

 yet realized by those who pay proper attention to manuring the land and rotation of crops. 



