No. 85.] 161 



NIAGARA COUNTY— MR. PARSON'S REPORT. 



Extract from the report to the State Agricultural Society, by Wm. 

 Parsons, President of Niagara County Society : 



It is probably well known that wheat is the great and leading arti- 

 cle of produce in Niagara county. But large amounts of other crops 

 are annually produced, to wit : corn, oats, barley, potatoes, wool, 

 &LC. The course pursued by a majority of our farmers, in the rais- 

 ing of wheat, is to summer fallow with three plowings, and twice as 

 many harro wings. Sow from 1st to 10th September, and harrow in 

 thoroughly. The last plowing is in lands from 16 to 20 feet in width, 

 carefully cleaning out the ditches between the lands, and making cross 

 ditches as may be necessary to drain off all the water. Others, (and 

 more especially a class of Germans from Pennsylvania,) apply all 

 their manure to the wheat fallow, between the first and second plow- 

 ings, and by a very light third or fourth plowing, generally with one 

 horse, cover the seed. But the most general course is to apply all the 

 manure to the corn and potatoe crops, followed with peas and barley, 

 then wheat, and seed down with clover and timothy grass, sown upon 

 the wheat in the month of March. 



Others, again, (and these are increasing,) plow but once^ and that 

 in June, with four horses, or an equivalent, 8 or 10 inches in depth, 

 being careful to do the work well — follow with the roller — pulver- 

 ize the surface to the depth of five or six inches with the harrow and 

 two horse cultivator, and cover the seed with the same, or sometimes 

 with a shovel plow. During the summer, sheep and cattle are allow- 

 ed to occupy the field, and if any fine or rotted manure can be obtain- 

 ed, it is applied to the surface, and mixed with the soil and seed with 

 the cultivator. 



In this way large crops of wheat are produced, whole fields yield- 

 ing from 30 to 40 bushels per acre. 



I._WINTER WHEAT. 



MR. AYRES' STATEMENT. 



Statement of Elias J. Ayres, of Tompkins county, relative to the 



culture of his wheat crop, which received the State premium of $15, 



and which yielded 114 bushels 58 lbs. on two acres. 



The soil on which the above crop was raised was a clayey loam, 

 resting on a clayey subsoil. An under drain was cut in the field on 

 which the above crop was raised, some 15 years since, and I believe 

 the first one cut in this town — the plan of which was adopted from 

 directions in the Memoirs of the Transactions of the board of the old 

 State Agricultural Society, It has succeeded completely to drain the 

 land, until this time, and before which half an acre or more was too 



[Senate, No. 85.] L 



