SECRETARY'S REPORT. 17 



"was by no means so unfrequent as it should be. Several instances 

 came to my knowledge, in which three successive crops of oats on 

 the ■ same land had yielded an average of fifty bushels or upwards 

 per acre. The average production of these grains, under good 

 treatment, may be set down as fifty bushels of oats, thirty of barley, 

 and thirty to thirty-five of rye ; the actual average would however 

 be found at least twenty-five per cent, less than this. 



Buckwheat is largely grown, and is probably gaining in estima- 

 tion, for the remark was frequently made by residents, that although 

 prejudiced hitherto against it, they had at length adopted its culture. 

 The variety grown, is called here, rough buckwheat, and elsewhere 

 known as Indian wheat. The smooth variety proves much less 

 successful and is nearly abandoned. Its yield varies from twenty 

 or thirty to fifty bushels — sometimes considerably more. With 

 good treatment, and on soil in good condition, forty to fifty bushels 

 may be confidently expected. It is usually grown upon the poorest. 

 Its weight is from forty-five to fifty pounds to the bushel, and it yields 

 about one-third of fine flour, which makes excellent bread and cakes, 

 from a third to two-fifths of a coarser description, but very nutri- 

 tious and highly esteemed for swine and other animals, the remainder 

 being principally hull, is of little or no worth. The value of buck- 

 wheat for fattening animals, as compared with Indian corn, was 

 variously estimated at from one-third to two-thirds its value, some 

 deeming a bushel and a half of buckwheat equal to one of corn, oth- 

 ers rating a bushel of corn worth three of buckwheat. The more 

 usual estimate was one-half, although some who professed to have 

 proved its value with care, were confident that deducting thirty-three 

 per cent, for the hull, it was equal, weight for weight, to Indian 

 corn, for fattening stock. The market value of Indian corn is usu- 

 ally two and a half times that of buckwheat. 



Professor J. F. W. Johnstone, in his report on the agricultural 

 capabilities of New Brunswick, states that he found, by analysis, 

 that the flour of buckwheat was equally nutritious with the finer 

 varieties of wheaten flour. 



The success attending this grain in Aroostook, and the compara- 

 tive extent to which it is grown, may be judged of from the fact, 

 that by the census of 1850, this county, containing a little more 

 than a fiftieth part of the population of the State, produced the 

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