INDIAN CORN. 161 



The other competitors for this premium raised corn of an 

 excellent quality, mostly yellow and very heavy, weighing 

 fifty-eight pounds and upwards per bushel, as commonly 

 measured. Mr. Nathan Whitman's corn vras harvested with 

 due care and weighed at the time of harvest, but unfortunately 

 got mixed with another lot of corn in his crib, by the breaking 

 away of a partition between them. 



Mr. F. W. Howland, oT South Hanson, had a very fine field 

 of corn, a part of which was white and a part yellow. The 

 land was an old bushy pasture. It was cleared and planted, 

 and attended with much labor and care, and had he been per- 

 mitted to harvest it, he would doubtless h(ave given us an 

 accurate and interesting statement of his proceedings and suc- 

 cess. But some of the corn having been stolen from the field 

 a short time before harvest, it was impossible for him to 

 give an accurate statement of the amount of the crop. The 

 corn, however, that was saved, was shelled and weighed in 

 January. It weighed about sixty pounds per bushel. I have 

 been waiting for his statement of the manner of raising this 

 crop, and of the amount saved, but have not received it. 



You will perceive by this report, that a few days in the 

 month of October greatly varies the weight of a field of corn. 

 The shrinkage on the corn which I took home, from the 6th 

 to the 9th of October, was found to be from 20 to 25| per 

 cent, when weighed in the first week of January, while the 

 corn which remained in the field from five to ten days later, 

 shrank 18*- to 22^ per cent, between the time of harvest 

 and January, making, on an average, about 3 per cent, dif- 

 ference. 



The five lots of corn in the foregoing, table together weigh- 

 ing in January 27,032 pounds, and yielding 395 bushels of 

 56 pounds each, required on an average 68.43 pounds of ears 

 for one bushel of shelled corn. 



Now if we estimate 85 pounds of ears at the time of har- 

 vest to yield 56 pounds of shelled corn, and the shrinkage is 

 upon an average 23 per cent., we have heretofore committed 

 an important error in reckoning 85 pounds for a bushel of 

 the specimen rod. For although 85 pounds of cars at the time 

 the farmer gathers in a field of maize, may on an average give 



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