FORAGE CROPS IN NEW ENGLAND. 177 



I know a good many of our very best farmers who never 

 had a barrel of flour in their families, except what they raised 

 themselves. I know one farmer in Northfield, who has been 

 on the State Board, who raises a few acres of wheat every 

 year, and makes his own flour ; who never has had less than 

 twenty-five bushels to the acre ; who never has lost a crop 

 entirely ; and not over three times in ten years has his crop 

 been what j^ou would call a partial failure. I know of 

 another farmer, recently president of our society, who raised 

 ninety-five bushels of wheat from two acres of land in 1880 ; 

 and the past year he had four acres from which he got one 

 hundred and sixty-eight bushels of the very best wheat. 

 That was land which had borne tobacco. Of course, it was 

 highly manured, thoroughly cultivated, and, from the care 

 and clean cultivation which tobacco requires, the land was 

 in perfect order. There was no foul stuff among it, but a 

 very fine stand of wheat, which sold for two dollars a bushel. 



Question. Was it spring wheat, or winter Avheat? 



Mr. Geinnell. This was winter wheat. Winter wheat 

 is more generally sown with us than spring wheat. It has 

 been regarded as a better quality of wheat. I know one of 

 our best old farmers whom I have seen every winter coming 

 down through the village from the hills west of the town 

 with his horse and sleigh and a freight of wheat, which he 

 was carrying down eight or ten miles to a flouring-mill. He 

 has done that for fifty years. He never has failed to raise a 

 crop of spring wheat. 



Question. What do you consider the best soil for spring 

 wheat ? 



Mr. Geinnell. I have grown over forty bushels of 

 wheat, with plenty of fertilizer, on a sandy loam. Either 

 spring or winter wheat requires a good, strong soil. The 

 trouble with farmers in raising wheat has been, that they 

 have not paid sufficient attention to the preparation of the 

 land, and to the manuring. They would sow their wheat as 

 they would rye, and expect it to grow without manure. 

 Now, I undertake to say that the doctrine which Mr. 

 Cheever has advocated here, and which I have always prac- 

 tised on, is the right one, — never to attempt to take a crop 

 from land without previously giving it sufficient nutriment 

 to feed it well. I grow two or tliree crops of some things 



