550 
EXTRACTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE. 
ERRORS OF THE CENSUS. 
Blount, Ala.—I am in receipt of the “ Statistics of Agriculture,” (census.) Itis a 
work in which I feel much interest, and if fullreliance could be placed in its accuracy 
it would be of much value. But, judging from those matters of which I have some 
personal knowledge, particularly in this county, I am constrained to infer that many of 
the returns are unworthy of credit. For instance, Table IV, page 95, shows 20,319 
bushels of spring-wheat raised in this county in 1872. This is utterly untrue. I have 
lived in the county upward of twenty years, and if a single bushel of spring-wheat 
has been raised in it during all that time I have never heard of it. Iam very anxious 
to get a sample of spring-wheat to experiment with, but know not where to obtain it. 
I think it would suit our climate. Fall or winter wheat, sown in the spring, sometimes 
does well here. 
The value of “orchard products” ($3,239) returned in the census must be far below 
the reality. In the number and size of farms given there are very grave errors; the 
unimproved land is, in the main, put down twice. In respect to wool, the low average 
clip per head in the Southern States may be accounted for in part from the fact that 
it is the custom to shear twice during the year, and the spring clip alone was on hand 
when the census was taken, and that was all that could be estimated as the product 
of that year. Hence only about half of the wool in the Southern States is embraced 
in the census returns for i870. The sheep having been shorn in the fall of 1369, the 
spring clip of 1870 was necessarily short—not more than 50 or 55 per cent. of the wool 
product of the year. 
WOOL PRODUCT DECREASED BY SEMI-ANNUAL CLIPPING. 
Blount, Ala.—The shearing of sheep twice a year diminishes the amount of wool, as 
I have satistied myself by experiment. One fleece annually shorn in the spring will 
weigh more than both the fall and spring fleeces from the same sheep. ; 
ROOT CROPS FOR STOCK. 
Franklin, Vt.—The cultivation of roots for stock is on the increase ; crops very fine; 
mangolds better than turnips. 
WORN-OUT LAND RECLAIMED. 
Russell, Ky.—In 1869 I purchased a farm on the Cumberland River. It had been 
cultivated in corn without rest for from fifty to seventy years, and was badly worn. 
It did not, in 1869, produce over 20 bushels per acre. A portion of it was not planted, 
as it was thought that it would not pay expenses of cultivation. A 35-acre field, one- 
half of which was not considered worth planting, I turned over, plowing 7 inches deep. 
In the spring sowed oats and clover; pastured my clover too close and had no sward 
to turn under. Last winter turned up 8 inches deep; in the spring cross-plowed with 
long bull-tongue, running 8 or 9 inches deep. Planted in corn 1st to 4th of May,3 feet 
by 4; thinned to two stalks in the hill. Did not plow as often as I would have done, on 
account of the rains in June, but plowed three times, last plowing with bull-tongue, as 
deep as I could well do. As the result, Iam now gathering from one-half the field 65 
bushels per acre, from the other half have gathered something over 50 bushels. An ad- 
joining farm of 200 acres, all in corn, has not raised as much as my 35 acres. So much 
for clover and deep plowing. I am confident that within a few years Ican make my 
farm produce 75 to 80 bushels per acre, with no other fertilizer than clover and deep 
plowing, Break deep, and plow deep, and when your corn is young. 
CEREALS IN ARIZONA. 
Mohave, Ariz.—Experiments have been tried in raising grain and sorghum with fair 
success. During 1874 a large acreage of grain will be grown, besides large vegetable 
gardens. 
LAND RECLAMATION. 
, 
Contra Costa, Cal—The rapid progress made in reclaiming the overflowed, and in 
irrigating the hitherto considered barren lands, opens the most extensive field for 
profitable and varied culture to be engaged in under favorable conditions. 
