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The Black Sea is a good wheat, but if not eut in season it shells badly.’ In 
Houston the Fife has deteriorated, and a variety known as the Circassian is 
proving successful, and is considerably sought after for seed the coming spring. 
In Scott the Fife is generally grown; “it makes a good stand, yields excellent 
flour in quality and quantity, and is never injured by smut.” Spring wheat is 
sown during the month of April, though a small proportion is put in rather earlier, 
and winter varieties during the latter part of August, and first week in Septem- 
ber. The harvesting of the former from the middle of July to the latter part of 
August, generally the first two weeks in August, and of the latter the third and 
fourth week in July. 
As has been stated, the mode of culture is at best indifferent, and if not 
improved must result in continued deterioration of yield per acre. A large pro- 
portion of the acreage is sown broadcast, though several counties report one- 
eighth, one-fourth, one-half, three-fifths, and three-fourths drilledin. The general 
practice is to plough the land in the fall and sow broadcast as early in the 
spring as the frost is out of the ground, the seed being harrowed in. In some 
cases the ground is harrowed before and after seeding. Little or no manure is 
applied, the rich soil being considered inexhaustible, the decreasing annual crops 
failing to remove this fallacy, and the mevitable result will be the gradual dimi- 
nution of the average yield until farmers appreciate the necessity of better culture. 
6. The common prairie grass is the principal natural grass and furnishes the 
general pasture for stock. This grass when pastured closely gives way to a 
species called blue-joint. While clover and several varieties of red-top are 
reported in several counties, while the cultivated pastures are chiefly timothy, 
red-top, Hungarian grass and clover. Our Rice county correspondent says : 
We still almost entirely use the natural grasses. Timothy and clover do well, but it will 
not pay to cultivate them while we have wild grasses in abundance for both hay and grazing. 
Native grasses furnish pasturage about five months; timothy, red-top, and clover some- 
thing over six months. 
Carver county : 
Blue-joint grass, so called here, grows in abundance in our natural pastures ; tame grass 
does well in the timbered land, but its culture has been neglected on account of the abun- 
dance of wild hay. At present cattle run without restraint in the summer, without cost 
except for care; the land is being rapidly settled, however, and the farmer must very soon 
provide pasturage for his stock. 
In Cass county : 
Farm animals feed exclusively six months in the pastures, and in mild winters they 
will keep in good order on the dried grasses of the meadows and a kind of rush growing in 
the bottoms. Blue-joint grows in the meadows, and makes excellent hay. 
Brown county : 
Our pastures are in the prairie, and wili be for some years to come, on which we ean feed 
thousands of head of cattle, horses and sheep. Oxen must be fed eight months in the year; 
other stock from five to six months. 
Hungarian grass is cultivated to considerable extent in some localities, and as 
the country becomes more thickly settled, and the common prairie pastures 
taken up for cultivation, more attention will necessarily be given to other varie- 
ties of foreign grasses. The pasturing season averages about six months in 
length, and the cost in most of the counties is not more than the expense of 
salting and herding, though in a few counties from 50 cents to $1 per month is 
estimated. Our correspondent in Houston county says : 
Considerable interest was beginning to be felt in wool-growing, but the decline in the 
price of wool, and the great losses resulting from lack of proper feeding last winter, have 
tended to discourage those engaged in this branch of business; yet I do not doubt sheep- 
raising will ultimately be one of the most common and profitable resources of the farmers ot 
this part of the State. Our soil and climate are well adapted to sheep, and we have greater 
manufacturing facilities than any other western State; besides, we must keep some kind of 
stock to keep up the fertility of the soil, and no kind of stock willso well pay for feeding 
through our long winters as sheep. 
