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stock will keep fat on the pastures until December. Pasturage on our prairies are free. The 
‘cost of herding large herds is about $20 per month per head ; in pastures about $1 per head 
per month for cattle, horses, and mules, and about 15 cents per head forsheep. For winter- 
ing stock, (about five months) about $12 per head for cattle, $20 per head for horses and 
mules, and $1 per head for sheep. 
Our Green reporter, in the southwest, says that stock can feed exclusively on 
pastures nine months in that section, and he has seen stock pastured all winter 
and come out in the spring in good condition, the mode being to take the stock 
off blue grass in August and turn on again in December. In many cases stock 
subsist through the winter in the woods, and in the marshes and wet lands, and 
the hogs get fat upon the mast in winter without corn, The cost of pasturing 
cattle is but trifling in most localities, the range being free and the only expense 
that of salt and herdsmen, and frequently the services of the latter are dispensed 
with. Our reporters return various figures under this head, from ‘‘ no expense”’ 
up to $1 per head per month. 
7. With but two or three exceptions our correspondents speak favorably of 
the capabilities of their respective counties for fruit culture—apples, peaches, 
pears, plums, grapes, and the various small fruits, being generally successful, 
though in the northern part of the State peaches are uncertain, in some locali- 
ties averaging not more than one crop in three or four years. A few extracts 
from reports of correspondents in different sections of the State will serve to 
iilustrate the general character of counties adjacent : 
St. Louis: 
This county is well adapted to fruit culture. Peaches are fine, and crop enormous, but 
are winter-killed at least once in three years, and partially so three times in five. Spring frosts 
hardly ever affect them. The Concord grape is entirely healthy here, never fails, and will yield 
under good treatment 10,000 to 12,000 pounds per acre; average about 8,000 pounds; never 
selling less than 15 cents per pound. , > 
Shelby county : 
Nearly every farm has an orchard, and the trees do well. Apple, pear, and plum trees 
bear nearly every year. Peach trees grow thrifty, but do not bear more than one year out of 
two; but when they do bear they yield well, and the fruit is of superior quality. Many of 
our older orchards yield 15 to 20 bushels to the tree, worth 75 cents per bushel. 
Howard county: 
This being one of the first counties settled has more fruit than any county except St. Louis. 
Winter apples are chiefly cultivated, and three-tourths of the trees are Rawle’s Jannetting, 
though most varieties of summer and winter apples do well. I have in my grounds, now 
nine years old; of summer apples: Strawberry, Harvest, Astrachan, Early Joe, Early June, 
Summer Pearmain; and of winter and fall kinds: Rambo, Swaar, Spitzenburg, Rhode Island 
Greening, Northern Spy, Newtown Pippin, Fall Pippin, Golden Pippin, Lady Apple, &c.,. 
which are bearing freely and promise well. Peaches are very uncertain, except on the bluffs 
near the Missouri river. Standard and dwarf pears do well if properly trained and cared for. 
Nectarines and apricots uncertain, though I have had some fine crops. About 1,600 bar- 
rels of winter apples were shipped from our village (Glasgow) last fall by river, at 50 
cents per bushel, though on the north Missouri railroad, passing through the uext tier of 
counties, the same varieties brought $1 per bushel. 
Linn county: 
Our capabilities for fruit are very fine. We produce apples, pears, plums, peaches, (about 
half the seasons, ) grapes, quinces, and all the small fruits. Apples, pears, and plums have 
not failed in 10 years. Apple trees five years from the nursery last fall yielded $10 each in 
fruit. Many trees have been set during the war. Grapes are doing well—no mildew or rot 
for three years past, nor previous to that, except on Isabella. Varieties grown here: Con- 
cord, Clinton, Hartford Prolific, Delaware, Rogers’s Hybrid, No. 15, Isabella, Catawba, &c. 
Chariton county: 
Apples are very profitable, and peaches do well when not killed by frost, and are very 
fine. Grapes succeed well. The past season peaches sold at from $1 to $4 per bushel; 
apples, 75 cents to $1 per bushel; grapes, 20 cents per pound. One farmer in this vicinity 
seld $2,500 worth from his orchard, the fruit being gathered by the purchasers. Another 
from an orchard of about 14 acre, realized about $600. 
