ROOT CROPS. 95 



I have endeavored to describe the whole process as practiced by the best 

 growers in Kentucky. The same mode will certainly apply to Iowa up to the 

 rotting process. With her advantages, steeping in soft water is entirely prac- 

 ticable, by which she will produce an article of water-rotted hemp perhaps iu 

 no respect inferior to the highest-priced Russian, which is fully double the value 

 of American dew-rotted, the only sort produced in this State. 



The writer apprehends that the season is too short in Iowa for the successful 

 growth of seed — a want easily supplied by the purchase of seeds grown in 

 more southern latitudes ; but no shadow of doubt exists in his mind that she 

 can, at the very first effort, produce better hemp than any territory south of 

 her. Time, he thinks, will demonstrate that Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin 

 compose the true hemp region of the American continent. 



ROOT CROPS. 



BY T, H. LEVEKETT, KEENE, NEW HAMPSHIRE. 



The cultivation of the root crop, generally, throughout the United States, 

 and particularly iu New England, is of vastly more importance to farmers than 

 they are aware of. In the raising of stock in Great Britain the root crop comes 

 in for a large share of attention as a cheap and profitable article of food. There 

 is no lack of expenditure, both in manure and labor, iu order to secure the 

 largest possible yield of this crop. In Canada West, land Adjoining our own, 

 the good and thriving farmers grow large crops of roots for their sheep and 

 cattle, and make them profitable. It is universally admitted that the grooving 

 of grain in the New England States cannot be made remunerative to the farm- 

 ers generally ; that particular branch of agriculture is more profitably attended 

 to by the farmers at the west. The western States must grow the grain for 

 the east, therefore New England farmers should turn their attention more to the 

 cultivation of roots, which they can make profitable, for they can buy grain 

 cheaper than they can raisS it. There is no farmer iu New England that makes 

 any pretension to raising cattle, sheep, and horses, but should have from one to 

 five acres of roots of varioits kinds, and the farmers in the middle and western 

 States would find it greatly to their advantage to make a special business of 

 raising roots to feed their sheep and cattle duriug the winter months ; and, with 

 Buch land as they have, it is wonderful what amount can be grown upon an acre. 



MANGOLDS. 



I will give my experience in growing mangolds the last few years, and the 

 feeding of them, with the results I have observed. 



The mangold is a great lover of rich land, and the more manure the larger 

 the crop. I have usually sowed the seed early in May, using about four pounds 

 of seed to the acre, and have used land that had been planted with corn and 

 potatoes the year previous, and had been well manured; then I plough in about 

 forty horse-cart loads of manure to the acre, plough eight inches deep, then 

 harrow thoroughly, and level the piece as well as I can with horse-poAver. The 

 best piece I ever planted was ploughed and harrowed, then cross-ploughed and 

 harrowed the second time, making the soil fine and mellow, and mixing the 

 manure most thoroughly with it. 



