3C4 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



tons of lodder-oats ou 1^- acres ; 200 quarts of strawberries on 1 acre of 

 vines, Avhicli Liad becu badly winter-killed ; 150 quarts of small fruits, 

 from plants mostly planted the preeeding year, on 2.', acres ; 1,000 pounds 

 of Concord grapes on 2 acres ; 300 busbels of apples on 3 acres of old 

 orchard ; 208 tons of hay ou 125 acres -, and a variety of vegetables from 

 the vegetable-garden. 



In the. cultivation of the farm the system of rotation of crops has been 

 pursued, the first year usually being occupied with a crop of corn ; the 

 second, with sugar-beets, mangel-wurzels, or potatoes -, the third, with 

 oats or barley, and grass-seed. In the management of the corn-erop the 

 following plan has been pursued the present year with satisfactory re- 

 sults : The manure made by the stock during the winter was hauled out 

 in the spring and spread oh the greensward at the rate of eleven cords 

 to the acre, and plowed in six or eight inches deep, after which the land 

 was harrowed with the Mshwitz harrow, and superphosphate spread on 

 at the rate of 300 pounds to the acre. It was then cross-harrowed with 

 • Thomas's smoothing-harrow, and planted with corn with a two-horse 

 dibble-machine, imported by the college from Germany last spring. 

 This machine will plant 25 acres a day, making eight rx)ws 1<S inches 

 apart at a passage, and dropping the corn, two or three kernels together, 

 at intervals of 18 inches in the rows. The land was harrowed just as 

 the corn was breaking ground, with a smoothing-harrow, and again 

 when it was 8 inches high. When it was a foot high it was thinned to 

 18 inches apart in the rows, and in a few days was cultivated with the 

 two-horse "J^ibenHack-Maschine," or root- cultivator, also imported from 

 Germany last spring, which cultivates five rows at a passage. The land 

 received no other cultivation, and yielded 80 bushels of sound shelled 

 corn, 10 bushels of unsound ears, and 3 tons of stover to the acre. The 

 total cost of raising the crop, exclusive of manure, was $18.54. The 

 course pursued in the cultivation of the rotation-crop of the second 

 year, the sugar-beet, is, to apply 400 i^ounds of commercial phosphates, 

 and in favorable seasons a yield of 20 tons to the acre will be obtained. 

 In the third year of the rotation the ground is sown with oats or barley, 

 and grass-seed, without additional manure, from which a good crop of 

 oats or barley is obtained the first year ; and for the next three years 

 three tons of hay per acre at two cuttings. 



Great attention has been paid to top-dressing mowing-fields, and ex- 

 perience has proved the course to be satisfactory and profitable. In 

 cases where the grass had been largely supplanted by weeds, the land 

 has been plowed in August, harrowed with Nishwitz's or Share's har- 

 row, and again with Thomas's smoothing-harrow. Five cords of com- 

 post, composed of three-fourths loam, were spread on an acre, and the 

 land was then sown down with grass-seed. In place of GOO pounds of 

 fodder, principally ox-eye daisy, (Leucanthemum vulgare,) to the acre, two 

 and a half tons of first-rate hay have been obtained, and no indications 

 of a return of the daisy have been observed. When the supply of top- 

 dressing made ou the farm has become exhausted, and the land is so 

 completely run out as to be incapable of yielding a paying crop, it has 

 been j^lowed in April, sown with oats and red clover, 10 pounds of the 

 latter to the acre, and at the same time 300 pounds of good superphos- 

 phate were harrowed in. This course has always given a good crop of 

 grain and straw, and also a good crop of clover the second year to cut 

 for hay, and a second crop to turn under for manure. In this way two 

 paying crops are obtained during the two years, the land is improved 

 by the process, and prepared for planting the next year. 



^portant expmmeiits.have been conducted by the president of the 



