148 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



The Parsnep. 

 Mr. P. T. Qiiinn, — The value of parsneps for feeding stock is 

 not properly appreciated. We have used them for fattening pigs, 

 for feeding milch cows and work oxen, and count them superior 

 to any other roots. They increase the quantity and improve the 

 quality of milk, and they certainly make cheap, sweet pork. We 

 have never found any better feed for work oxen than parsneps. 

 We cut them pretty fine in a machine; and feed a pair of oxen 

 half a bushel at a time, three times a day. To grow a crop, it is 

 well to commence preparing the ground the previous year, by 

 planting some crop that will keep the soil clean and deeply 

 worked. Then plow in autumn, and again in spring. Math turn- 

 ing and subsoil plows, twelve to twenty-four inches deep — the 

 deeper and looser the better, and the more well rotted manure 

 you work in, the heavier will be the crop. The land must be 

 rich, deep, and mellow, and free from sticks, stones, or hard 

 lumps, or the roots will groAV forked, and of much less value. To 

 make a profitable crop, you must grow long, straight, smooth 

 roots. If coarse, unfermeuted manure is used, the seeds are apt 

 to fail. When ready to plant, turn two furrows together, so as to 

 raise a bed three inches high, which is raked smooth and a trench 

 opened with a bayonet hoe, in which the seed is dropped by hand; 

 taking care not to cover too deeply. No machine answers to drill 

 parsnep seed, and that kept over one year is apt to fail, unless it 

 has been very safely kept. Plung up in a bag, in a dry room, is 

 the best way to keep seed. The drills are twenty-four to thirty 

 inches apart, and seeds are sown much thicker than they are 

 intended to grow, mixed with radish seed, to mark the rows and 

 enable us to put in the horse-hoe much sooner than otherwise. It 

 is one of the most important things to begin early, and keep con- 

 stantly ahead of the weeds, as the work can then all be done with 

 horse or mule, except thinning out, and a little weeding from the 

 row, at a cost of $5 to $10 an acre, by German women. If weeds 

 are neglected, they sometimes make a costly crop. Care must be 

 taken in thinning out, as parsnep-tops are poisonous, when wet, to 

 many persons. A Avell managed parsnep crop costs no more labor 

 than a potato crop. We sow in April, May, or early June. For 

 winter use, we dig and store in pits in autumn. Those for spring 

 may be let stand where they grow. In harvesting, we run a sub- 

 soil plow close to the row, and that loosens the earth so that a 

 man can pull the roots out easily. The produce has been from 



