SWEDISH TURNIPS 



to try it ; but, the best security is, pretty early sowing thick, and 

 transplanting. However, this has been a singular year : and, 

 even this year, the ravages of the fly have been, generally speaking, 

 but trifling. 



238. Another enemy has, too, made his appearance : the 

 caterpillar : which came about the tenth of October. These eat 

 the leaves ; and, sometimes, they will, as in England, eat all up, 

 if left alone. In Mr. BYRD S field, they were proceeding on pretty 

 rapidly, and, therefore, he took up his turnips earlier than he 

 would have done. Wide rows are a great protection against these 

 sinecure gentry of the fields. They attacked me on the outside of 

 a piece joining some buck-wheat, where they had been bred 

 When the buckwheat was cut, they sallied out upon the turnip 

 and, like the spawn of real Boroughmongers, they, after eating all 

 the leaves of the first row, went on to the second, and were thus 

 proceeding to devour the whole. I went with my plough, 

 ploughed a deep furrow from the rows of turnips, as far as the 

 caterpillars had gone. Just shook the plants and gave the top 

 of the ridge a bit of a sweep with a little broom. Then burried 

 them alive, by turning the furrows back. Oh ! that the people of 

 England could treat the Borough- villians and their swarms in the 

 same way ! Then might they hear without envy of the easy and 

 happy lives of American farmers ! 



239. A good sharp frost is the only complete doctor for this 

 complaint ; but, wide rows and ploughing will do much, where 

 the attack is made in line, as in my case. Sometimes, however, 

 the enemy starts up, here and there, all over the field ; and then 

 you must plough the whole field, or be content with turnips 

 without greens, and with a diminished crop of turnips into the 

 bargain. Mr. BYRD told me, that the caterpillars did not attack 

 the part of the field which he ploughed after t l e zist of September 

 with nearly so much fury as they attacked the rest of the field 1 

 To be sure ; for, the turnip leaves there, having received fresh 

 vigour from the ploughing, were of a taste more acrid : and, you 

 always see, that insects and reptiles, that feed on leaves and bark, 

 choose the most sickly or feeble plants to begin upon, because the 

 juices in them are sweeter. So that here is another reason, and 

 not a weak one, for deep and late ploughing. 



240. I shall speak again of Swedish turnips when I come to 

 treat of hogs : but, I will here add a few remarks on the subject of 

 preserving the roots. In paragraph 106, I described the manner 

 in which I stacked my turnips last year. That did very well. 

 But, I will not, this year, make any hole in the ground, I will pile 

 up about thirty bushels upon the level ground, in a pyrarnidical 

 form, and then, to keep the earth from running amongst them, 

 put over a little straw, or leaves of trees, and about four or five 

 inches of earth over the whole. For, mind, the object is not to 

 prevent freezing. The turnips will freeze as hard as stones. But, 

 so that they do not see the sun, or the light, till they]. are thawed, 



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