AGRICULTURE. 



7 



faring, throw tip sixty separate standards, each 

 bearing grain. This arises from tiller roots 

 thrown out near the earth crown, hut whenever 

 any one root of a stool comes in contact with 

 a cold suhsoil, which has never heen disinte- 

 grated, the tillering in the whole crown ceases. 

 It is for this reason that grass crops frequently 

 run out, in soils not so prepared ; while with 

 proper preparation, and the top-dressing we 

 have named, a field once in grass may be main- 

 tained at its maximum of product for any length 

 of time. 



Recent Changes in Farm Crops. Until with- 

 in a very few years the American farmer has 

 paid but little attention to the cultivation of 

 roots as food for cattle. William Cobbett, the 

 English statesman, was the first to introduce 

 the culture of the rutabaga turnip as food for cat- 

 tle in America. Its general adoption, however, 

 until within a few years has been slow ; it is 

 now known that a proper variety of root crops 

 is not only less exhausting to the soil than grass 

 or grain crops, but that they are more economi- 

 cal as food for stock, securing a higher state of 

 health, and producing results not attainable 

 without their use in part. 



Beets, parsnips, carrots, turnips, caulo-rapas, 

 and many other roots, are now being raised by 

 our dairy and stock farmers. The old style of 

 cultivation, requiring laborious hand-work with 

 hoes, spades, forks, etc., is fast passing away, 

 also the hilling of potatoes, corn, etc., for which 

 practice no good reason has ever been present- 

 ed. The introduction of the various horse tools, 

 for the cultivation of root and other crops, has 

 materially lessened farm labor. Fifteen years 

 ago, the writer required 20 men to cultivate 

 properly a garden of 30 acres ; now, by the use 

 of a few judiciously chosen horse tools, he cul- 

 tivates many times that area with but 8 farm 

 hands. 4 of whom are boys. These tools in- 

 clude the digging machine, the lifting subsoil- 

 plough, used as an instrument for cultivation, 

 the carrot- weeder, the horse-hoe, in two modi- 

 fied forms, the roller, and the clod-crusher. 



Seeds are now sown by machinery, and the 

 variety of seed-sowers has been much increased 

 within the last few years. For broadcast pur- 

 poses. Gaboon's seed-sower is the best. It will 

 sow with perfect evenness 35 acres a day ; and 

 the same instrument will spread manures, in- 

 tended as top-dressings, over an equal number 

 of acres. The corn-planters, drawn by a single 

 horse, will do the work of 25 men ; the ordi- 

 nary seed-drills for the sowing of row crops, 

 work with great exactness, and as they leave 

 the seeds perfectly straight and equidistant 

 from each other, the after cultivation of the 

 surface is readily performed by a single mule or 

 a horse. 



"With either of the following tools, a mule, 

 with a boy driver, will represent many men 

 with forks and spades. Thus, when row crops 

 merely appear at the surface of the soil, a small- 

 sized lifting subsoil-plough may be run half-way 

 between the rows, disturbing the soil by a slight 



lifting, so that soil and plants are both raised 

 together, leaving the earth loosened to a depth 

 of twelve inches, and nore thoroughly than 

 could be effected by many hoeings, without 

 covering the plants at all ; this, in addition to 

 the original ploughings, constitutes the necessary 

 manipulation of the soil for the sowing of seed ; 

 the carrot-weeder may then be run between 

 the rows, embracing the whole surface from 

 row to row, disturbing the upper two inches 

 more thoroughly than can be done by re- 

 peated hoeings, and leaving all the weeds lying 

 on the surface to he wilted by the sun, and at 

 the same time effectually disintegrating the 

 surface soil. In this way the crops may be 

 kept clean until their completion, and with 

 very much less labor than would be required 

 hi the use of hand-tools. 



The larger row crops, or, as sometimes grown, 

 hilled crops, should receive a somewhat similar 

 treatment. Corn, for instance, may be thus 

 cultivated ; the lifting subsoil-plough is run in 

 both directions transversely, when the hilling 

 system is preferred, and on each side of the 

 rows of corn, when two or three inches high, 

 and before the roots have extended out into 

 the paths between ; the expanding horse-hoe 

 is then run between the rows, keeping the 

 whole surface clean of weeds, and at such 

 depths as the operator may desire, rendering 

 the tedious hand-hoeing unnecessary ; for if the 

 planting be straight and true, every inch of the 

 soil may thus be cheaply and thoroughly dis- 

 turbed. 



The same may be said of the potato and of all 

 other analogous crops. 



One of the greatest improvements in the 

 feeding of roots to stock, consists in pulping 

 them by machinery. After being pulped, the 

 roots are mixed with chaffed hay or other prov- 

 ender, doing away with the necessity of the 

 use of large quantities of water, and presenting 

 the food in the most acceptable form, and sus- 

 ceptible of greater variety ; for all the roots 

 that we have named may in turn be used, 

 changing the kind each week. The carrot is 

 perhaps the most valuable of the roots as food 

 for all animals ; with the cow, it increases the 

 flow of milk, greatly improving its quality as 

 well as that of the butter, cheese, etc. Horses 

 fed in part with this vegetable are not liable 

 to the heaves, and, as is the case with other 

 cattle so fed, soon acquire a loose hide, smooth 

 skin, shining coat. The value of the carrot does 

 not consist alone in the amount of nutriment it 

 furnishes, but rather in the pectic acid which it 

 contains, and which is found in degree in many 

 roots ; this acid has the curious property of 

 gelatinizing the contents of the stomach, thus 

 enabling the peristaltic motion of the intestines 

 to act more thoroughly hi the process of diges- 

 tion. "When the stomach of an animal is filled 

 with wafW containing cut hay and other mate- 

 rials, digestion is very incomplete ; thus we find 

 horses fed on cut hay and whole oats fre- 

 quently voiding the oats unchanged, and always 



