124 AMERICAN AGRICULTURE. 



of previous highly artificial cultivation. There are many 

 other varieties which have a partial or local popularity, and 

 from the readiness with which new kinds are produced, care- 

 ful attention and observation on the part of the farmer, will 

 detect from time to time such as may have a decided value 

 over others for particular localities. A superior kind was 

 discovered in a field of common oats in Oneida County, N.Y. 

 some years since, and from the produce of one stool it became 

 widely disseminated and has uniformly proved both hardy 

 and prolific. The variety most cultivated in the United 

 States, is the common white, which is hardy and a good 

 bearer, weighing from 32 to 35 Ibs per bushel. The black 

 oat is preferred in western N. Y. and some other sections of 

 the country. Repeated trials have been made with the 

 potato oat, a heavy grain weighing from 35 to 45 Ibs per 

 bushel, but its merits have not proved conspicuous enough 

 to have given it the place of the old and long tried varieties 

 in the United States. 



CULTIVATION. In this country oats are sown at the rate 

 of 2 to 4 bushels per acre during all the spring months and 

 sometimes, though rarely, in June. The earliest sown ure 

 usually the heaviest and most productive. They may occupy 

 a turf or follow any of the well-manured hoed crops as men- 

 tioned in the preceding grain. No apparent advantage has 

 been derived from steeps for the prevention of smut as in 

 wheat, the impervious husk of the oat apparently arresting 

 the liquid and preventing its penetration to the kernel. 

 Sowing salt broadcast over the land at the rate of 2 to 6 

 bushels per acre has been found of use to the crop, both in 

 furnishing it with a necessary manure and by killing insects. 

 The seed should be well harrowed in and rolled and no after 

 attention is required except to destroy the prominent weeds. 



HARVESTING. Oats frequently ripen unevenly and if there 

 is a large proportion of such as are backward, the proper 

 time for cutting will be as soon as the grain in the latest may 

 be rubbed out of the straw by hand. The oat is sufficiently 

 matured for harvesting after it has passed the milk state, and 

 is easily compressed between the thumb and finger. The 

 lower part of the stalk will then have assumed a yellow color 

 and it ceases to draw nutriment from the soil. If cut at this 

 time the straw is better for fodder and for other uses ; the 

 grain is fuller ; the husk lighter ; and the loss from shelling, 

 which is frequently a great item when left too late, is avoided. 

 Oats when very tall are most profitably cut with the sickle, 



