THE STALK CHOP. 177 



make a further abatement, reducing the eight million 

 tons to six and a half million, we shall still have a 

 grand total of FORTY MILLION TONS as the product of 

 the stover of Indian corn for the whole country, at 

 the period of the last census. This stover is worth, 

 in some sections, from three to five dollars per ton ; 

 in other localities ten dollars and upwards. If we 

 estimate the whole crop at five dollars per ton, It will 

 give for the aggregate value of the stalk crop of the 

 United States, TWO HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS. 



The hay crop for 1860 was about nineteen million 

 tons. The census tables record some products of 

 but little over a million dollars in annual value. 

 Yet here is a product worth more than two hundred 

 millions, which the Government has never recognized, 

 and which, it is believed, is nowhere represented in 

 any authentic record, or any published account. 



THE ADVANTAGE OF CUTTING CORN-STALKS. There 

 is perhaps no question in agriculture that has given 

 rise to more discussion than this. The opinions of 

 farmers on the subject are as various as their prac- 

 tices. Some of them are accustomed to cut their 

 stover half an inch long, others a full inch in length, 

 while some contend that the greatest advantage is 

 found in chaffing them very finely, not over one-fourth 

 of an inch, and still another class maintain that there 

 is little or no benefit in cutting them at all. This 

 difference of opinion has kept up, for years, a lively 

 discussion in the agricultural journals, without appar- 

 ently settling any one point to the satisfaction of the 

 opposing parties. 

 8* 



