WIND-BREAKS. 837 



W. S. GILE, 



VENANGO, ELLSWORTH COUNTY. 



Tree Culture as a Protection to Crops — Winter Wheat and 

 Corn — The Latter the Best Crop — Sheep Interest Increas- 

 ing — Climate. 



VENANGO PARK FARM 



is situated in the east end of the county, in the valley 

 of the Smoky Hill river, fourteen miles east of Fort Hacker. 

 It contains three hundred and twenty acres, two hundred and 

 twenty of bottom and one hundred of upland, and is all prairie. 

 When located (1872) it was entirely treeless. The bottom 

 is sand and loam — upland sandy, on a clay subsoil, well Ava- 

 tered, by springs, and in good pasture from the native grasses, 

 blue stem and buffalo grass. 



WIND-BREAKS. 



It is one mile long, east and west, and has a double row of 

 forest trees set around all that is broken. They are set two 

 feet apart, and as fast as I break I intend to continue the set- 

 ting of trees thus closely on the outside, as they will afford not 

 only ornament, but a wind-break for the protection of growing 

 crops. I set out tlie seedling cottonwood, box alder, coffee 

 bean, white ash, black walnut, and honey locust. The cotton- 

 wood and the box alder are the surest to live, and are the 

 most rapid growers of any tree I have tried. In front of and 

 around my house, I have trees that I set from seedlings, that 

 are thirty feet high and eight inches through, whose growth 

 is only seven years. 



WHEAT. 



I have one hundred and thirty acres in cultivation. The 

 land is well suited to the production of all the grains. Fall 

 wheat usually produces twenty bushels to the acre on the 

 bottom lands, and is generally a plump, well-filled berry. 



