FOR PROMOTING AGRICULTURE 51 



the ''borer." He says, "I mentioned the subject to 

 Professor Peck and to the corresponding secretary 

 (Mr. Lowell) and to several others, none of whom 

 had heard of this destroyer of the apple tree." He 

 recommended extermination by means of a wire, 

 thrust into the hole where the worm is at work. 



In 1818 a letter was received from a farmer of 

 Framingham giving account of a large annual yield of 

 butter from a particular cow, and of his method of 

 generous feeding. The editor of the Journal com- 

 mented approvingly and drew from his reserves a 

 manuscript sent by Rev. Mr. Packard in 1799, the 

 words quoted from which, the editor says, ought to 

 be pasted up in every dairy in the State, viz.: "Three 

 cows [on a farm in Marlboro] produced 278 pounds of 

 butter. They were a more productive dairy than six 

 usually are with ordinary feed. Farmers egregiously 

 mistake when they overstock their farms. Were dairies 

 always estimated by the pails of milk they produce, 

 instead of the number of cows, many a farmer's wife 

 instead of asking her husband to buy another cow 

 would urge him to sell two, to enrich the dairy." 

 During the same year a Norfolk county farmer pro- 

 tests against the prevalent recklessness in pruning 

 fruit trees, by means of a hatchet or bill hook, lopping 

 off branches six or eight inches from the limb and 

 leaving the remnant to rot. He urges that pruning be 

 done in May or June when the sap is flowing, instead 

 of March, as was usual, and cutting the branch 

 smoothly off, close to the limb, covering the cut with 

 a cement of tar, beeswax and ochre; also the cutting 

 away of the sky-pointing young branches, which he 

 calls "gluttons," and giving the horizontal or fruit- 

 bearing branches a chance. 



In 1819 the importance of statistics of agriculture 



