36 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



[No. 1. 



neck, round to the back bone of the neck, in half 

 circles, until you reach the fore legs ; continue 

 round the fore legs, always shearing in half cir- 

 cles, from the Iront round to the back bone, also, 

 from the middle, or front of the belly in the same 

 way, in lialf circles, round to the back bone, until 

 you reach the tail, which will be exactly half the 

 eheep. Then shift the sheep around, still keeping 

 him on his butt, and his teet irom touching any 

 thing, which would cause him to kick and strug- 

 gle. With his head under your left arm, begin 

 figain to shear at the neck, near the head, as be- 

 fore, by shearinu from the back bone of the neck, 

 this time in half circles to the front of the neck, 

 where you begun at, so as to meet up, and make 

 entire circles around the neck, with the first half 

 circles already done; and so on, li-om the back 

 bone to the belly, making circles around the 

 whole body, legs and all, until you reach the tail, 

 when the operation is done. And the sheep will 

 be sheared in circles all around the body, and if 

 fat, will look very well, instead of looking very 

 ugly, as they generally do in the common mode 

 of shearing. 



This mode of shearing, saves the time of tying, 

 avoids the pain caused by it ; and you are much 

 less apt to cut the sheep, and the sheep looks much 

 better after shearing than in the old way; besides 

 wliich, you get the wool otf cleaner and in better 

 order; for the fleece all falls off in an entire sheet 

 together, and not in detached pieces; and it enables 

 you to roll up each fleece in a snug bundle to it- 

 pelf, 



1 think a man may shear one-third more sheep 

 per day, in this way, than in the old lashioned 

 way. My hands ti'equently shear fifteen or twen- 

 ty sheep per day, in this way, and formerly, in the 

 old way of tying, they never exceeded twelve sheep 

 per day, to the hand, VVilson, an Englishman, 

 who taught my men to shear, could shear thirty 

 sheep per day, and used to tell of their shearing 

 forty and fitiy, in England, to the hand, per day, 

 in this way ; and some very expert shearers, fiir 

 exceeding that. 



From the difficulty of explaining this mode of 

 shearing, I have made use of a great deal of tau- 

 tology, but I could not well explain myself with- 

 out. 



iliLi. Carter. 



♦fo tUe Editor of the Farmers' Register 



GYPSUM. 



Shirley, July, 1835. 



In looking over my journal, I discovered a fact, 

 which may be of some use to fiirmers, particularly 

 economical ones, and if you think it worlb publish- 

 ing in the Farmers' Register, you are at liberty to 

 do so. 



In the year 1832, May the 7th, we began to plas- 

 ter our clover, and only having on hand iifty bush- 

 els, I intended only lo plaster the poorest part of a 

 field, containing one hundred and sixty acres, and 

 directed the man to sow a light handful, at a cast, 

 (on fifteen-feet beds,) and as near a bushel to the 

 acre as he could ; and as he had been in the habit 

 of sowing gypsum lor seventeen or eighteen years, 

 and had gotten the gauge of his hand so well, from 

 my frequently measuring the acres, and testing it 

 accurately, 1 did not think it worth while to test it 



this time, by measuring the land, every now and 

 then, as is my usual habit, bul let him go on sow- 

 ing for two or three days, until he had gone over a 

 cut of land that I knew vvas fifty acres, t>y surv^ey. 

 I then inquired how the plaster held out, and to 

 my utter astonishment, he told me it held out very 

 well, lor there was a good deal left yet. On exam- 

 inino; the plaster, I found there was quite a smart 

 bulk of it, and had it measured, and found twenty 

 four bushels oi' the fifty yet on hand, which, of 

 course, made the sowing at the rate of only one 

 half bushel to the acre. I was very much vexed 

 with the seedsman, and told him be tuid lost the 

 gauge of his hand entirely, and that I should now 

 have to go over all the trouble of ineiisurinij, and 

 gauging, which I had been doing alf my lite be- 

 fore, and had hoped to avoid the trouble of in fu- 

 ture, as he had been so accurate, for several years 

 past : lie insisted, he liad not lost the gauge of his 

 "one bushel hand," but told me that i had told 

 him only to sow once on a bed this year, when, as 

 always heretofore, when he was ordered to sow a 

 light haudfiil, he had also been told to sow twice 

 on each bed, and said if I would let him sow twice 

 on a bed with the light handlijl, or once with a 

 heavy handful, it would be riii-ht. I immediately 

 recollected that that vvas the fact, -i-^d was at)ou1 to 

 have tbe fifty acres sown over again, at the same 

 rate; but there came on a spell of rain, and wind 

 alter the rain, which prevented our sowing for sev- 

 eral days, and in the mean time, I found another 

 part of the field, which I thought required the 

 gypsum, as much or more, than the one already 

 sown; and 1 deteriniued to sow the remaining 

 twenty four bushels of plaster elsewhere, and had 

 it sown twice on each bed, at the rate of a bushel 

 to the acre, leaving a bed here and there unsown, 

 as an experiment, in both instances, as is my con- 

 stant practice. I did not expect to see much effect 

 from the gypsum sown at the rale of half a bushel 

 to the acre; but to my surprise, the difference in fa- 

 vor of the plastered beds of clover, was as great in 

 the half-bushel instance, as the other, and was 

 very great in both ; just as great a difl'erence, as I 

 ever saw before, on my land. I have fi-equently 

 had it so great, as to be considered by .all who saw 

 it, as one hundred per cent, better on the plastered 

 land, than the unplastered — the plastered beds 

 looking green and luxuriant, and the other yellow 

 and s|)indling. But the unplastered bed, between 

 the plastered beds, is always made worse, for be- 

 ing between the others; that is to say, the land for 

 twelve or fifteen feet, adjoining the plastered land, 

 is alvvays injured, or rather the clover on it, is al- 

 ways injured, and made yellow and spindling, by 

 the plastered clover drawing the fertility li'om the 

 unplastered. [suppose this to be the reason, though 

 I do not know that it is tbe correct way of account- 

 ing for it, hut merely mention a fact, which every 

 man who has used plaster lor any length of time, 

 must have discovered, provided he left out narrow 

 strifjs, or lands, as an exneriment. If lie has not 

 discovered this fiact, liis land is not good plaster 

 land; for one of the strongest proofs of fand being 

 adapted to plaster, is, that where you leave out 

 narrow strips between the plastered lands, these 

 strips will be worse than they otherwise would 

 have been, if the land had not been plastered at 

 all: as is proven by the clover some distance ofl', 

 on land ol' the same quality, being very good, as 

 compared with the unplastered strips, between the 



