278 



THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



his opinion more fully in a private letter, eubse- 

 eequently received by the reporter, and which 

 passage he will make free to quote here. 



" In regard to seed wheat, not recollecting dis- 

 tinctly what my answers were, I would say that 

 I greatly preler the mountain [)ur[)le straw to 

 any other variety I have ever tried on our lands. 

 It generally maintains its superiority here Irom 

 seed time to harvest, over every other kind. 

 There is less seed required, from the smailness 

 of the grain, and I have observed that it general- 

 ly comes up better than any other sort tried 

 here. Although it grows very tall, my observa- 

 tion is that it stands better during its growth, and 

 also in a protracted harvest, than any wheat 

 known to me, and that there is less loss incurred 

 in securing it. I do not doubt, however, the 

 peculiar adaptation of particular wheats to par- 

 ticular soils ; and on some of my own lands even, 

 I preler the culture of other kinds, and particu- 

 larly when, from the tenacity and humidity of the 

 soil, there is any danger of the smut. The tur- 

 key wheat is well suited to such places. Having 

 said so much in favor of the purple straw, I must, 

 on the other hand, admit that it is very subject to 

 injury from the fly. 



"With regard to continuing the same kind of 

 wheat, from seed raised on the farm, without de- 

 terioration, I incline strongly to the opinion that 

 it may be done by great care in selecting seed ; 

 which is a very important matter, and should be 

 strictly attended to. It is said to be an excellent 

 plan to select the earliest and finest heads, and to 

 keep it pure in that way." 



On the 15th of October, the sowing on the 

 clover fallows is begun — believing that then com- 

 mences the best and very limited time lor sowing. 

 It is important to get as much seed in the ground 

 as possible in the next 10 or 12 days — and the 

 facilities for much the most rapid operations are 

 offered on the clover fallow. Double-shovel 

 ploughs are there used to get in the seed, follow- 

 ed by harrows. The water-ILirrows are every 

 where cleared out well by the passage of a suit- 

 able (double mould-board) plough, and cross 

 Itirrows and grips (small, narrow and shallow 

 ditches,) opened wherever needed in low places 

 where the rain water would otherwise collect and 

 stand in the water-furrows, to the injury of the 

 crop. 



Of late, the wheat seeding operations have 

 been usually completed early in November ; and 

 immediately after they are done, the ploughs pro- 

 ceed to break up the land for the next crop of 

 corn, which it is important to begin thus early, 

 for the purpose of forwarding all the operations 

 of the season. The great body of the field for 

 corn is wholly ploughed before Christmas, or 

 soon after. The land remains softer lor being 

 ploughed thus early, (turning under a good cover 

 of wheat stubble or of clover in most cases,) and 

 is the better to work during the whole of the 

 following season of tillage, than if ploughed later 

 in the winter. The particular attention to this 

 important object of early ploughing, for the next 

 crop, causes it to be late before all the corn of the 

 crop then made is housed. No night work in 

 shucking the corn is permitted. Most of the crop 

 is'put up at first in the shucks, and shucked after- 

 wards, during rainy or other bad weather. 



The corn for seed is selected carefully — and 



ought (o be changed every few years. The same 

 necessity for change exists as to wheat — though 

 in changing seed, Mr. Harrison would still adhere 

 to the same kind, the purple straw, for the great 

 body of the crop. 



Oats. — Not much of this crop made, and only 

 lor part of the horse-lbod. Contrary to the pre- 

 vailing opinion, and judging Irom his experience, 

 the orowih of oats is supposed by Mr, Harrison 

 to be not so exhausting to the land as that of 

 wheat. 



Clover. — The uses, and some of the after ma- 

 nagement ol this very important crop, have been 

 necessarily anticipated in the preceding state- 

 ments, and under other heads. 



The seed is sown between the 5th and 25ih of 

 February, on the wheat succeeding corn. It is 

 preferred to complete the seeding on the wheat 

 land, if possible, between the loth and 25th of 

 February. On the oat land, the clover seed is 

 sown immediately after harrowing in the oats, 

 and of course later than on the wheat land, ac- 

 cording as the season may permit the oat seeding 

 to be done. The quantity of clover seed given 

 is a bushel to 10 acres. Some of the best grown 

 clover of the first growth of the second year after 

 sowing is mown for hay — and more would be 

 so disposed of if it were convenient at that time 

 to devote more labor to that object. No percep- 

 tible lessening of the succeeding wheat crop has 

 ever been observed on the places from which the 

 first crop of clover had been thus taken off. Il^x- 

 cept this small extent of mowing, and the par- 

 tial and light grazing, within limited times, be- 

 fore stated, all the growth of clover is turned un- 

 der by the plough, as manure, either in August 

 and September lor wheat, or in November and 

 December or later for corn, according to the ro- 

 tation of crops — the former being required lor 

 the (our-shift and the latter by the three-shift 

 courses. These remarks apply to the (wo farms 

 of the upper estate. On the two fiirms of the 

 lower estate, as before stated, the difl^erence of 

 rotation requires a practice somewhat diflerent. 

 There the clover is grazed close during its third 

 year of growth on that half of the field which 

 was not fallowed for wheat the previous year. 

 The portion of the field thus grazed in the third 

 year ol the growth of clover, and the fourth year 

 of the order of the rotation, as stated at its place, 

 comes under corn the next succeeding year, to- 

 gether with the remainder of the field, which had 

 been put in wheat. This course, on the Lower 

 Brandon and Church Pastures farms, has been 

 (bund more improving to the land than the tho- 

 rough four-shilt rotation of Upper Brandon farm ; 

 but both of them less improving than the three- 

 shift rotation in use on the Upper Quarter farm — 

 and this rotation, in suitable circumstances of 

 soil, crops, &c., is preferred both for improvement 

 of land and for annual products, to either of the 

 other courses. 



Mr. Harrison's general views of the compara- 

 tive merits of the three and four-shift rotations, 

 and with such change as longer experience had 

 caused in bis mind, have been presented at 

 length in several communications to the Farmers'" 

 Register.* His practice, in making use of both 

 rotations, especially when examined personally, 



* See p. 464, vol. ii., and p. 241, vol. iii. 



