1889] 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



186 



periments a few years ago, which we copied into 

 the Maine Farmer. These were valuable. Un- 

 til within a few years it haa been generally be- 

 lieved that Indian corn was the only legitimate 

 food for swine, and although they were led with 

 potatoes and the wash from the kitchen, yet In- 

 dian corn, after all, was the only sure substance 

 wherewithal to produce pork. 



Now we are willing to ackovvledge the great 

 excellence of this article in feeding and fattening 

 hogs, and almost every other animal — man not 

 excepted ; but oftentimes the expense of it is eo 

 great as to render it very unprofitable as an arti- 

 cle for swine diet. 



The experiments and researches of Mr. Col- 

 man, if we mistake not, established it as a fact 

 that it should not cost more than four shillings 

 (67 cenis) per bushel, in order to render it pro- 

 fitable for making pork when round hogs sold at 

 61 cents per pound. 



In situations where flour mills abound, the ar- 

 ticle called pollards, a portion of the ground wheat 

 not fine enough to pack in barrels as flour, is of- 

 tentimes used as a food for fattening hogs. Ac- 

 cording to Young, a Mr. Jebb, a miller of Ireland, 

 instituted some experiments to ascertain its value 

 lor this purpose. According to him, a barrel which 

 would weigh 84 lbs. paid in feeding and breeding 

 hogs, I85 cents per hundred weight — that is, 

 when pork is worth S4,44 per cwt., he could 

 make 18^ cts. per bushel, weighing 21 lbs. by 

 feeding it out to hogs. 



Mr. A. B. Allen, of Buffalo, N. Y., who is do- 

 ing great good in his experiments in breeding and 

 improving swme, and who has produced some 

 excellent animals by his judicious crosses, informs 

 us that he kept his full grown swine last winter, 

 in the best of order almost exclusively on raw 

 potatoes, at a cost, including time of attention, of 

 only three cents per day per head ; and he gives it 

 as his opinion, that had he possessed an appara- 

 tus for steaming their food instead of giving it raw, 

 he would have saved from 25 to 30 per cent on 

 the above trifling cost. He also remarks, and we 

 think with great propriety — that if this can be done 

 in New York, Maine, with the best soil and cli- 

 mate in the world for the production of potatoes, 

 can do it with much more advantage. 



IRRIGATION QF LOMBARD Y. 



From Artliur Young's Notes on the Agriculture of Loinbardy. 



Lombardy is one of the richest plains in the 

 world; for ferrlity of soil, united with the use 

 •hat is made of it by watering, it much exceeds 

 every other in Europe ; but for mere natural fertil- 

 ity, I take the plain which extends from Holland 

 to Orleans to consist of a richer soil, and it is 

 also of a greater extent. From the loot of ihe 

 •Alps, near Suza, to the mouths of (he Po, are 

 about two hundred and fifty miles ; and the breadih 

 of this noble plain varies from fifty to one hun- 

 dred, containuig, probably, about fifteen thousand 

 square miles. The Po bends its stately course 

 through the whole extent, its branches ramifying, 

 in innumerable streams, from the Alps on one 

 side, and from the Appenines on the other ; the 

 prodigious extent of the former range, covered 

 Vol. VlI-24 



with eternal snows, afford a vast supply of water ; 

 preserved most conveniently in those immense re- 

 servoirs, the Lago Moggiore, Lugano, Conio, Iseo, 

 Guarda, whose waters are the origin of the great- 

 er part of the irrigations 0/ Lombardy. But in the 

 Appenines there are no such reservoirs, nor any 

 extent of enow similar to that of the Alps. Thus 

 the space watered to the north of the Po, is pro- 

 bably ten times more considerable than that to the 

 south of the same river. 



The soil of Lombardy is, wherever I viewed it, 

 either sand, gravel, or loam. I met with none, or 

 at least, with very little clay (speaking always as 

 a farmer, and not as a naturalist,) and no chalk. 



If there be one circumstance which gives a su- 

 periority to Lombardy, over all the other countries 

 I have seen, it is this, [its irrigation] and therefore 

 it merits the most particular detail. 



Piedmont — Nice. — Such is the consequence 

 of water here, that a garden of 4 eestaradi, (a 

 square of 12 trebucchi, i. e. 144 is a sestarada, and 

 400 trebucchi a giornata, which ia to the English 

 acre as 0.7440 is to 0,7929,) with a small house, 

 lets at 20 louis d'or per annum, or about £15 an 

 acre. 



Coni.— For the last 10 miles from Nice to Coni, 

 the country imf)roves continually. The soil, near 

 the mountains, is stony, but is a good sandy loam 

 lower in the vale. It ispcrl(3ctly level,and watered 

 with the utmost attention, in a manner I had not 

 noticed before; not, as in Spain, in bed^', but the 

 field is ploughed flat, sown with Avheat, the clods 

 broken with hoes and bush-harrowed, and then 

 great deep trenches struck witli the plough, for 

 letting in the water ; these are 8 to 12 yards asun- 

 der. They are now (September,) watering clover 

 eight inches high, by letting the water into these 

 trenches, and conducting it^in a singular manner. 

 A man walking backwards, draws, by a line, a 

 bunch of straw and weeds, just large enough to 

 stop the water in the trench, and force it to°over- 

 flow on each side. This is an expensive and ope- 

 rose method, and inferior to the Spanish. The 

 crops now on the ground are maiz; good, but not 

 extraordinary : millet, and a little hemp ; the male 

 plants picked. A great deal of clover, but not 

 much that is clean. But meadow abounds, which 

 is the glory of Piedmont; and the conducting of 

 the water, in muhiplying conduits, seems welilin- 

 derstood, and practised in great perfection. 



Coni to Chentale. — In the watered meadows, 

 much chicorium inly bus and plantago lanceolata. 

 Watered meadows are cut ilnice commonly; but 

 in some seasons, four times. 



Racconis. — The watered meadows are now 

 mowing for a third time ; the iirednminant plants: 

 the chirorium intybus, plantago lanceolata, acchil- 

 lea millefolium, and trifoliumjira tense. 



To Turin.— Fvoin Coni lo Turin, something 

 more than half the country appears to be watered" 

 possibly two-thirds : and vvlioievcr the water is 

 carried, it is aiiparently with great skill. It is, 

 however, rather singular that more trenches are 

 not cut for taking the water off the land ; the at- 

 tention is chiefly paid to bringing it on ; from which 

 we may conclude, either Ihat'the heat of the climate 

 renders such drains less necessary than in Eno'- 

 land, or that water is too valuable, from every one 

 understanding its use, to be brought on in the least 



