96 



THE FARMERS' REGtSTER. 



sliou'd, if poi=sibIe, be finced in, to prevent cattle 

 Jrom browtiinij U()on and desiroyin<x the younijand 

 growing liaiber. It miijh:, however, be l<ept as 

 a hog range, and would be valuable lor this pur- 

 pose. 



In cutting timber for fuel, grown and dead trees, 

 not valuable lor other purposes, ought invariably 

 io be selecied. Young timber should be sacred 

 from the woodman's axe. He ought never to be 

 perniitied, as is too frequently the case, ;o range 

 the woods at pleasure, and desiroy the most valu- 

 able timber ; young hickories iitr instance, because 

 they make the best fuel. The choppers ought to 

 be instructed to trim up iheir tree tops closely, by 

 neirlecting which, an immense quaniiiy of wood 

 je lost on almost every farm — lo cut their slumps 

 low — iQ spare the young limber as much as possi- 

 ble, not destroying a single tree unnecessarily. 



If some of the improved stoves or air furnaces 

 were used instead of fire-places, our houses would 

 be infiiiiiely more comfortable, while an immense 

 expense would be saved in the destruction of tim- 

 ber, and in cutting and hauling wood. On many 

 of our farms a team and two or three hands are 

 employed almost constantly during the winter in 

 procuring and cuMiuij wood. 



A creat deal of timber and hard work might be 

 saved by a more judicious system of enclosure, by 

 abolishing all unnecessary cross fences, and laying 

 oti' our farms as compactly as possible. Wor-m 

 fences, those pests and aliominalions, ought to be 

 universally proscribed, and straight post and rail 

 fisnces of durable materials, or stone fences, cubsii- 

 tuted in their places. In cutiing tinrber for rails, 

 buildiriiTs, firmins utensils, &.C., it will be recol- 

 lected tlial experience and science have both de- 

 monstrated, that timber cut in the summer will 

 Jar o'lilast thii cut, according in the common prac- 

 tice, in the winter. The lops of rail timber ought 

 to be carefully inmmed up lor fuel, and your cook 

 will thank you for a lew wairon loads of chips. 

 " Gather up the frafrments that nothing be lost," 

 is a divine maxim, no where more applicable than 

 to ibe diversified operations of the farmer. 



Upon farms defii-ient in timber, and indeed upon 

 all farms where it will flourisli, I would most ear- 

 nestly recommend the culiivaiion of the locust 

 tree. I do not know how a it^w acres can be more 

 profitably employed on most fums, liian in grow- 

 ing this invaluable limber. In addition to your 

 regular plantation, a great many trees can be 

 grown along permanent fences, public roads, on 

 rocky spots incapable of cultiv,iiion, and scattered 

 about through your woods, where the timber has 

 been cut down, or stands too ihin. In this man- 

 ner, and by the judicious ami tasteful disposition of 

 clumps of trees in particular situations, oiir fiirms 

 would be vastly improved in beauty as well as in- 

 creased in value. Exhausted fields may be re- 

 deemed Irom sterility and converted into valuable 

 pastures by planting them thickly with locust 

 trees. In our forest fields Vv-e generally find a 

 patch of sweet green-sward about the locust trees. 

 To cover your fields with the locust, you can set 

 out the trees at such regular distances as you wish 

 tliem to grow; if pretty thick, the timber will be 

 taller and better; or you can plant, say 30 or 40 

 trees to the acre, and by cutting off their roots with 

 a sharp coulter plough after they have grown a 

 few years, your ground will soon be covered with 

 a locust thicket. When your plantation is once 



establisiied, you are sure of an endless succession 

 of"locust trees ; lor every tree you cut down will pro- 

 duce sufficient shoots lor a dozen successors. By 

 pursuing this plan, you can enclose your farm in a 

 low years with a post and rail fence of locust, 

 which will last from seventy to one hundred years, 

 to say nothing ol'the large sums you might pocket 

 from the sales of limber. What an immense ex- 

 pense you would thus save to yoursellj your chil- 

 dren, and your children's children ! 



Young locust trees can be raised in abundance 

 from the seed, which at this season of the year, 

 can easily be gathered in any quantities from old 

 trees ; the larger and more vigorous the better. 

 The seed must be scalded in hot water to soften its 

 hard envelope, or it will not vegelafe for years. 

 Plant at any time in the spring thickly in drills, 

 say two feet apart; keep the weeds down the first 

 year with the hoe or plough, and your labor ia 

 finished. You can transplant the second, third, 

 fourth, or fifth year, or later at pleasure. The roots 

 left in the ground in digging up the trees will se- 

 cure you a permanent locust nursery. In planting 

 out your trees leave the roots pretty long; trim the 

 tops off, unless the tree is very small ; set the trees 

 firmly in the ground, as deep as they grew natu- 

 rally, and no deeper, and leave them to themselves. 

 You may set I hem out at any time from the fall 

 of the leaf in autumn, to the bursting of ihe bud 

 in spring. Trim your trees up if not planted 

 closely, and they will have taller and better stems. 

 Keep cattle out of your orchard until your trees 

 are oul of their reach. Follow these plain direc- 

 tions, which I have tried with great success upon 

 a small scale, and in a few years you will have an 

 abundant supply of tlie most vainat^'le timber, 

 which will add vasliy to the value of your farm. 



I wish I could persua(ie all your readers to pro- 

 mote the comfort and beauty of their homes by 

 embellishing their farm-houses wiih ornamental 

 trees and shrubbery. Plant locust trees, if nothing 

 else. I intend, however, (o ornament my yard, as 

 lijr as may be practicable, with specimens of every 

 tree to be found in our forests, lo be procured from 

 lime to lime as my convenience will permit. The 

 example of Ihe la:e Judge Buel in this, as in other 

 respecis, deserves the imiiation of us ail, and is 

 lull of encouragement. " Twenty years ago," 

 says he, " at lorly years of age, we conmienced 

 the ciiltivation of what was termed a barren, un- 

 tamealtle common, not an acre of which had been 

 cultivated, and on which a tree or shrub had never 

 been planted by the hand of man. We have now 

 growing in our court-yard, comprising about half 

 an acre, and in the highway in front of it, fifty 

 species of forest and ornametital frees, many of 

 them fi)r:y and filly feel high; more than fifty 

 species of ornamental shrubs, not including the 

 rose, besides a vast number of herbaceous, orna- 

 menlal, and bulbous and flowering perennial 

 plan's — the greaier number of which, in all their 

 variety and hue of foliage, flowers and fruit, may 

 be emhraced in a single view f>om the piazza. 

 Most of our fruits have been raised by us from the 

 seed, or propagated by grafting ; yet we can now 

 enumerate more than two hundred kinds, includ- 

 ing varieties, which we are in the habit of ga- 

 thering annually from the trees, vines, &c., of our 

 own planling." 



With this instructive example before theireye*, 

 if any of your readers fail this spring to plant out 



