1856. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



167 



EXTRACTS AND REPLIES. 



YOUNG PEAR AND PEACH TREES. 



Mr. Editor : — I should like to inquire through 

 the medium of your valuable paper, where I can 

 obtain a few thousand pear stocks, and at what price ; 

 wishing to set that amount out the coming Spi'ing. 

 Also, where I can buy some young peach trees. 



Danvers, Feb. 20, 1856. A Subscriber. 



HOW TO RAISE COLTS. 

 If I had a good colt, I would take him from the 

 mare at four months old, and feed him in the barn. 

 If in warm weather, give him good room and air, 

 and some green food daily. If late, I would give 

 him half a pint of oat meal with a quart of cut car- 

 rots, and continue this through t\\Q first ivinter to 

 keep him in good flesh and gi-owing. I would lead 

 him to water and let him play. After this, with a 

 decent chance, he would take care of one, no mis- 

 take, without grain, till he came to work. I reckon 

 this better for mare and colt, than remaining longer 

 together. 



DO POTATOES MIX. 



In answer to A. Pixby, permit nie to say, pota- 

 toes never mix, any more than beets, carrots or tur- 

 nips, by the roots growing in proximity. I have 

 planted different kinds in my garden, and I have 

 taken the balls from one kind, and then raised as 

 many kinds of seedlings, as there were different 

 varieties of potatoes in blossom, and also some hy- 

 brids. I once planted the kidney potatoes alone, 

 and took the balls and planted to renew them, and 

 my seedlings were of only one kind, the kidney, 

 which afterwards produced abundantly and very 

 fine qualitj'. I consider it an established law of 

 Nature, that like produces like, and that the hybrids 

 in animals, fruits and vegetables, are the conse- 

 quence of mingling different species. We might 

 raise every variety of fruit without budding or graft- 

 ing, could we get the unminghd seed. 



For many years I raised and sold the finest va- 

 riety of peaches and peach trees, the product of one 

 tree standing alone, till I procured other kinds for 

 the sake of variety, and set out in the same garden, 

 when lo ! I had no more of the kind pure, but hy- 

 brids enough in my nursery, raised from the pits of 

 this same tree. I have had the same experience in 

 apples. Benjamin Willard. 



Lancaster, Feb. 12, 1856. 



FISH FOR MANURE. 



Mr. Editor : — Can you, or any of your corres- 

 pondents, give me the best method of applying 

 fish to the land, as a manure for corn ; they are 

 very extensively used in this part of the country ; 

 some prefer to spread them on broadcast and plow 

 them in immediately ; others , to stack them with 

 dirt and sand. We get them during the month of 

 May. By giAing your opinion upon this subject, I 

 shall be much obliged. G. "W. p. 



Little Compton, R. 1., 1856. 



Remarks. — Personally we have no experience in 

 the use of fish manure, but have often heard opin- 

 ions of it expressed, and have seen lands dressed 

 with it. It adds great value to the compost heaps 

 of the barn-yard, and when mingled with them in 

 moderate quantities, will decompose and not be 



come particularly disagreeable during the process 

 of decay. It is said that by making an excavation 

 in the earth — according to the amount of fish it is 

 desired to work over —filling it with fish and cover- 

 ing it with peat muck or loam, that in a few days it 

 will become soft. It should then be wet with dilut- 

 ed sulphuric acid, and the muck, sand or loam, stirr- 

 ed in with it. Then the whole may be removed, and 

 the same process gone through with a fresh supply. 

 They are excellent composted in alternate layers 

 of leaves, peat muck, loam, pulverized charcoal, or 

 even saw-dust. Excellent plowed under in a crude 

 state. Excellent when four are laid around the hill 

 and covered up when the corn is planted, and excel- 

 lent dug in, in moderate quantities around fruit 

 trees, say thi'ee to ten feet from the tree, according 

 to its size. 



tall trees. 



I saw accounts of some large trees in your paper 

 last week, and read them with interest. I cut a 

 Rock Maple from my woods the 14th inst., which 

 is less than two inches in diameter and measures 

 41 feet in length. A Pine less than 3 inches diam- 

 eter, 45 feet. 



We don't boast of our large trunks, but we stump 

 the readers of the JV. E. Farmer to measure poles 

 with us in Vermont. Benj. F. Whittier. 



Hartford, Ft. 



FLOWING CRANBERRY MEADOWS — PRUNING. 



Mr. Editor : — Will spring water haA'e the same 

 effect when used to cover cranberry vines in winter, 

 as common river or rain water ? Or will the spring 

 water so used be an injury to said vines? (a.) 

 What benefit is derived from the top-dressing -with 

 sand on peat or swamp land for the cultivation of 

 the cranberry ? (6.) 



What month is best for pruning old apple 

 trees ? (c.) T. C. Kingsley. 



Alhnton, R. /., 1856. 



Remarks. — (a.) We have no doubt that spring 

 water will answer all purposes for flowing a cran- 

 berry meadow. 



(6.) As a general thing, wherever we have found 

 a luxuriant growth of cranberries, we have found 

 sand, usually white sand — Avithin six to twelve inch- 

 es of the surface. This has led us to believe that 

 the cranberry plant requires considerable sand, and 

 that, therefore, it will not flourish well on meadows 

 composed, or nearly so, of jiure vegetable matter. 

 Hence the benefit of sand when a^jplied to a peat 

 meadow. The sand coming in contact with some 

 salt, which acts as a base, is dissolved, and is then 

 ready to be taken up by the roots of the plants. 

 It has the effect, on meadow lands, to make herd's 

 grass and red-top stand up, by coating the surface 

 of the stem with a substance which is brittle and 

 almost as hard as glass. 



(c.) Prune in mid-summer, or in October or No- 

 vember. Not in March or April, unless you wish 

 to spoil your trees. And when you prune, cover 



