Vol e. 



CJENESEEFARMER. 



I6t 



WHEAT IN WESTERN NEW-YORK. 



Wheat on the ground looks remarkably fine. — 

 We never saw it better. Indeed there is some 

 danger that it will get too forward, before winter 

 sets in, so that the frost may injure if not destroy 

 some pieces. Some of our best farmers say that 

 they shall feed off the too luxurient growth with 

 sheep. 



The last harvest has turned out better than was 

 expected at the time the grain was cut. We have 

 seen a man who has spent most of his time for the 

 last four weeks in thrashing wheat with a machine, 

 who says that nearly every farmer finds his yield 

 larger than he anticipated before it was measured. 



Mr. .Tohn Barber of Farmington took 1,500 bush- 

 els from 40 acres — an average of 37J bushels. 33 

 acres in Pittsford, gave an average of 37 bushels. 

 Sixteen acres in Brighton gave 38 bushels per 

 acre. 



There is great encouragement for wheat grow- 

 ers in Western New-York to make renewed eftbrts 

 to improve the culture of this great staple. Im- 

 provement, most valuable improvement, is within 

 their reach. 



Mr. Taft of Greece, raised the past season thirty- 

 six bushels of wheat on less than one half an acre of 

 land. His whole farm contains but one acre. The 

 other half did as well in the Summer crops. <S'ey- 

 entji-tu'o bushels per acre, is a great crop. Mr, T . 

 is a comb maker, and wisely fed his wheat plants 

 with the precise elements in all kernels of wheat, 

 by manuring his soil with horn shavings and scrap- 

 ings. 



We have a mass of facts, on making something 

 into wheat, which the readers of the Genesee Farm- 

 er shall have in due time. 



For the Genesee Farmer. 



WHEAT CROP, ITS PROSPECTS, he. 



Mr. Editor : — In this great wheat growing re- 

 gion, any thing respecting our great staple is of im- 

 portance to the farming community: wheat has been, 

 and probably for a long time will be the principal, 

 production of Western New York, and wheat and 

 flour the principal articles of exportation: all classes 

 are interested in its culture, from thebusy,calculating 

 tradesman, to the day laborer; all are more or less 

 interested in any thing appertaining to the crop ; 

 therefore a few lines upon its prospects cannot be 

 uninteresting. 



For one I think the coming year will be a re- 

 markable wheat season: my reasons are these; in the 

 first place, the ground has been better prepared 

 than I ever before knew it ; wherever I have been 

 this fall, I have noticed a remarkable change in the 

 preparing of theg-round for wheat ; instead of the old 

 method of getting it in, no matter in what condi- 

 tion, I have seen many who have adopted the proper 

 mode of feeding the plant with its natural ingre- 

 dients, such as lime, gypsum, ashes, charcoal, k,c., 

 and nearly all seem to think that wheat in order to 

 produce, should be so cultivated as to pay the cost of 

 production, and that this can not be done without 

 preparing the ground in a proper manner. It has 

 been one of the finest times for getting the seed 

 into the ground, and having it germinate that I 

 ever knew; it seemed as if the rains came just often 

 enough to start the seed, but not so much as to 

 give it a sickly growth. I have noticed that 



after a dry summer we invariably have a good 

 wheat season. I have never known this fail, and it 

 would pcem reasonable that there should be, as the 

 ammonia of the atmosphere by collecting through- 

 out the summer and having but few chances to de- 

 scend in showers, it comes at the proper time to 

 benefit the young and growing crop. Would it not 

 be a good plan to sow gypsum or plaster upon our 

 wheat at the present time, to absorb this ammonia 

 and hold it for the use of the crop herrafter ? I think 

 that by sowing it in the fall it will not only collect 

 the ammonia from the atmosphere, but by remaining 

 through the winter on the surface of the ground, it 

 will also absorb what fertilizing substances there 

 maybe upon the melting of the snow in the epring, 

 and remain as a stimulant to vegetation the coming 

 season. By imparting its fertilizing properties im- 

 mediately and being partially dissolved by the melt- 

 ing of the winter snows, I think it must act with 

 greater force than when sown in the spring ; expe- 

 rience would seem to show the same thing, as, when 

 plaster is sown on wheat in the spring, and clover 

 sown, it is of more service to the clover the next 

 year, than it is to the wheat crop. So much this 

 time, Mr. Editor. I intended to have said more of 

 the culture of wheat, but have not time and must re- 

 serve this, together with my own experience and ex- 

 periments, to some future day. 



Yours, F. 



Remarks. — Our correspondent is taking hold of 

 the true science of Wheat culture with commend- 

 able spirit, and we will add, for we happen to know, 

 with signal success. We desire an account of his 

 "experience and experiments" for our January num- 

 ber, if not before. 



Plaster, ashes, lime and charcoal had all better be 

 applied as a top dressing to wheat in the fall or be- 

 ginning of winter, for the reasons our correspon- 

 dent suggests, than in the spring. We have just 

 spent eight days in travelling through many counties 

 in ihis state, and never saw the wheat crop look 

 much better than it now does. 



Travels jn North America, in 1841-2, with Geo- 

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Both volumes are bound in one. For sale by S, 

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