Vol. VII. 



ROCHESTER, N. Y., SEPTEMBER, 1846. 



No. 9. 



THE GENESEE FARMER: 



Issued the first of each month, at Rochester, N. Y., 



D. D. T. lOORE, PROPRIETOR. 



DANIEL LEE, EDITOR. 



BARRY, Conductor of the Horticultural Department. 



FIFTY CENTS A YEAR : 



Five copies for $2 — Eight copies for $3. Subscription 

 money, by a regulation of the Tosi-Master General, may be 

 remitted by Post-Masters free of expense. 10° AH sub- 

 scriptions to commence with the first number o-f the volume. 



PuBUCATtoN Office over the Rochester Seed Store, 

 (2d story,) Front street, nearly opposite the Market. 



Post-Masters, and all other friends of Agricultural Jour- 

 nals, are requested to obtain and forward subscriptions for 

 the Farmer. Address D. D. T. Moore, Rochester, N. Y. 

 03= The Farmer is subject to newspaper postage only. ,Ili\ 



Geological Excursion. 



During the month of August, the editor of this 

 paper and twelve of his pupils made a geologi- 

 cal excursion from Lake Ontario, south to Por- 

 tage Falls on the Genesee river. Our object 

 was to examine, in their natural beds, all the 

 rocks in Western New York up to the Chemung 

 Group, collect fossils and cabinet specimens, with 

 fair samples of the different soils, as modified by 

 each class of rocks. We provided ourselves with 

 a tent large enough to accomodate 15 persons — 

 with a cooking apparatus, and implements for 

 breaking rocks, examining specimens, &c. The 

 enterprize was a pioneer one, planned with ref- 

 erence to economy, for the more thorough inves- 

 tigation and study of the origin, properties, nat- 

 ural and cultivated products of the soil in this 

 part of the State. Many of these .soils, and speci- 

 mens of the several rocks, in place, will be anal- 

 yzed, to discover how far the composition of the 

 solid strata affects that of the loose matter over- 

 laying them. 



twenty, and even fifty feet, when brought to the 

 surface, yield good crops of wheat, but many of 

 the solid rocks to an unknown depth abound in all, 

 or nearly all the elements, except water and air, 

 used by nature in forming cultivated plants. — 

 The ingredients necessary to make good crops^ 

 are more remarkable for their great depth below 

 the surface of the earth, than for their abundance 

 in the soil, which the j)lov/-share turns up to the 

 light and warmth of the sun. The solubility of 

 these minerals, as well as their abundance, deep 

 in the earth, gives rise to a great number of gas 

 fountains, and mineral springs, one or two of 

 which are said to yield pure, but of course dilu- 

 ted, sulphuric acid, and others nitrogen. 



Commencing at the southern shore of Lake 

 Ontario and going south, the following are the 

 names of the several groups of rocks as given by 

 the State Geologists: 



1. Medina Sand Stonp. 



2. Clinton Group. 

 Niagara '• 

 Onondaga Salt Group. 

 Heldenberg Series. 

 Moscow Shales. 



Portage Group and Genesee .Slate. 

 Chemung Group. 



These are only a part of the Sedimentary Rocks> 

 in w-hat is called the New York System. They 

 were deposited in the bed of an ocean, on the 

 bottom of which lived both plants and animals 

 during the whole period. Their aggregate thick- 

 ness, if restored to their natural position before 

 abrasion took place, would be some five or six 

 thousand feet. Inconceivable as must be the 

 force, deep in the planet, which could rend asun- 

 der strata of solid rocks a mile or more in depth, 

 still the power of ancient volcanoes was equal to 

 the task. At their upheaval all the rocks in 

 Western New York were tiled to the south. 



It is owing to this "dip," as it is termed by 

 geologists, that no one rock, like the sand-stone 

 near Lake Ontario, or the lime-stone at Roche.s- 



The results of our excursion have been alike ^ 



interesting and satisfactory, as a beginning. The 1 teV," Loclcport, and Niagara Falls, extendshor 

 writer of this has long been of the opinion that 1 izontally over all the country at its level — 

 the agricultural capabilities of this section are far 1 By dipping to the south, all rocks present at the 

 from being duly appreciated, by the public at falls of the streams running north, like the Gen- 

 large. Not only does the sub-soil down ten, I esee River, the "out-crop" of their northern and 



