390 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



JUNE 13, 1S38. 



AND gardener's JOURNAL. 



Boston, Wednesday, June 13, 1838. 



MANURE-GREEN FEED— TURNIPS. 

 Before farming can be rendered whit it may be, and 

 what it ought to be among us, an important revolution 

 must take place in the farmers' management and culti- 

 vation. Every observing and intelligent firmer knows 

 that manure is the great means of success ; that without 

 it, success in our old lands is not to he expected ; and 

 that with it our farms, if they do not produce as much. in 

 quantity, will often make a very much larger pecuniary 

 return than three times the qnanlity of land in the fer- 

 tile regions of the West. 'I'lie market gardeners near 

 the capital perfectly appreciate the value of manure; 

 and pay for it prices, which are absolutely astounding. 

 We have known five and even six dollars per cord 

 given for manure, which the fir., er had then to trans- 

 port six and even tin miles, at an expense before it 

 couid be placed upon his fields, certainly not less than 

 four dollars, making the total cost of tlie manure nine 

 or ten dollars per cord Yet even in spite of this enor- 

 mous expense, it is .1 common, and we believe a well- 

 founded remark, tliot the most successful and thrifty 

 farmers in the vicinity of Boston are those who are most 

 liberal in the purchase of manure. We believe that a 

 D-reat deal of this expense might be saved (o tlie.se far. 

 mers by providing with more care and judgment for 

 their own wants; and that the farmers in the interior, 

 who are too remote from the city to supply their wants 

 from that source, ought to make it a great obji ct of their 

 study and operations to create lis large a manure heap 

 as possible from sources within iheir iiu'nediate reach, 

 or wilhin their power to create. 



On another occasion we shall go into tills subject 

 much more at large Our present design is to point 

 out one means or source of increasing the manure heap, 

 which can and should be provided for at this very sea- 

 son : and that is the cultivation of green and succulent 

 vegetable crops for the feeding of their stock. 



It is too late to think of much el.<e than turnips ; the 

 common white turnip, the yellow Aberdeen, and the 

 Swedish turnip or ruta baga. Our winters are long and 

 our cattle suffer much from being kept so long and con- 

 stantly upon dry fodder; corn stalks often musty and half 

 rotted ; and coarse hay of a very inferior quality, which 

 no person will buy ; and wh ch the cattle must eat or 

 die, just as they choose. We are perpetually hearing 

 farmers boast how poorly and how cheaply they keep 

 their milch cows and tiioir young stock through the 

 winter; but much as they plume themselves on their 

 skill in this m.itler, we have never been able to bring 

 ourselves to admire either their good judgment, or their 

 humanity; to say nothing of the justice or rather the 

 injustice, the absolute immorality, of half starving so 

 useful and beneficent an animal as «• cow, who contrib- 

 utes so liberally to our sup^iort and c«m(orl. Besides 

 it is in truth the worst of all economy. .'V good cow 

 will, in any situation, where milk is worth but two cents 

 a quart, and skim milk is almost always worth as much 

 as that to be given to swine of a proper and good kind, 

 more than twice pay for the best keeping lliatcanbe 

 given to her. A good farmer ought to he ashamed to 

 keep a poor and worthlens -cow ; and a cow which is 

 vfell kept through the wiuter is nearly half kept through 

 the ensuing summer. A cow that comes out in the 

 spring half wintered, poor, and consumptive for want of 

 lufficient food, will evidence the bad effects of such 



miserable and disgraceful husbandry all the ensuing 

 season. It is commonly said that dry cows may be kept 

 on almost any thing, which will barely enable them to 

 stand upon four legs and hold body and soul together, 

 if the poor things have any souls ; but how does the cow 

 constitution differ from the constitution of any other 

 animal ; and is it not obvious that any animal in a bear- 

 ing condition particularly requires at such times sufli 

 cient and the most nutritious food ? 



No man then making any pretensions to the character 

 of a farmer ought to suffer himself to go into the winter 

 without a most ample supply of green succulent vege- 

 tables for his stock. Beets, parsnips, carrots, potatoes, 

 all are good ; but turnips are f aised with more ease ihan 

 almost any other vegetable ; and it is not too late, and 

 will not be too late even through the month of July to 

 plant some kinds of turnip fir the winter consumption of 

 live stock. Every farmer who keeps a horse, a yoke 

 of oxen, and six cows ought to raise at least four or six 

 acres of ruta baga or common turnip. We know that 

 this will frighten many fanners and make them open 

 their eyes almost to an extent as large as the turnips, 

 which they commonly grow, who have always thought it 

 enough to plough up a piece of lanil by the road side or 

 some corner of a field, as big as their wife's apron, 

 where they have yarded their cows ; and who feel great 

 self-complacency in their extraordinary husbandry, if 

 they perchance should have the mighty quantity of fifty 

 bushels of white flat turnips to put into their cellar in 

 the autumn. Instead of this many a farmer ought to 

 have his one, two, three, and four thousand bushels to 

 put in his stores; and such a capital heap for his winter 

 consumption, as to make his cows and his oxen think 

 as well of him as his neighbors will be compelled to 

 think when they shall see how his stock came out in 

 the spring. We hope the time is not distant, and that 

 our eyes will be blessed with the sight of it, when such 

 II be general, not to say universal. 



practices w 



What would be the consequences of such management 

 it is easy to predict. Our horses, instead of being those 

 miserable, jaded, galled, Rosinante looking forms, which 

 they now exhibit, suitable only as one observes to make 

 lanterns of, if you could contrive to get a lighted candle 

 into their mouths, would be round, sleek, strong, and 

 spirited animals, fit for pleasure or for labor, and noire 

 quire to be driven ' woman fashion ' by the bit with both 

 hands holds of the reins. Our oxen would be in high 

 condition, able to labor and always ready for llie butcher 

 when we saw fit to consign them to bis disposal. Our 

 young stock instead of being that lean, puny, constantly 

 degenerating stock now but too commonly seen in our 

 barnyards, half starved upon orts and refuse hay would 

 double their value, and our cows would in most cases 

 actually treble their produce ; and make it not difficult 

 to make butter little inferior to June butter in the midst 

 of winter ; to what profit and advantage every farmer 

 might easily ascertain by bringing such butter made and 

 put up in the best manner, to Boston market in the 

 months of February and March. 



We advise then most strongly our brother farmers the 

 cultivation of green crops for their winter consumption. 

 Eow farmers are ignorant of the mode of cultivating the 

 common turnips. We advise however that they should 

 be sown in drills fiom two feet to twenty-seven inches 

 apart, that the cultivator or plough may be constantly 

 used among ihein. It is scarcely worth while to attempt 

 their cultivation, unless they are to be well tended — 

 These turnips may be sowed any time in the month of 

 July; and if you have no other land upon which to 

 place them, then turn up a piece of g'Ccn sward, being 



careful completely to invert the sod, and to cultivate 

 the field without breaking or disturbing the sod. 



The Ruta Baga requires a longer cultivation. We 

 have raised good crops on turning over a clover ley af- 

 ter the grass was cut and sowing them the first part of 

 July. In this case we obtained from thiee to four hun- 

 dred bushels. But it would be belter to sow the plants 

 in a seed bed in your garden, and when your field is 

 ready for setting them out transplant ihem. After your 

 land is thoroughly manured and prepared, then furrow 

 it out at a distance of 27 or . inches apart : then take 

 up your plants, and having dipped the roots in water 

 lay them in the furrows, being careful to select the- 

 best plants only, at a distance of a foot apart ; and then 

 cover them with a plough, we mean of course the roots 

 only, letting a hand follow with a hoe to set up those 

 which are too deeply buried, and to secure those which 

 the covering has not reached. There is very little risk 

 t.'iat they will not live ; you ran scarcely kill them un- 

 less you lay them on a stone, where they cannot reach 

 the ground— and the advantage of ihis method is that 

 you choose your time to the greatest advantage for pre- 

 paring your land ; you save lime by getting your plants 

 forward before ynur field is prepaied ; you have an op- 

 portunity of selecting your best plants ; and all the trou- 

 ble of thinning u\.t your plants is [saved, as you set 

 them at the disiances, at which you determine they shall 

 stand. 



But the great objection will be, we have not manure 

 enoui'h ; — begin then with what you have — otherwise 

 you never will have enough. The very way to get ma- 

 nure is to increase the succulent food for your stock. — 

 No article of feed, whicli can be given to stock will pro- 

 duce such large secretions of urine, and where straw 

 and mud are bountifully supplied, enable the farmer to 

 make so much manure, as turnips. Be content then, at 

 first, with a small yield ; but take the first step — go on in 

 the cultivation ; get what you can ; use all you can gel ; 

 the more turnips you raise the more manure you will 

 have ; the more manure you have, the more turnips you 

 can raise ; the more turnips you raise the more stock 

 you can keep, the more butter, beef, mutton and pork 

 you will make; the more produce the more money; 

 the more money the more improvement and cultivation ; 

 the more improvement and cultivation, the more pro- 

 duction ; the more production the more wealth. — Now 

 " gee up Dobbin." Don't say 1 can't. If that word is 

 in your vocabulary, out with it ; and never suffer it 

 longer to disgrace your husbandry. The creation of ma- 

 nure is the creation of wealth. The manure heap is the 

 farmer's gold mine. Increase it— increase it. Often it 

 happens that the time occupied in going to the city to 

 get a cold of manure, "liich costs the farmer ten dol- 

 lars in the end, to say nothing of the vexations which 

 always attend it, would, from materials and means with- 

 in his own reach at home, enable the farmer to make 

 three cords in his premises. Think of this, Brother 

 Jonathan. 



CONGRESS. 



Congress is still in session ; and for aught we see 

 in a fair way to become a permanent body. They ex- 

 liihit only tew signs ol life ; but those of quite a bril- 

 li.int character. They have been for some time much 

 in the situation of a fire raked op over night. It ap- 

 pears to be out, i>ut when you open the ashes in the 

 morning with the poker, there are some sparks, which 

 suddenly explode; and some brands, that will blaze. 

 There is a good deal of combustible matter in Congress ; 

 and besides the internal heat, there is no doubt the ex- 

 ternal heat increases the fever. Of late, some of the 



