PUBLISHED BY GEO. C. BARRETT, NO. 52, NORTH MARKET STREET, (at the Agricultural Warehouse.)— T. G. FESSENDEN, EDITOR. 



VOL. XII. 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, SEPTEMBER 18, 1833. 



NO. 10. 



COMMUNICATIONS. 



For the Neiv England Farmer 

 CULTURE OP WHEAT JVo. V. 



We have assumed the position that, the soil of 

 New England is not unfavorable to the growth of 

 wheat; and though, as in other places, it is ex- 

 posed to various accidents and diseases, yet there 

 is no substantial ground for being discouraged in 

 its cultivation. There is nothing in the soil or 

 climate, as yet ascertained, that forbids its growth. 

 We do not pretend that the old and worn out soils 

 of New England are to he compared to the virgin 

 soils of newly cleared countries, or to the rich al- 

 luvions of the western states. We do not pretend 

 that our soil is peculiarly favorable to its growth ; 

 or that it can be raised at as little expense as in 

 many parts of the country ; though much of the 

 land in Maine, we know from personal observa- 

 vation, is eminently propitious to its culture ; but 

 we believe that on most of our farms, some por- 

 tion of land may be devoted to this cultivation with 

 success and advantage ; and as good flour has been 

 made from wheat grown in New England as was 

 ever produced in any part of the country. Rye is 

 doubtless a more sure crop ; Indian corn a much 

 more sure, and under good cultivation, not a less 

 valuable crop ; but wheat should have a place in 

 our husbandry ; and every farmer who is not very 

 unfavorably situated, should attempt to produce 

 enough at least for his own consumption. The 

 crops in Massachusetts, from facts already adduced, 

 it is apparent, have averaged more than twenty 

 bushels to the acre ; and some have risen as high 

 as fifty. Now the average crop throughout the 

 world as stated by Armstrong, is not higher than 

 seven or eight bushels. There seems then to be 

 the strongest motives to make this valuable culti- 

 vation matter of particular inquiry, observation, 

 and experiment, that it may be carried to that de- 

 gree of improvement of which it is susceptible. 



I have already extended ray communications 

 much beyond what I at first designed ; and there 

 remains now but one topic upon which I shall 

 offer auy farther remarks ; that is, the selection of 

 seed for sowing. 



The earliest kind of wheat is to be chosen, and 

 in this matter there is a great difference. The red 

 chaffed wheat and the bearded, has been, from the 

 best observation made, less liable to blast than the 

 white flint and the thick chaffed varieties ; and it 

 is important in the next place to choose the fairest 

 and healthiest seed. It is an opinion prevalent in 

 many parts of the country, that blighted wheat is 

 equally good for seed as the fair and perfect grain. 

 Iudeed, I have been informed that some farmers 

 have actually changed their sound and full seed 

 for that which was blighted, as the latter was 

 cheaper, and from the greater number of grains to 

 a bushel would go farther. This practice has been 

 sanctioned and encouraged by as high an authority 

 as that of Sir Joseph Bunks ; but both reason and 

 experiment loudly condemn the practice. Who 

 expects to get as good a product from small and 

 half ripened potatoes as from those which are 

 fair and fully grown ? and so in respect to other 

 seeds ? Who would take his most diminutive, half 

 grown, stunted, and deformed animals, for the 



purpose of raising from them an improved stuck : 

 and who does not know that by such a choice the 

 race must inevitably become deteriorated ? Why 

 does not the analogy apply equally to wheat? The 

 matter, however, has been put beyond a question 

 by a most valuable experiment on record. 



"The late Benjamin Bell, Esq. in October 1783, 

 sowed a field of twelve acres at Ilunetrillin, Rox- 

 burghshire, with 54 bushels of wheat, of which 12 

 bushels were the best that could be procured in 

 the London market of crop 1783, 30 bushels were 

 from East Lothian of crop 17S3, 6 bushels the 

 best wheat in the London market of crop 1782, 

 and 6 bushels produced near Edinburgh in the 

 year 1782. It must be remembered that 1782 

 was a season generally unfavorable to raising wheat 

 in perfection ; but that in 1783 the grain was sound 

 and of good quality. The field on which these 

 parcels of wheat were sown had been well fallow- 

 ed, was equally manured with dung, and the 

 whole of these seeds were sown in the beginning 

 of October, all of them having been washed in 

 strong brine, and afterwards dried with powdered 

 quicklime. The English seed of crop 1783 was 

 sown on one side of the field ; three bushels of the 

 Mid-Lothian seed of crop 1782 were sown in the 

 next three ridges ; to this succeeded the English 

 seed crop of 1782 ; then the East Lothian wheat 

 of crop 1783 ; and lastly, the remaining three 

 buslfeTs of Mid-Lothian seed crop 1782. 



" The— field being all in good condition, the 

 wheat appeared early above ground ; and tlje 

 shoots were every where strong except on those 

 ridges which were sown with the Mid-Lothian 

 seed crop of 17S2, on which the plants were weak 

 and not very numerous; neither did they spread 

 or titter like the others ; so that during the winter 

 and spring months, the wheat on these ridges had 

 a weak appearance ; on harvesting, the straw was 

 thin and short; and the ears were short and small, 

 the grain likewise being not so large nor heavy as 

 on the other parts of the field. On being threshed 

 and measured, the produce of the 12 bushels ol 

 seed, crop 1782, both the London and Mid-Lothian 

 taken together, was only 66 bushels, or 5£ after 

 one. The produce of the rest of the field was 

 fully 15 bushels for every bushel of seed. The 

 difference in value was also considerable, as the 

 produce of the seed from 1782 sold almost a shil- 

 ling the bushel lower than the other. On the 

 whole, it seems the safest plan, to use none but 

 good seed, and to avoid as much as possible the 

 seed of wheat that has been infected with any dis- 

 order."* H. C. 

 Meadowbanks, Beerfield, 26th Aug. 1833. 



year known by the oldest inhabitants. Our Indian 

 corn crops are very short, and our pastures and all 

 vegetation drying up. But it now appears as if we 

 should have rain soon, as it is clouding over pretty 

 generally." 



For tht New England Farmer. 

 DROUGHT. 



Extract from a Letter from Mr. J. Adlum to the 

 Proprietor of the New England Farmer, dated — 



" Vineyard near Georgetown, D. C. Sept. 6, 1833. 



" My grapes in the Vineyard, this year, are near- 

 ly a total failure, and my neighbors' vineyards, with 

 but one asception, have also suffered much by the 

 grape cracking and drying up. 



" We have had one of the greatest droughts this 



* Sinclair's General Report, Vol. I, p. 479. 



For the New E7i{rland Farmer. 

 FRUIT TRIES. 

 Tme following observations are prefatory to an 

 abridged Descriptive Catalogue of the Fruit Trees 

 in the Collection of J. B. Van Mons, a celebrated 

 Cultivator of Fruit Trees in Belgium, Europe. 

 We were favored with the manuscript by R. Man- 

 ning, Esq. of Salem, Mass. for whom it was trans- 

 lated from the French by Miss Elizabeth C. Ha- 

 thorne, of that place. We think the remarks 

 cannot but prove useful to all persons engaged in 

 the raising of Fruits, and especially to those who 

 wish to create or introduce new and improved 

 varieties of Apples, Pears, &c. — 



TRANSLATION. 



Being unwilling to leave my correspondents in 

 ignorance of the fruits which I have sent them, 

 designated by numbers alone, I have caused the 

 materials for this catalogue to be collected during 

 a severe illness. There may be omissions in i», 

 but there are no errors ; and the repetitions refer 

 to the parent stocks, and to their grafts, but are 

 not unnecessarily employed. 



In so vast an establishment, containing not less 

 than 86,000 trees, it was impossible to inscribe at 

 length on tickets the names of all the fruits of 

 which we distributed grafts ; and we found it at 

 once more simple and more expeditious to mark 

 on a slip of paper the No. attached to the tree, and 

 to point out afterwards the variety to which the 

 No. belonged. 



We attached a No. in lead, suspended by a wire 

 of the same metal, to every tree and graft in the 

 garden, as well as to every Sauvageon (ungrafted 

 tree, raised from seed,) from which we gathered 

 fruit, and we noted in catalogues the names or the 

 qualities of the fruits to which these Nos. referred. 

 We have thought it expedient to have those Cata- 

 logues printed. 



There are in the first series many Nos. to which 

 no descriptions are annexed, because they are oc- 

 cupied by old varieties generally known. The 

 vacant Nos. in the second and third series belong 

 to new varieties which have not answered the ex- 

 pectations formed respecting them. Some vacan- 

 cies are also left by duplicates and triplicates of 

 die same variety, which we had received under 

 the same names. 



We have, as far as possible, given the names of 

 the Authors of the Fruits. By its Patrons, signi- 

 fies that it was found by the Cultivator whose 

 ■Sine it bears. By ourselves, that it is the result 

 of our endeavors. The articles designated by Nos. 

 alon*, are necessarily products of our culture. 



I have added in my Catalogues the approxima- 

 tive forms of my new fruits, though nothing can 

 be more uncertain than this characteristic, for the 

 form of a pear varies during 12 or 15 years before 

 it is definitively fixed ; and there are some which 

 never attain a fixed form, as the Bon Chretien 

 d'hiver, the Beurre Ranee, &c. I have compared 

 them to known varieties. I might here compare 



