84 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



SEPTEMBER 35, 1833. 



From the American Farmer. 

 BARNITZ'S BREED OP HOGS. 



In one of your lato papers, you noticed in terms 

 of commendation, the breed of hogs which I have 

 kept upon my farm ; and I now offer to you a brief 

 account of their origin and peculiar properties of 

 value. In the valleys of Pennsylvania, the farm- 

 ers generally have distilleries, and their stock of 

 hogs is obtained from the western drovers, who 

 collect them as they can get them. The distillery 

 affords abundance of food, and the good and bad, 

 when moderately fat, are sold in a mixed lot for 

 the city market*, without much regard to quality, 

 or any discrimination as to the separate values of 

 the animals. 



Chester county seems to form an exception; 

 here are few distilleries there ; and the farmers, 

 > turn their means to the greatest advantage, have 

 ,hown a laudable attention to their farm stocks. 

 The breed of hogs, especially, which is preserved 

 with great care, has a celebrity throughout the 

 State. I have not been able to learn their origin ; 

 but incline to the opinion that they are a cross 

 from the Chinese, with the English white Suffolk 

 breed, of which some were imported to Philadel- 

 phia county many years since. They are white in 

 color, of fine form, easily fattened, and of early 

 maturity : at one year, without extra keep, they 

 often weigh 300. 



I obtained several females of the Chester breed, 

 and found on the farm of an intelligent man in this 

 county, a peculiar kind which I thought valuable 



they were in shape like the Chinese, but larger 



. in growth, of a red color, with occasional black 

 spots. The owner told me he had first obtained 

 them from the neighborhood of Westminster, Ma- 

 ryland, and that they were said to be of the Park- 

 inson breed. I procured a boar of this kind, and 

 adopting the recommendation of the celebrated 

 Cline, crossed with the larger Chester breed. — 

 This is the stock I have had, and they are much 

 esteemed by all who have seen them. They fat- 

 ten easy, at any age, and when fat will weigh at 

 nine months 200, and at a year S00 and more. I 

 had one which was kept until twenty-seven months 

 old, the last three months being put up to fatten ; 

 he weighed 494 nctt weight. I thought this cross 

 an improvement in some respects, but the clear 

 white of the Chester breed was more pleasing to 

 the eye, and the breeders I now have, are chiefly 

 of this kind. — Those I sent to you last season and 

 this spring, embraced both varieties — the white 

 being of the full Chester breed, or with a very 

 small portion of the other blood. 



I have seven or eight breeders, producing from 

 eighty to one hundred pigs in the year, about one 

 half I dispose of currently at five dollars the pair, 

 and this pays the expense of keeping and fattening 

 the whole. The common stock of this neighbor- 

 hood does not command more than three dollars 

 for the best parrs, and the demand for those I have 

 would etiable me to sell, at the above rate, many 

 more than I can spare. 



I have no distillery ; my mode of feeding is, the 

 first winter feed on boiled potatoes and pumpkins, 

 with linseed oil meal occasionally ; in the summer, 

 keep them on the clover field, say from May to 

 November ; those intended for fattening, aro then 

 put up for four or five weeks, and fed upon corn ; 

 five bushels to each in the car (but better if ground) 

 will bring them to full condition for killing. 



I have a cheap and useful boiling apparatus, the 

 whole cost being not more than eight dollars ; it is 



simply a cast iron kettle, containing a barrel, put 

 up like a hatter's kettle, with a small fire place be- 

 low, and flues running up behind ; a sheet iron lid 

 covers the top, and a rough board shed is fixed 

 about it to keep oft' the wind and ram. A boy in 

 two hours may thus boil several barrels of pump- 

 kins, and refuse potatoes or turnips, and the slop 

 keeps moderately warm during two or three days, 

 even in winter; a sprinkling of salt is necessary, 

 and a few hamlfulls of corn meal will richly im- 

 prove the mass. A piece of rotten wood, or a 

 shovel of coals from the bake oven-pit, occasional- 

 ly thrown into the pens, is necessary as a luxury, 

 and I suppose a useful absorbent. 



The praises of the poor man's cow we often hear, 

 but the poor man's pig I deem of really greater 

 value. The cow, it is true, yields his family a 

 luxury during nine months in the year, hut at an 

 expence not less than twenty-five dollars. A pair 

 of pigs, of a good breed, the cost of which with 

 keep and fattening will not exceed fifteen dol- 

 lars, furnishes his family with five hundred pounds 

 of meat, sufficient for his year's consumption. 



Among the agricultural improvements, of the 

 day, some attention has been excited to the breed 

 of hogs, and the mischievous notion long prevail- 

 ing, that feed makes tliebreed, is going by. A val- 

 uable article was published some time ago in your 

 paper on this subject, from the pen of your late 

 lamented correspondent, Mr. Meade, containing 

 many excellent hints. The loss of this useful cit- 

 izen to the agricultural community, would seem 

 to make it incumbent upon others, to contribute 

 occasional suggestions, which their practice or in- 

 formation may furnish, to further our common 

 cause ; and in the hope that the example may 

 draw upon the leisure hours of some to follow me, 

 I have extended my sketch to a more tedious de- 

 tail than I at first intended. C. A. Barnitz. 



Spriiigdale, York, Pa. Aug. 31, 1833. 



and seeing them eat, than to be getting out our 

 grain, and having the straw ready for its various 

 uses : furthermore, what is a day's work at that 

 time of the year compared with one in harvest ? 

 In making these observations it is expected I shall 

 be understood to have a suitable bottom to mow ; 

 and grain that is extremely stout, so as to lodge, 

 may be expected. The difference of the value of 

 labor between the two seasons (grain harvest and 

 winter) alone, is almost a turning key to the ques- 

 tion. I can procure three days' work easier at the 

 last mentioned season than one at the first. In 

 giving these views to the public, I am conscious 

 that I shall find very little support, perhaps be 

 contradicted : if I should be, I shall not be wound- 

 ed in my feelings, but hope to learn something 

 that shall be of use to me in husbandry hereafter." 



. BEES. . 



The method of keeping bees in rooms or gar- 

 rets prepared for them is a great improvement- 

 These rooms should be so tight that rats, mice, 

 and other vermin cannot get to them ; and they 

 should be dark, for if there is a window the bees 

 fly to that instead of going to the apertures made 

 for them to pass in and out. Bees managed in this 

 manner never swarm, and you may take from them 

 such quantities of honey as you like. — Maine Far. 



MOWING WHEAT. 



A writer for the Maine Farmer, with the sig- 

 nature " A young Farmer ," assigns several reasons 

 in favor of mowing wheat with a scythe in the 

 same manner that grass is mown, and gathering it 

 with a rake. " In reaping," he says, " there are 

 many heads cut off so short, that they are never 

 bound ; and there is some waste in binding. 

 Where I have mowed it one way and raked thu 

 other, there is hardly a straw to be seen." 



Cradling grain he likewise condemns as waste- 

 ful. Mowing, he says, saves three fourths of the 

 time in a busy season — gives a greater quantity of 

 straw — prevents the scythe being dulled the sue 

 ceeding year by stubble, and furnishes more straw 

 for fodder and manure. 



With regard to threshing the writer says, " I 

 know full well that I cannot thrash as much grain 

 when mowed as when reaped. As near as I can 

 judge from what experience I have had, the differ- 

 ence is about one quarter ; i. e. to thrash the 

 mowed grain costs a quarter more labor. Now 

 let us strike the balance, in order to find how the 

 account stands. By mowing, according to my es- 

 timate, we save threo fourths of our time ; by 

 thrashing we lose one fourth of it. But still we 

 have half left, i. e. 2 days in 4. Is this of any 

 consequence in this busy season ? Now how does 

 the account stand ? 



" As our cattle demand so much of our time at 

 the barn in the winter, what can we do better, 

 while we are thus enjoying the pleasure of feeding 



BEE HOUSE. 



We have seen a bee house, the method of con- 

 structing which was introduced into our country 

 by Mr. Eber Wilcox of Salem, and which is said 

 to be a very valuable improvement. Several in- 

 dividuals have tried it with entire success. It 

 consists of a house of brick or wood, (if wood 

 Standing on stakes,) say of the size of a common 

 smoke-house, with a door to admit of the entrance 

 of a man. The inside is merely furnished with 

 shelves like an ordinary pantry. The bees pass in 

 and out through several apertures resembling 

 spouts, arranged in rows on each side. These 

 spouts project six inches, and the hole is perhaps 

 two or three inches wide' by from one eighth to 

 one half an inch in height. The benefits of the 

 method are said to be these : the bees never 

 swarm, but continue filling up the house ; the 

 honey may be easily taken out, when the bees re- 

 tire to the bottom of the combs in cold weather ; 

 and it is said to be an infallible preventive to the 

 worms, and the light fingers of the night gentry. — 

 Cortland Advocate. 



SICKLE PEARS. 



We had occasion on Saturday to visit the farms 

 belonging to the Girard estate on the Neck, and 

 on one, now in the occupancy of Mr. Ash, and be 

 it said, well cultivated, we found a pear tree load- 

 ed with that delicious fruit, known in our market 

 as the " Sickle Pear." This tree is the parent 

 stock, as we learn, from which all the Sickle Pear 

 trees in the country have come. We could not 

 learn the origin of the tree, and indeed so muny 

 vague stories are told, that it would be difficult to 

 find out whence it come. — U. S. Gazette. 



RHUBARB. 



Dr. Stebbins, the queerest genius in all our 

 town for gathering up the odds and ends of 

 vegetable and animal .curiosities, has at his office 

 in the Court House, a leaf of the Rhubarb plant 

 which measures thirty inches long and is twenty 

 eight inches wide. — Northampton Courier. 



