74 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Feb. 



solicited. Models or drawings of agricultural im- 

 plements or machinerj', if sent free of expense, 

 will be placed on exhibition. 



Gentlemen -who may wish to become life mem- 

 bers of the Society, can do so by paying or re- 

 mitting ton dollrrs to the Treasurer, Hon. B. B. 

 French, Washington city. This will entitle them, 

 without any further payments, to the full privi- 

 leges of membership — among these are : free ad- 

 mission to all exhibitions of the Society, the an- 

 nual volumes of published transactions, and the 

 large and elegant diploma, 



RIarshall p. Wilber, President. 



Ben: Perley Poore, Secretary. 



For the Nex England Farmer. 

 THS PAST SEASON— OVBB.PK.UKING, 

 ONION BLIGHT — A DESTRUCTIVE FOREST WORM. 



Messrs. Editors : — May and June were cold 

 .axrd wet ; much corn required replanting, but an 

 av.arage crop was raised, yet with a larger por- 

 tion of unripe ears than usual. Oats, rye and 

 buckwheat have been good crops. Potatoes have 

 jn-ovtd more nearly a failure than has ever been 

 know 3jere, for though their vines were large and 

 long, the tubers were proportionately reverse, 

 few and small ; one large farmer offering for the 

 digging, ^only the quantity which he had planted. 

 Apples have been few and very defective. The 

 blossoms Y/ere abundant, but cold, rain and 

 clouds held them stationary till they lost their vi- 

 tality, and tliey were generally blighted. The 

 apples that set were destroyed, for the most part, 

 by the curoulio. Peaciies have been nearly all 

 killed by the tv.'o last winters, and plums have 

 shared the same fate on my ground, and on that 

 of others. Cherry trees, even in most favored 

 localities, have been in a dying process, and tlieir 

 lives may well be despaired of. 



A thrifty apple tree of mine, in good soil, that 

 had born six bushels of Greenings two years be- 

 fore, immediately after the decay and fall of its 

 blossom, showed signs of decay, in its lower 

 branches. The loose bark had been scraped off 

 with a hoe and soap suds applied with a broom, 

 wliiie the tree was in blossom, and I surmised 

 this might have done mischief; but as my other 

 trees, served in the same way, showed no such 

 symptoms, I adverted to another fact. I had 

 pruned the ti'ee of several of its large, low branch- 

 es, growing horizontally too near the ground, in 

 November, 1855, thinking the higher branches 

 would grow the faster and compensate for those 

 removed. But the tree had reached the age for 

 its mature shape, and I largely reduced its for- 

 mer spread. Hence I am inclined to think the 

 tree has suffered from too large pruning, and may 

 not recover from it. Though healthy, new bark 

 had grown around the wood, where the branches 

 had been removed, yet the large diminution of 

 branches too greatly diminished the natural flow 

 of sap from the roots, by cutting off their chan- 

 nels, and producing in them disease and decay. 

 Whether this theory is correct or not, I would 

 like to have the opinion of vegetable physiolo- 

 gists, regarding it. In a young and growing 

 state, a tree may be safely altered in form and 

 expansion ; for new wood will naturally grow to 

 give full development to its sap and the vitaj 



energies of the roots, but if the fruit tree has come 

 to full bearing, in all the branches shooting from 

 the parent stock, is not the pnming off of sever- 

 al of these, at once, dangerous and injurious ? 



Onions, in my own, and in some other gardens, 

 often growing and promising Avell, till their tu- 

 bers were of one-fourth or one-half size, showed 

 Vjliite tips and spots upon their tops, and their 

 growth was arrested early in August, and the 

 blight progi-essed till their growth prematurely 

 closed. The cause I cannot discover, any more 

 than that of the potato rot, which has prevailed 

 greatly among us, the past season. Sugar beets 

 have been arrested also, in mid gi'owth. 



A new and formidable forest worm has ap- 

 peared among us towards the close of the season. 

 Their ravages in the town east of us had been re- 

 ported as seen in a maple forest, a year since, 

 and this year also, resulting in the entire destruc- 

 tion of the trees. Late in August or early in 

 September, the leaves of my door-yard mapleg 

 were seen to be falling, evidently eaten off by 

 some insect, and the attack became general, and 

 soon the oak forest near us, on the west, was vis- 

 ited by armies of the spoilers, who continued 

 their work till the natural fall of the leaves. The 

 worm Avas seen crawling here and there, in the 

 highway to the west in great numbers, and their 

 continual droppings of shot-sized, round balls 

 from the trees, upon the di-y leaves, seemed like 

 the noise of a constant rain. The worm is about 

 the length of the bag caterpillar on apple trees 

 in the spring, but is smooth, with longitudinal 

 stripes of white and blue, with seven feet on each 

 side of the body, one near the head, four in the 

 middle and two near the tail. The head is an 

 oval, bronze shape and color, and a protuber- 

 ance of like appearance is at the opposite extrem- 

 ity. I have tried to keep them in a jar with 

 leaves, Avhen they are changed into a crysalis 

 form. Among the leaves of the forest I find 

 them burrowed for the winter. "WTiat they will 

 do another season Providence will decide. 



SaXisbury, Gt., Dec. 12th, 1857. J. Lee. 



For the New England Farmer. 



WINTER BUTTEE. 



Messrs. Editors : — After experimenting near- 

 ly half a century on butter-making in the winter, 

 we have come to the following conclusion as the 

 best way we have tried yet: viz.: As soon as 

 the milk is strained we set the pans on the stove 

 or some other hot place, till it is nearly or quite 

 scalding hot ; then we remove the pans into a 

 closet near tlie cooking-stove where the thermom- 

 eter ranges from 40 to 60 degrees night and day ; 

 then, after the cream is well risen and taken off, 

 it is kept in the same closet till churned ; an op- 

 eration which takes us from 10 to 30 minutes, and 

 gives us equally as good and yellow butter as we 

 churn in the summer, provided we keep the cream 

 no longer than in the summer. We have tried 

 keeping our cream in the summer dairy-room, and 

 sometimes it Avould freeze, and O, the dreaded 

 day of churning Avould come, which would prove 

 '*a man's Avork," if not more, of from 3 to 8, 10 

 or 20 hours, and sometimes prove a failure, and 

 the refractory cream Avould be reserved to short- 

 en doughnuts. Il' we should have the good luck 



