372 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



June 6, 1832. 



Agriculture 



MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURAL 

 SOCIETY. 



R'port of the Committee on the best culticatcd Farms. 



The committee appointed by.tlie trustees, to ex- 

 amine and consider the claims for premiums for 

 tiie best cultivated farms, suliniit the following 

 report : — 



The committee, Avitli much regret, find that the 

 premiums offered by the trustees, for the best cul- 

 tivated farms, have not receive'd the attention from 

 our respectable farmers, that was expected. Only 

 three applications have been made this year ; and 

 although they all have merit, and appear to come 

 from skilful agriculturists, your committee do not 

 perceive in either of them such superiority, either 

 in their processes or results, as would justify 

 them in i-ecommending a premium. They had 

 hoped that the encouragement offered, and the de- 

 sire which they knew was generally felt by that 

 respectable class of citizens, to promote the inter- 

 ests of agriculture, would excite a generous com- 

 petition among our most intelligent and practical 

 farmers, which would prove useful to themselves, 

 and more useful to their brethren who had less 

 experience and skill than themselves, by enabling 

 the trustees to conununicate, through their state- 

 ments, their methods of cultivating their farms, with 

 results — tho most satisfactory tests of good hus- 

 bandry. The information communicated in this 

 way, would be founded on and accompanied by a 

 history of the experiment, the best foundation of 

 all science, and more especially of improvement 

 in agriculture. To answer this end, or indeed any 

 other valuable purpose, it is indispensable that the 

 applicant should state with much particularity, the 

 kinds and qualities of the soil of his farm, his man- 

 ner of tilling, manuring, planting, sowing, and gath- 

 ering; liis crops ; of manufacturing his butter and 

 cheese, and making and preserving his cider ; his 

 rotation of crops, and the quantity of produce of 

 every kind, and indeed all his processes and oper- 

 ations in carrying on his farm. To prevent mis- 

 apprehension and insiu-e this benefit from their 

 statements, the trustees, in their proposals, speci- 

 fied with minuteness the particulars which they 

 deemed necessary to render their account useful 

 to the public, and which they required to be stated 

 as the condition on which the premium would be 

 allowed ; and altliough it was perceived that this 

 particularity might occasion some trouble to the 

 farmers, it was hoped that the benefit they might 

 derive from a more accurate record of their own 

 proceedings, the consciousness ih.at they were ben- 

 efiting the publicand the premium offered, would 

 be deemed an adequate compensation. The com- 

 mittee, although twice disappointed, do not relin- 

 quish the hope they at first entertained, nor feel a 

 doubt of the benefits that will accrue to our farm- 

 ing brethren from this measure, if they see fit to 

 co-operate in carrying this into effect. 



It is well known that the trustees, for many 

 years ])ast, have given premiums for the encour- 

 agement of the cultivation of neatly all the differ- 

 ent agricultural products, vegetable and animal, 

 that are grown in our country, and thereby mate- 

 rially promoted improvements in most of them ; 

 the judicious m.anagement and cultivation of a 

 farm, it is thought, requires a combination and 

 practical exercise, by the farmer, of all the know- 

 ledge and skill necessary for the cultivation of the 



articles separately, that are |>roduced on that farm. 

 It is obviously a different science, more complex, 

 more difficult to learn ; requiring judgment, ex|)e- 

 rienco and observation to carry it into successful 

 liraclicc. A man may know how to cultivate any 

 or all of those vegetables separately, and yet 'not 

 understand how to carry on a farm for the best 

 advantage. Next to an individual's own experi- 

 ence, is a true and particular account by others, 

 of a judicious and skilful cultivation and manage- 

 n)ent of farms like his own, where the expense of 

 labor, markets for crops, and habits of living, are 

 nearly the same ; if he can have their method and 

 practice fully and accurately comnuuiicated to him. 

 The latter is indispensable to enable him to adopt 

 their experience as his own. It will probably be 

 found, that many important agricultural processes 

 are yet unsettled among our intelligent formers, 

 and some practise one way and some another — 

 sowing of grass seed is an instance, whether it is 

 best to sow it in the fall or spring, by itself alone, 

 or with grain and what grain. Different practices 

 and opinions on this head, will be found in the 

 few communications the conuniltee have received. 

 Nothing in the opinion of the committee would 

 tend more to settle these questions, which must be 

 determined by experience, than an interchange of 

 the opinions and accounts of the practices of sci- 

 entific and experienced agriculturists, which a com- 

 petition for these premiums would jiroduce. 



Although the committee entertain these views 

 of the subject, they cannot but feel a discourage- 

 ment from the want of interest the public api)car to 

 take in it, which certainly ought to lessen thiir con- 

 fidence in its practicability, if not its utility. They 

 however venture to recommend the continuance 

 of a bounty for this object, for one year more; 

 provided the trustees shall think themselves justi 

 fied in raising the premiums to an amount, that 

 will liberally indemnify the successful candidates 

 for all the trouble and expense of taking the -par- 

 ticular account required, and be considered an 

 honorable mark of distinction to an intelligent 

 practical agriculturist. 



The Rev. Morrill Allen, of Pendjroke, has claim- 

 ed a premium for his farm of about seventy acres 

 in that town. His statement, the committee think 

 shows him to be a scientific and judicious cultiva- 

 tor. He states, that he had no ca]>ital, and, in sea- 

 men's phrase, " was obliged to work his passage ;" 

 and it appears that he began with purchasing small 

 parcels of land, one after another, gradually sub- 

 duing the Bushes, and inclosing them with walls, 

 and then proceeded to improve the soil. Part of 

 the land consisted of old fields, which had been 

 exhausted by tilling without manure. These he 

 renewed principally by the incorporation of earths 

 of different qualities; the cold and tenacious soils 

 he dressed with silicioiis earths, and other materi- 

 als that tended to open and warm them ; and sandy 

 soils he dressed with clay and swamp nmd, and 

 alluvions in wliich sand formed the chief jiart. — 

 The committee think Mr Allen has shown judg- 

 ment and discrimination in the mixture of earths, 

 and making compost manures adapted to the qual- 

 ity of the soils to which they were to be applied, 

 that is worthy of notice and imitation. It will be 

 seen by Mr Allen's statement, that he makes yeatly 

 from 300 to 500 loads of compost manure, by car- 

 rying earths, swamp mud, and vegetables, into his 

 bani-yards, and adapting the mixture to the soils 

 it is intended for. This is rather a large quantity 

 for the land he cultivates, and accounts for his crops 



of grass on land once exhausted. Last year he 

 ])hinted seven acres of Indian corn, three loamy 

 and four sandy soil, and in one acre of the latter, 

 six'cords of coi}q)Ost manure, and in another six 

 ks of lime were spread, but he omits to state 

 the quantities jiroduced on these ])articidar acres. 

 No manure was laid on the other five acres, and 

 the whole produced two hundred and ninetyeight 

 bushels, which may be considered a fair crop for 

 the quantity of manure used. Mr Allen's rotation 

 of crops is simple. He tills nine acres, which he 

 plants alternately with corn or rye, and once iu 

 five or six years plants with potatoes, or beans, or 

 some other vegetables, which he thinks makes a 

 favorable change from his common course ; but 

 here again he omits the quantity of manure used. 

 His practice, he says, is, as soon as he has taken 

 off the crop of rye, in August, to plough in the 

 stubble and sow grass seed, which produces her- 

 bage that he afterwards jilouglis in as a green 

 dressing. Tins practice the connnittee take upon 

 themselves to recommend, convinced that the 

 farmer would find his labor and expense amply 

 compensated, by its mellowing and enriching his 

 land, and saving his manure, the most precious ar- 

 ticle on his farm. The committee regret that Mr 

 Allen has not slated when he sowed his rye, wheth- 

 er in the spring or fall. It has, they believe, gen- 

 erally been thought, that in common seasons In- 

 dian corn would not be ripe for gathering in sea- 

 sou to sow winter rye. If this can be effected by 

 planting early, or using corn that ripens early 

 and yields well, it might often be found a conven- 

 ient and advantageous succession of crops. — 

 Spring rye is by many not thought so certain a 

 crop ; hut on this question a more extensive know- 

 ledge of the practice and experience of success- 

 ful farmers is wanted. Mr A. has also omitted the 

 quantity of rye prqduced in this rotation of crops; 

 but he tells us that in laying down his tilled land, 

 he prefers sowing his grass seed alone in the month 

 of August, that September will answer better than 

 cither of the spring months, and that it is better to 

 sow it with winter rye than with any spring grain. 

 His clayey soils, not suitable for grain, he some- 

 times turns over with a i)lough inmiediately after 

 the grass is cut, rolls down the furrows, and puts 

 on a <lressing of manure and seed again. In this 

 way, hay is his ])rincipal crop ; and it appears, 

 that upon twenty acres which had been ploughed 

 and laid down, and twelve acres of meadow and 

 irrigated land, he usually cuts, according to his es- 

 timate, ihirtythree and three quarters tons of Eng- 

 lish hay of first quality, ten tons of second qualit)', 

 and fourteen and one third tons of inferior hay, 

 making about fiftyeight tons, better than one 

 ton and a half to an acre, and over a ton of 

 the first quality to an acre. The committee regret 

 Mr Allen did not receive the trustees' notification 

 in season to ascertain the quantity of hay made this 

 year, as he put it into liis barns. The estimate 

 furnished is one made in 1827, when the hay was 

 in the barn ; and he says his crops have varied 

 but little for four or five years past. Mr A. sella 

 from ten to fifteen tons of hny annually, and keeps 

 but a small dairy. Mr Allen states, that forty 

 acres of his land are of a light sandy soil, and so 

 much exhausted by tilling without manure, that lie 

 was discouraged from attempting to recover it in 

 his usual way, and that last S|)ring lie ploughed 

 three acres, fenced it in, and sowed it with locust 

 seed, which have come up and look well, and he 

 expects, if the worm should spare them, they will 



