46 FLORIDA: ITS SOIL, CLIMATE, AND PRODUCTIONS, 



November or as late as April have been known only at intervals of 

 years. 



With the protection against competition with foreign cheap labor 

 now afforded by the government, sugar will speedily become one of the 

 commanding industries of Southern Florida especially, and a source of 

 immense wealth to the State. 



Dr. Westcott, president of the Madison County Agricultural Society, 

 in 1870, gave the following on the subject of cane culture: 



It takes about the same labor to cultivate a sugar-cane crop as it does for com. For 

 a farmer not cultivating more than 5 or 10 acres of cane, the expense of an iron mill, 

 boilers and brickwork, house or shed, &c., Avould not cost to exceed $400. To manu- 

 facture 10 acres of cane would require the work of six men forty days; one pair of mules, 

 horses, or oxen at the mill, and another pair to haul the cane from the field. The 

 profits of 10 acres planted in cane, from actual experiment, omitting capital required 

 for boilers, mill, troughs for crystallizing, houses for draining, teams, &c,, are as follows : 



DR. 



Ten days' work of team to break up laud, at $1.50 per day f $15 00 



24,000 seed cane, at $10 per M 240 (0 



Fifteen days' work planting, at $1 15 00 



Ten days' work with hoe 10 00 



Fifteen days' work with cul ti vators and plows 22 50 



>Six men 40 days, equal to 240 days' work, manufacturing, at $1 240 00 



Two pair oxen 40 days, at $3 per day 120 00 



Barrels, &c 60 50 



723 00 

 CR. 



!By 3,700 pounds sugar per acre, 37,000 pounds, at 10 cents 3,700 00 



Showing a net profit of 2, 977 00 



It is no uncommon thing to produce, by proper fertilizing, 2,000 pounds of sugar 

 and 170 or 200 gallons of sirup, equal to 1,700 pounds of sugar, or a total of 3,700 

 pounds of sugar, of a superior quality, per acre. 



Sugar requires natural strong laud, or well-manured light land, the 

 latter making a better quality of sugar. By properly manuring the 

 ratoon, or cane springing up from the root, after the first crop from 

 planting, it will yield nearly the same product for two or three years; 

 after that time experience teaches it is best to remove the roots to other 

 ground. It will be observed that after the first planting there is no 

 more expense for seed cane. 



COTTON. 



Sea-island or long cotton is raised mostly from the Suwannee Eiver 

 to the ocean, and south of latitude 30. The average product per acre 

 is from 150 to 200 pounds, though it often exceeds double that. This 

 species of cotton is only raised on the sea islands -bordering South Car- 

 olina, Georgia, and in Florida, our State raising over half the total crop. 

 'The price ranges from 25 to 50 cents per pound, though there are planters 



