70 



Draining, No. 2. 



Vol. ir. 



poverish it. Next to leached ashes, he con- 

 siders lime the best manure for land." Mr. 

 Stimson's course of farming is as follows: 

 1st year, wheat, manured; 2d, corn, plast- 

 ered; 3J, flax, rye, or barley; 4th, clover 

 and herdsgrass; 5th, clover and herdsgrass; 

 6th, pasture; then manure as above and 

 wheat. 



In no part of the United States has agricul- 

 ture and horticulture reached a greater de- 

 gree of perfection than on some parts of 

 Long Island ; and this conversion of sandy 

 plains into the most fertile of soils is, by those 

 who are acquainted with the history of that 

 region, attributed mainly to leached ashes, 

 purchased at New York and the various land- 

 ings on the North River. Dr. Williams 

 says, the favor with which thi^y are viewed 

 there is the result of experience, and adds, 

 "I know of many thousand acres on the Is 

 land which were once too poor to produce 

 even mulleins and rib-grass, which now cut 

 from one and a half to two tons of clover hay 

 per acre, and this has all been done by buy- 

 ing leached ashes at from twenty to thirty- 

 two shillings per fourteen bushels, and cart- 

 hig them from one to ten miles. I therefore 

 conclude that leached ashes are a good ma- 

 nure, and if properly applied will be invalua- 

 ble even in Western New York." In a va- 

 luable paper on this subject by E. L. Homme- 

 dieu, published in the N. Y. Ag. So. Trans., 

 he says: "That ashes are found best to suc- 

 ceed on dry loamy lands, or loam mixed with 

 sand. It is here considered as the cheapest 

 manure that can be procured. Ten loads of 

 this manure on poor lands, will produce or- 

 dinarily twenty-five bushels of wheat, the 

 value of which exceeds by five dollars the 

 expense of the manure, and the five dollars 

 pays for the expense of labor in the crop 

 The land is then left in a state for yielding a 

 crop of hay of between two and two and a 

 half tons per acre, which it will continue to 

 do for a great number of years. No manure 

 continues so long in the ground as ashes." 



We think the opinions and experience of 

 the eminent farmers we have given above, 

 abundantly sufficient to establish the fact of 

 the value of leached ashes as a manure, and 

 also incidentally to illustrate the kind of soil 

 on which it is most effective ; and we trust 

 the attention of farmers favorably situated 

 for its use, or on farms which may require its 

 application, will make a thorough experiment 

 of its effects in the interior, and report the re- 

 sult. It has we believe been hinted, that as 

 nature is made up of a system of balances, 

 and as gypsum is found to be nearly value- 

 less on the sea coast, while it is all important 

 in the country, so ashes may be effective on 

 the coast, owing to the combinations effected 

 by the salts contained in them and those of 



the sea air, while from this cause in the in- 

 terior they must of course be inert; but this 

 reasoning will most probably be found entire- 

 ly incorrect. 



! One principal reason why leached ashes 

 are so valuable as a manure appears to have 

 been mostly overlooked, and that is, the quan- 

 tity of lime they contain. This substance is 

 placed in considerable quantities at the bot- 

 tom of the vats or leaches in all asheries, to 

 facilitate the labor of working, and is thrown 

 out with the ashes. This fact, taken in con- 

 nection with the one that a Inrge portion of 

 alkaline matter must remain in all ashes after 

 leaching, accounts for the benefit they rendej) 

 to wet sour soils, by neutralizing such acid, 

 and promoting the decomposition of vegetable 

 matter, which in such earths always proceeds 

 slowly, while at the same time they prevent 

 adhesion in the soil, and enable the roots of 

 plants to seek their sustenance freely. On 

 light sandy soils they give consistency, and 

 by the existing action of their still abundant 

 sails effectually promote vegetation. 



The best mode of application appears to 

 be, to mix it witii the surface of the earth, 

 where it will be slightly covered by the ope- 

 rationsof sowing or planting. A Pennsylvania 

 correspondent of this paper says: "I put a 

 small handful of unleached ashes into each 

 hill of corn at the time of planting, and I 

 think this way better than to put it on the 

 hill after the corn has come up. Leached 

 ashes tor this purpose are not worth as much 

 as unleached, yet with the latter, the corn 

 was far better than in that part of the field 

 where no ashes was applied." A writer in 

 an eastern journal affirms from his own ex- 

 perience, that a bushel of ashes is worth as 

 much to tlie farmer as a bushel of corn, and 

 advises his brethren to apply their ashes to 

 their corn, flax, or grass, in preference to 

 selling them at eight or ten cents per bushel. 

 — Gen, Far. 



Draining, No. 2> 



Some of the richest land is formed of allu- 

 vial deposites in the bottom of valleys. Its 

 consistence is sofextremely fine and compact, 

 that water is very slowly imbibed by it: hence 

 in a wet time, or even after a heavy shower, 

 the turf becomes like a sponge; and the sur- 

 face having little or no declination, the water 

 rests longer upon it than is suitable for the 

 o-rass, for'the cattle that feed upon it, or for 

 Those who breathe the vapors rising from it. 

 Add to this that, when in this sloppy state, 

 heavy cattle poach itsadly— breaking the turf, 

 and filling it with stoppings and holes, which 

 becomes so many pools of unwholesome water. 

 If sheep are put on such land in autumn, it 

 will "•0 far to rot them; in a showery time, it 



