THE FAR 



AND 



AMERICAN HERD-BOOK, 



DEVOTED TO 

 AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, AND RURAL AND DOMESTIC AFFAIRS. 



" The Productions of the Earth will always be in proportion to the culture bestowed upon it." 

 Vol. v.— No. 3.] 10th mo. (October,) 15th, 1840. [Whole No. 09. 



KIMBER & SHARPIiESS, 



PROPRIETORS AND PUBLISHERS, 



No. 50 North Fourth Street, 



PHILADELPHIA. 

 Price one dollar per year.— For conditions see last page. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 On Steeping Seed-Wheat. 



Sir, — The opinions of agriculturists on 

 this subject, are remarkably divided. While 

 some believe that, without it, a farmer has 

 not, and ought not to have, a chance of avoid- 

 ing smut in the year to come, anotlier nume- 

 rous and respectable portion of cultivators 

 believe nothing about it. Amongst the former 

 of these is Jelhro Tull, while the latter boasts 

 of John Lawrance, the author of the ISiew 

 Farmer's Calender ; and from these works I 

 would wish to make a few extracts, for the 

 consideration of those, who will so soon be 

 called upon to make their choice, " for weal 

 or for woe." 



Tull informs us, there are but two reme- 

 dies proposed, brining and a change of seed : 

 that brining, to prevent smuttiness in wheat, 

 was accidentally discovered about 180 years 

 ago, in the following manner. A ship, loaded 

 with wheat, was sunk near Bristol (England) 

 in the autumn, and afterwards, at low tide, 

 the cargo was all taken up, after it had soaked 

 many days in salt water; but, it being unfit 

 for making bread, a farmer sowed some, and 

 it was found to grow well ; the whole cargo 

 was, therefore, bought by the farmers at a 

 low price, and it was sown in different places. 

 At the following harvest, all the wheat in 

 England was smutty except the crops that 

 were raised from this brined seed, and that 

 was perfectly free from it ; and this accident 

 has been sufficient (he adds) to justify the 

 practice of brining seed ever since, in all the 

 adjacent parts, and in most other parts of 

 England. And he goes on to say, I knew 

 two farmers, whose lands lay intermixed, and 

 who bought the same seed together, from a 

 very good change of land, and separated 

 every load between them in the field ; one 

 of them, believing brining to be a mere 

 fancy, sowed his seed without; the other 

 brined his seed, and had not a smutty ear in 



Cab.--Voi,. v.— No. 3. 



his crop, while the other's crop was very 

 smutty ! He adds, if seed-wheat be soaked 

 in brine, it will not grow ; or if it be only 

 sprinkled with it, most of it will die, unless 

 it be planted immediately. He advises, to 

 sifl quicklime on the wheat while it is wet- 

 ted with strong salt-water, or brine, to dry 

 it, which confines the brine to the surface of 

 the grain, and suffers none of the salt to be 

 exhaled by the air.* 



But, after saying all this, he adds, smutty 

 seed-wheat, although brined, will produce a 

 smutty crop, unless the year prove very fa- 

 vourable, for it is to be known, that favourable 

 years will cure the smut, as unkind ones will 

 cause it, else, before brining was used, and 

 the bad seasons had caused all tiie wheat in 

 England to be smutty, they must have brought 

 all their seed from foreign countries, or never 

 more have had clean wheat ; therefore it is 

 certain that kind years will cure the smut ; 

 and it is, therefore, to prevent the injury of a 

 bad year that we brine and plant clean seed. 

 At the same time, he adds, " of the two reme- 

 dies against smut, some think a proper change 

 of seed the most certain ; and one informs 

 me, that since he has discovered a place that 

 affords a proper change of seed for his land, 

 he has never had a smutty ear in his crop, 

 altJiough he never limes or brines ; and this 

 gives a suspicion, that the drowned wheat, 

 being foreign, probably would have given a 

 clean crop the next year, although it had not 

 been soaked in salt-water : so that the wheat 

 sown by the two farmers before mentioned, 

 might have been from a good change of land, 

 but the seed, not being changed the preceding 

 year, might be no more infected than what 

 the brine and lime did cure." 



Now, all this is not very clear at this time 

 of day, it must be confessed; but to this 

 might be added the testimony of thousands 

 of limers and briners, who have demonstrated, 

 through a long life, the absolute necessity 

 for both brining and liming ; and we are left 

 to wonder, that the complaints of smut in an 

 unkind year are still as prevalent as ever,, 

 even after the most explicit directions have 

 been followed out, and not an iota of the cere- 

 mony neglected. 



* He ought to have known, that no part of thaaalt 

 will evaporate by exposure. 



(81) 



