THE GENESEE FARMER. 



365 



quality of their barley. Malsters too frequently 

 pay as much for poor barley as for good, and the 

 consequence is the quality of the crop, instead of 

 improving, has actually deteriorated. We believe 

 our barley to-day is not as good as it was fifteen 

 years ago. 



Malsters and brewers are now beginning, how- 

 ever, to discover the importance of using good 

 barley. There can be little doubt that one reason 

 of the superior quality of English ale is owing to 

 the excellence of the barley used for malting, and we 

 hazard little in saying that the time is not far dis- 

 tant when good barley, weight for weight, will 

 command a much higher price than inferior 

 samples. 



GRINDING CORN IN THE COB. 



"Will it pay to grind corn in the cob?" 



To answer this question intelligently it will be 

 necessary, first, to ascertain what the cobs are 

 worth as food ; and secondly, how much it costs to 

 grind them. 



From the only analysis we have ever seen of 

 corn cobs— that of Dr. Salisbury — we should say 

 cobs, when ground, are worth about as much as 

 good wheat straw. 



What it is worth to grind them we do not know, 

 but the millers in this city charge four cents for 

 grinding a bushel of ears of corn, and five cents 

 for grinding a bushel of shelled corn. ■ 



Estimating that two bushels of ears, weighing 

 80 lbs., will yield a bushel of shelled corn, weigh- 

 ing 60 lbs., we have in the two bushels of ears 20 

 lbs. of cobs. Now to grind this 60 lbs. of corn 

 and 20 lbs. of cobs (two bushels of ears), costs 8 

 cents, while to grind the 60 lbs. of shelled corn 

 alone costs 5 cents ; so it costs 3 cents to grind 20 

 lbs. of. cobs. This is equal to $3.00 per ton : in 

 other words, the ground cobs cost $3.00 per ton. 



If, however, we estimate that it costs a cent a 

 bushel to shell the corn, the ground cobs would 

 only cost us two dollars per ton. 



Hay and all kinds of fodder are very high, and 

 it would seem that the cobs should be worth $2.00 

 per ton. There are those, too, who think that 

 cobs mixed with the meal are an advantage over 

 and above the nutriment they afford. On the 

 whole, we think it will pay well in this section to 

 grind the corn in the cob. 



THE BOUND VOLUMES OF THE GENESEE FARMER.. 



Charles Beach, of Penn Yan, Yates county, 

 N. Y., has invented a flax-dressing machine of 

 much merit. 



Messrs. Editors : Seeing your offer in the 

 Genesee Farmer to send the last six volumes of 

 your paper u handsomely bound" for five dollars, 

 I concluded to invest. I received them in good 

 order, prepaid, by express. They more than came 

 up to my anticipations. There are no six volumes 

 in my library that afford me move satisfaction, 

 either to look at or examine. I have but one fault 

 to find: The volume for I860 is better bound than 

 the rest. Perhaps you thought this your premium 

 volume, and that it was entitled to a handsomer 

 dress! If this was your idea, I agree with you, 

 though I would have preferred to have had them 

 all bound precisely alike*. 



I have been examining this same volume for 

 1860, and am surprised at the amount of valuable 

 informal ion which it contains. The first article in 

 the book, on the "Nature and Value of Peat and 

 Muck," is admirable. Every farmer should know 

 what is there asserted on the authority of Prof. 

 Johnson, that "a well-made compost of two loads 

 of muck and one of stable manure is equal to three 

 loads of the manure itself." 



The next long article, on "Thomas Bates," the 

 great Shorthorn breeder, I read with much pleasure; 

 and though I do not feel very friendly toward 

 England just now, yet I could not help liking his 

 honest, farmer-like countenance. Give us more 

 lives and portraits of agricultural worthies. 



The next article, on "English Bacon," did not 

 specially interest me, as I am not acquainted with 

 the article. 



"Beans and Indian Corn for Milch Cows" are 

 next spoken of — doubtless very good food, but I 

 do not think it will pay to feed beans when they 

 are worth $2.25 per bushel. Do you ? [No.] 



The "Spirit of the Agricultural Press" is good — 

 as it always is. There is no part of the Farmer I 

 read with more pleasure. [Excuse me, Messrs. 

 Editors!] After this I skipped a number of short 

 articles, the horticultural department, editor's table 

 and advertisements, (by the way, would it not be 

 well to leave them out in binding?) and came to 

 the leader on "Bones as a Fertilizer," in the Feb- 

 ruary number, which is capital. 



Next we are told how the Hon. A. B. Dickinson 

 raised seventy-two bushels of barley per acre. This 

 was not pleasant to read about. (My crop was 

 only 18 bushels per acre this year!) 



On the next page I got a new idea: that heavy 

 oats, weight for weight, are worth more than light 

 oats. Such is, of course, the case, but it had not 

 occurred to me. 



Then I turned over a page or two, and came to 

 the " Genesee Farmer Prize Essays." We have 

 here nineteen prize essays on various subjects, evi- 

 dently written by practical men. These essays 

 alone are worth the price of the volume; but in 

 addition to them we have an immense amount of 

 information on all subjects interesting to the farmer 

 and gardener, and I can not but wish that every 

 farmer in the State had this volume of the Genesee 

 Farmer for 1860 in his library. It costs but a dol- 



* All the volumes are bound alike, except that the volume for 

 186 i has a purple-colored back. We think with you, however, 

 that it would have been better to have had them all of a uniform 

 color.— Eds. 



