Vol. VIII.— No. 6. 



AND HORTICULTURAL JOURNAL. 



43 



ihlili 



\y 



'Oke of oxen should follow the plough, as soon 

 .s may be convenient; this will smooth any nu- 

 venness of surface. Set the furrow slices close 

 Dgetlier, anil tfiereby jtrevent their being torn up 

 'y the harrow, and also prevent the escape of the 

 asses that are thrown out ])y fermentation. Eve- 

 farmer, who has three acres of ground to till, 

 hould have a roller. One made in two parts is 

 inch preferable to that made hi the usual way. 

 kftcr rolling, harrow with a light harrow — the 

 ■ lore the better, provided the sod be not disturbed, 

 ^he compost should then be spread oa and tlie 

 round again harrowed, when it will be ready to 

 eceive the seed, either corn or potatoes, or the 

 mall grains, with or without grass seed, or grass 

 eed alone. 

 The strength of team should be according to 

 'lie toughness of the sward, and the depth of 

 loughing. One good yoke of oxen and a horse, 

 hand to hold the plough, and another to drive, 

 vere all that I found requisite to perform my 

 vork. 



Howard's Plough, with a wrought u'on share 

 nd cast iron mould, I have found to be the best 

 or turning over greensward. It is the only kind 

 f plough, that I have seen, which turns the 

 iirrow flat, without breaking it ; and this circum- 

 tance is owing to the turn of the mould, and its 

 laving a share wide enough to cut just as wide a 

 lice as the mould will completely turn over. 



As to the number of lands, I would make as 



BVV as possible, as the more furrow lands a lot is 



livided into, the more vacant barren spaces will 



" le left, and the more labor required to fill them. 



" jo round the whole lot, and when finished, let 



he outside furrow slice be taken up, in pieces 



hat may be conveniently handled, put into a cart 



)r drag, and placed in the vacant space (occasion- 



' id by turning the furrows outward) in tiie middle 



md corners of thO lot. This will leave the whole 



iinoolh and level, prevent ridges at the sides and 



nds, and save the necessity of back furrows, 



,vhich would give an unevcnness of surface. 



Lexington, August, 1829. E. P. 



INSECT IN BARLEY. 



[Extract of a letter from the Hon. John Merrill, of 

 Newburyport, to the Ed,tor of the New England Farmer, 

 dated Aueust IG, 1829.] 



The Barley in this neighborhood has yielded a 

 irery small crop — mine not much more than the 

 seed sown, and perhaps not so much. The grain 

 was good, plump and heavy, and some of the heads 

 of good length, but generally very short. Since 

 cutting, I have discovered, as I suppose, the cause 

 of the failure. — Most of the stalks, generally in 

 the second joint, have a number of small worms ; 

 the stalk being punctured has become indurated, 

 and the circulation of the sap prevented, or great- 

 ly impeded. I send you a sample of the straw, 

 and my object in sending it is, that information 

 may be diffused for the benefit of that class of 

 persons who have the greatest interest in knowing 

 the facts. It may be well to be made acquainted 

 with the habits and character of the fly or insect 

 producing these worms, but the most important 

 point to be determined, is, whether the evil is 

 more likely to continue another year, on account 

 of the propagation of the worms tbia season, 

 and whether their ravages may be prevented. 



TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



ON RIPENING CURRANTS. 

 Sir — May I be permitted to say one word as 

 to the common currant ? It is so common a fruit, 



that every man will smile, when any one proposes 

 to say any thing new about it. Yet I say fearless- 

 ly, that the common currant is less known, than 

 any other fruit ; and that it is always eaten un- 

 ript — that the whole croj) is gone before one 

 herrij is ripe. I have now 50 plants full of ripe 

 currants, and they are a delicious fruit. I am 

 not alone in my opinion. In England, they cover 

 their currant bushes with bunting, and preserve 

 them till October. I have excellent currants in 

 September, and they come when no other berries 

 exist — and they come too, at the period of autum- 

 nal diseases, and your physicians will tell yon 

 that their ripened acid is perhaps the best preser- 

 vative, as well as one of the best remedies in the 

 decline of a disease, and in the approaches to a 

 sounder state of health. J. LOWELL. 



I am induced to give my own name, in these 

 little hints, because we are all pleased to kuow 

 the authority for any opinion, and perhaps the 

 experience of thirty years may be deemed of 

 some little value. These hints may induce others 

 to set aside one portion of their bushes untouched 

 until every currant shall have disappeared from 

 the market. IIow much superior would the wine 

 be from September, or the last of August fruit. 



Roxbury, August 25, 1829. 



FOR THE NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



THE THOMERRY MODE OF PRUNING 

 GRAPES. 



Mr Editok — It seems that the London Horti- 

 cultural Society have introduced into the last 

 number of their Transactions a full account of 

 the Thomerry method of treating grapes — and 

 Mr Loudon lias copied it into his last number of 

 the Gardener's Magazine with praise. He says, 

 " we consider this paper an important one ; indeed, 

 ''i//'"" fhc best, that has yet appeared in this vol- 

 ume of their Transactions. We would recom- 

 mend the young gardener to study it in connec- 

 tion with the method of culture in the Gardener's 

 Magazine, vol. 3, p. 145. In nine cases out of 

 ten the unfruilfulncss of wall trees in this country 

 is owing to the too great depth and richness of the 

 borders, and the continual cropping and digging 

 of their surfaces." — Loudon's Gardener's Maga- 

 zine, for June, 1829. 



Figures are given by Loudon of the Thomerry 

 mode of training, which grove, that Mr Dean's 

 sketches, left at the New England Farmer office, 

 were correct. It is some satisfaction to perceive 

 that the English cultivators, appreciate, as highly 

 as we did, the Thomerry practice. If we are 

 ever to raise the European grapes freely in our 

 country, it must be by short pruning, for if in 

 France, (that favored country of the vine,) such 

 a method has been found best, it must be more 

 necessary in one, where the foreign grape ripens 

 with so much difficulty. Let it not be said, that 

 some gentlemen ripen grapes easily on the old 

 plans ; we all know, that these are exceptions, 

 due to personal skill and science, and not applica- 

 ble to general culture. Mr Dean is entitled to 

 the credit of appreciating this mode of culture, 

 two years before it was noticed in England ; and 

 it was on his suggestion, that I published it. 



J. LOWELL. 



N. B. It is a striking proof of the increased 

 attention to Horticulture, that we are able in Au- 

 gust to lay before the public, articles published in 

 London in the June preceding. J. L. 



Roxbury, August 25, 1829. 



ON IMPROVING VARIETIES OP FRUITS. 



M. Poiteau, a writer in the Annals of the Paris 

 Horticultural Society observes in substance, that 

 it is but rarely that improved varieties of our na- 

 tive fruits originate with nursery-men ; they are 

 generally the productions of chance, found in the 

 woods or hedges, from distant corners of provin- 

 ces, where the finer sorts are hardly known, and 

 where the sorts they have are mismanaged or 

 neglected. That " like begets or produces like" 

 has long been considered as a law of nature 

 among animals and some vegetables ; but this 

 law is not always uniform, especially among do- 

 mesticated animals or highly cultivated jilants. 

 Yet, on this princijile, our nursery-men have acted 

 in their endeavors to obtain better kinds of fruit, 

 by sowing seed of the best, in the hope that they 

 would raise something still better. It is well 

 known that in this process they have failed. The 

 celebrated Duhamcl and his cotemporaries fliiled 

 in the same way. From these and other instan- 

 ces, the author concludes that ])ractitioners are 

 wrong in their expectations of obtaining at once, 

 what can only be the result of time. He seems 

 to infer that seedlings, apples or pears, for exam- 

 ple, require some years, and some cultivation, 

 while they are passing from one stage of their 

 infancy to another, before they can show their in- 

 herent quahtics. 



After noticing the fact proved by Mr Knight, 

 P. H. S., thirt a crab, fecundated by the pollen of 

 a good fruit, produces better kinds from seeds 

 than can be had from seeds of improved fruit, he 

 proceeds to describe the method pursued by the 

 Flemish orchardists, td obtain new sorts, and 

 which is given on the authority of M. Van Mons. 

 The Belgians, he says, do not prefer the seeds of 

 ameliorated fruit. When the seedlings appear, 

 they do not, as others do, choose such only as are 

 free from spines, having large leaves, and remark- 

 able for the thickness and beauty of their wood ; 

 but on the contrary, such as are most spinous, 

 provided the spines are long, and well furnished 

 with buds or eyes, placed near together. This 

 last circumstance they consider as an indication 

 that they will soon show fruit. Individuals hav- 

 ing such properties are grafted, apples on para- 

 dise, and pears on quince, stocks, to hasten fructi- 

 fication. The first fruits of these grafts are gen- 

 erally bad ; but whatever they are, the seeds are 

 carefully saved and sowed. The second genera- 

 tion, treated in hke manner, begins to show im- 

 provement. Through a third and fourth, the 

 process is continued, till they arrive at a point, 

 which gives fruit worthy of being preserved. 

 Peaches and apricots, treated in the same way, 

 yield excellent fruit the third generation ; apples 

 require four or five, and the pear about six transi- 

 tions. 



PRESERVIN© SWEET POTATOES. 



At a meeting of the Horticultural Society of 

 Paris, M. Loiseleur-Deslongchamps, stated, and 

 the fact was confirmed by M. Lacroix, that ex- 

 posing the tubers of the sweet potato to a dry 

 air, like fruit in a fruit room, had succeeded bet., 

 ter in preserving them than any other method. 



OIL FROM THE SUNFLOWER. 

 A very delicate oil, much used in Russian cook- 

 ery, is expressed from the seeds of the sunflower, 

 and is prepared by enclosing them in bags, and 

 steeping them in warm water, after which the oil 

 is expressed.; this is actually as sweet as butter. 



