THE GENESEE FARMER. 



299 



iturity of the crop, we would recommend to 

 >w as much or more clover than at present, and 

 toad of plowing it under to convert the or- 

 lized carbonaceous matter into beef, mutton, 

 jese, butter, wool, &c., and to return theammo- 

 i to the soil in the form of manure. 

 •'■ We can not bring ourselves to believe for a 

 mient that we shall have to give up wheat cul- 

 •e in Western New York. Our soil and climate 

 ) exceedingly favorable to the production of 

 leat. There is no ietter wheat soil in the world, 

 i but very little in this or any other country 

 it is as good. In fact, the soil wliich is natu- 

 ly adapted to wheat is comparatively limited 

 this continent. This fact is an additional reason 

 ly the farmers of Western New York should not 

 mdon wheat culture without an earnest effort to 

 cover some method of counteracting, or at least 

 tigating, the ravages of the midge. 

 ' While nearly all the soil of Western New York 

 ivell adapted to wheat culture, there are on every 

 ra some fields that are more suitable for wheat 

 m others. We must confine the cultivation of 

 eat to such land. Let the portion of the farm 

 st favorable to wheat be cultivated with those 

 >ps which, when consumed on the farm, furnish 

 I most valuable manure. Let this be used to en- 

 h the soil for wheat. In short, sow early va- 

 ties of wheat on the best portions of the farm, 

 derdrain, adopt a judicious system of manuring, 

 :1 our word for it, wheat culture Avill not have 

 be abandoned in Western New Y''ork." 



rhis was written in January, 1857, at a tinae 

 len it was not popular to encourage farmers in 

 iir attempts to raise wheat. It was thought 

 it if everybody would give up wheat growing 

 • a few years, the midge would be starved out. 

 rhaps it would. But we should have starved 

 ) ; and the midge would have returned when we 

 urned to wheat culture. Wherever wheat is 

 )wn, there you will find the midge. In a new 

 antry we escape for a few years, but it is not 

 ig in making its appearance. In 1812-13-14 in 

 otland it destroyed millions of bushels of wheat, 

 d several years ago Prof. Henslow stated that 

 i midge in England did much more damage than 

 e farmers had any idea of. I suppose the crop 

 wheat is so good that they do not miss a few 

 sliels per acre ! 



I shall be told that the midge and the Hessian 

 drove wheat from New England. I very much 

 ubt it. New England never was a good wheat 

 ?ion — and it never will he. It was you — the 

 mers of the "Genesee Country" — and not the 

 dge that forced the farmers of New England and 

 the eastern counties of this State to abandon 

 i cultivation of wheat. In a word, you could 

 se it cheaper than they could. It is just so now.i 

 ! good wheat can be raised in New England to- 

 y as when the first Pilgrim landed on Plymouth 



Rock. I have, witliin the last two or three years, 

 seen as good wlieat raised in Connecticut and New 

 Hampshire as I ever saw in this State. But it 

 won't pay. Wheat can be brought from the West 

 cheaper than it can be raised in the East. This com- 

 petition with the W^est has more to do in molding 

 the character of our agriculture than is generally be- 

 lieved. We feel it here, and we are destined to 

 feel it still more. I do not fear competition with 

 the West in growing wheat. Our soil is better 

 adapted to wheat than most of the land in the 

 West, and the freight is, to a certain extent, equiva- 

 lent to a- protective duty. It is not in the produc- 

 tion of grain, but in the production of beef, pork, 

 mutton and wool that the West has the advantage 

 of us. I know this is contrary to the generally 

 received opinion, but as long as the Atlantic cities 

 continue to bo the great markets of the country, 

 so long will it be cheaper to send beef, pork, mut- 

 ton and wool to these markets than wheat and 

 corn, for the simple reason that the freight on a 

 hundred dollars' worth of these, articles is much 

 less than on a hundred dollars' worth of wheat 

 and corn. It costs the Western farmer much less 

 to send five pounds of pork to New York than to 

 send the sixty pounds of corn from which this 

 pork is produced. And so it is in regard to beef, 

 and mutton,, and wool. We shall be obliged to 

 submit to a much keener competition in the pro- 

 duction of these articles than in the production of 

 wheat, corn, oats, barley and other bulky articles 

 on which the freight from Iowa amounts to five or 

 six times as much as the farmers there receive for 

 them. 



It behooves us to look this matter squarely in 

 the face. Some gentlemen with whom I have con- 

 versed on the subject, say we can raise beef, and 

 mutton, and pork, and wool as cheap as they can 

 at the West because we understand the matter bet- 

 ter, and because we have better barns and better 

 breeds, and give our cattle and sheep better care. 

 There may be some troth in this at the present 

 time. But the farmers of the West are by no 

 means deficient in enterprize and intelligence, and 

 the fact remains that it costs them much less to 

 send meat and wool to market than it does grain — 

 and they will adopt that system which is most 

 profitable. 



We can compete with them in the production 

 of grain, but to produce grain we want manure, 

 and to make manure we must keep stock. I do 

 'not say we can not compete with them in stock; 

 , but certain I am that so long as the Eastern cities 



