THE GENESEE FARMER. 



14T 



THOUGHTS BY THE WAYSIDE. 



"When I see a mass of chips accumulate in a 

 farmer's back yard, remaining year after year, 

 thinks I to myself, if the coarser ones were raked 

 out, they would serve for fuel, while the finer 

 parts, with the addition of soap suds, etc., from 

 the house, would afibrd a valuable source of 

 manure. 



"When I see the banks of manure resting against 

 a barn in the summer season, serving only to rot 

 the building, thinks I to myself, that manure might 

 be employed. 



When I see plowing done year after year in the 

 same track by the side of a fence, forming a gully 

 or bank of considerable height, and of course a cor- 

 responding leanness in the interior of the field, 

 thinks I to myself, there is a great want of good 

 husbandry. 



When I see fruit trees loaded with twice the top 

 necessary for bearing well, and this perhaps partly 

 dead, thereby keeping the needed rays of the sun 

 from the under crop, thinks I to myself, here is an 

 indication of bad husbandry. 



When I see stones piled round the trunk of a 

 fruit tree, thinks I to myself, here is an invitation 

 to suckers and to mice ; and if dull scythes should 

 follow, it would not be strange. 



When I see a total failure of a crop of Indian 

 corn, thinks I to myself, if that man had bestowed 

 all the manure and two-thirds of the labor on half 

 the ground, he would have had a fair crop. 



When I see a farmer selling his ashes for ten 

 cents per bushel, thinks I to myself, he had better 

 have given the purchaser fifty cents to leave it for 

 his corn and other grain. j. t. sergeant. 



Sergeanttville, IT. J. 



SOIL ANALYSES. 



Editoes Genesee Farmer: — I am truly glad to 

 find in your February number a moderate portion 

 of common sense^ mingled with scientific speculation, 

 on the " analyses of soils." I have neitlier the skill 

 nor the patience to pursue the sub-division of mat- 

 ter to the milliontJi part of a grain^ as some pretend 

 to have done; and if I had, I have no confidence in 

 any benefit to arise from such experiments. When 

 I take into view the absolute impossibility of select- 

 ing a small parcel of the soil of a field, that shall 

 Indicate correctly the productive powers of the 

 field, and the many casualties incident to any such 

 experiment, I am satisfied that but little reliance 

 can be placed upon them. I would not discourage 

 any rational attempt at scientific improvement, but 

 when such attempts are forced beyond the limits of 

 propriety, as has sometimes been done, by Messrs. 

 Lee and others, the reaction is tremendous. 



iSc> Banvers, 3fas8., April, 1S5S. JOHN. W. PEOCTOE. 



Lice on Calves. — I think that lice on calves are 

 much like ticks on sheep. If Mr. Avery would 

 give his calves plenty of good hay, corn and oats, 

 good water, and warm and comfortable quarters 

 during the winter, he would not have any use for 

 oil to drive ofi" lice in the spring, not saying but flax 

 seed would be very good feed for them. But I 

 never knew an animal in good condition that was 

 lousy. A. HoosiEE. — Mt. Jefferson^ Ind. 



ADVANTAGES OF MOWING MACHINES. 



Editors Genesee Farmer : — In reading the long 

 letter of E. A. Bundt, of Oxford, N. Y., (see Gen- 

 esee Farmer, page 115,) I came to the conclusion 

 that it was such absurd nonsense, that it required 

 no answering ; but on showing it to several of my 



neighbors, they say " the man must be a , or 



interested in the manufacture of scythes," and 

 "that it ought to be answered by all means." My 

 own opinion is that if you, Messrs. Editors, did not 

 occasionally like a spicy argument; you would not 

 have published such a long rigmarole. Still, we 

 farmers here may all know little about the fiirmers 

 around Oxford, Chenango Coimty. Perhaps their 

 carelessiless and bad habits may incapaciate them 

 for using horses in mowing. Men that can not go 

 to the village without " talking long and loud, and 

 getting down before they get home," are not com- 

 petent to use even scythes. It also may be true 

 that the introduction of labor saving machines, ir; 

 the town of Oxford, Chenango County, may be the 

 cause of an unwonted degree of idleness. If such 

 is the case, they have got the labor-saving mow- 

 ing machines before they were fully prepared for 

 them. It shows the people need reforming or edu- 

 cating, before they can appreciate the value of a 

 mowing machine. And it is just like men that can 

 not come home from the tillage without getting 

 down, "to talk long and loud about it, or pitch it 

 into the road." I wonder if Mr. B, had not just 

 come from the village when he penned that letter. 

 Thanks to the Temperance cause, we have no such 

 farmers here. Mr. B. might as well try and con- 

 vince the farmers in this part of the country to use 

 spades in place of plows, as to get them to "pitch 

 their machines into the street" and go back to their 

 scythes ; or to take their grain to Albany or New 

 York by wagons, in place of boats-; or to take their 

 own horses to go a journey, when they can travel 

 on railroads at about one-third the expense, as to 

 try to make them give up mowing machines. The 

 revolving Horse-rakes, Reaping Machines, Thrash- 

 ing Machines, and Mowing Machines, are farm ' 

 implements that are destined to be in use until 

 time shall be no longer, let Mr. B. and the Che- 

 nango farmers write what they may. One of the 

 best farmers in Oneida County was with me when 

 I received the Farmer with Mr. B.'s article in it. 

 I showed it to him. He said he had used a mower 

 some years, and if he could not get another, he 

 would not sell it at any price. He has a son not - 

 yet sixteen years of age, and for the last two years 

 that son, and one pair of horses and mower, has. cut 

 from 80 to 100 tons of hay yearly. There is no use 

 of my going into a calculation, to show the saviiog 

 of cutting by machines. As ajnacliine cuts and 

 spreads atthe same time, in heavy grass, yoii can. 

 cut and spread by a machine nearly as cheap as- 

 you can spread it by hand labor. 



We put our mowing and reaping machines under 

 cover here, and I have known some farmers so 

 careful, that they would bring them home every 

 night, lest there might be a loafer that had stopped 

 " late at the village talking ]ong and loud," and out 

 of spite break the mowing machine. 

 Near Gmeva, N. Y. JOHN JOHNSTON. 



This is rather severe ; but friend Bundy is able 

 to defend himself. 



