"^^ERlCAN HERD-Bobli- 



DEVOTED TO 

 AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, AND RURAL AND DOMESTIC AFFAIRS. 



Perfect Agriculture is the true foundation of all trade and industry. — Liebio. 



Vol. IX — No. 9.] 



4th mo. (April) 15th, 1845. 



[Whole No. 123. 



PUBLISHED MONTHLY, 



BY J O^S I A H T A T U M, 



EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR, 



No. 50 North Fourth Street, 



PHILADELPHIA. 



Price one dollar per year. — Forconditions see last page. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 The Preparation of Seed. 



Mr. Editor, — I do not know any subject 

 in the whole range of agricultural pursuits, 

 upon which labour can be so profitably be- 

 stowed as in the preparation of seed. It is 

 lamentable to observe the immense loss 

 which is continually sustained in conse- 

 quence of indifference and carelessness on 

 this point; and it is really to be feared that 

 every species of grain will continue to de- 

 generate in quality and diminish in quantity, 

 unless the farmer is awakened to a proper 

 sense of the importance which he should at- 

 tach to this part of his business. It has 

 been the observation of almost every man, 

 that those products of the farm which are 

 le.ss valuable, and which, therefore, the 

 farmer is more indifferent about, are annu- 

 ally prowing worse in quality. Oats are 

 ligliter in the grain and upon the ground 

 than they were formerly, and rye is becom- 



Cab.— Vol. IX.— No. 9. 



ing so exceedingly bad in quality, and so 

 uncertain a crop, as to be scarcely wortL 

 committing to the ground. Farmers are 

 heard constantly to express their wonder 

 why the product of the rye crop is not'as it 

 was fortnerly, and that they cannot raise as 

 much oats to the acre as they used to do ; 

 but they will cease to wonder, if they will 

 but reflect how exceedingly indifferent they 

 have been, with regard to the quality of the 

 seed which they have used. The import- 

 ance and value of the wheat and corn crops, 

 have sometimes induced them to make an 

 exertion to procure better seed than their 

 own ; but who ever takes the trouble to go 

 beyond his own granaries to seek for seed 

 rye or oats ? or who ever takes more pains 

 in its preparation, than to measure it into 

 his bags from the pile, as it comes from the 

 barn floor? To this aLone is attributable the 

 fact that these crops make but a scanty re- 

 turn for the labour bestowed upon them. I 

 do not urge the recollection of these things 

 for the sake of these crops, for I do not deem 

 them essential to the farming interest, beyond 

 the small amount of them which the farmer 

 may be supposed to require fur his own im- 

 mediate consumption ; but the same reasons 

 and principles precisely are appliable to 

 wheat and corn, to which we attach so 

 [much importance. If in the preparation of 

 jseed wheat, we take the grain as it is pre- 

 ! pared for grinding, and run it through the 

 {wind-mill at a speed which will blow one- 

 'fourth or one-third of it out, and with this, 



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