XVI. M>. 3J. 



AND HORTICULTURAL REGISTER 



253 



KionI the tame. 



i;MEDY FOR SMUT IN WHEAT. 

 fo/nit« — I attended the Legislature at its 

 sessiDD, and talked with a luimbor of the 

 3, whose conversation was on the subject of 

 jisinfT, and their {rreat complaint was that 

 leat smutted, and nearly destroyed the val- 

 iC crop. I had thought that the preveii- 

 heat from snuittin? was so well under- 

 at no farmer was willing to acknowledge 

 ■aiscd smut, any more thhn dairy-women 

 lling to own that their milk vessels were 

 ;hat their milk soured in cold weather. It 

 been my opinion that the farmer who 

 nut was a sloven — so much so that he 

 3t to complain if he had a wife who was a 

 he first degree. I find that your readers 

 e upon line, and those who gel what little 

 know by borrowing your paper of their 

 rs, need it still more. 



is a disease in wheat, as much as the itch 



human race, or the scab in sheep. The 



icalness in farming, and a free use of alka- 



hjs been variously used but with the same 



set, and it has never failed where it has 



ihfully used, unless the manure has been 



mut which was used on the land sowed to 



Tlie Wiiithrop mill hardly knows what 



but from history. I will mention a few 



lat have been effectual. 



Make a strong ley of wood ashes, and 

 3 wheat well in cold water; then take a 

 more and dip it into the ley while scalding 

 let it be in about one minute or less, then 

 it immediately on a floor or some conve- 

 ice for it to cool. A basket or a cloth may 

 to dip it with, then mix plaster sufficient 

 , after which it may be sowed, 

 id. Wash clean as before, in cold water, 

 ;nd it on a floor, and put in slacked lime, 

 but cold; stir it well with a shovel until it 

 ; of the lime, after which nii.\ with plaster 

 it The plaster is put in that it may be 

 ibly sowed without injuring the hands of 

 ^r. Others have well washed their wheat 

 it into a ley made of lime, a day or two 

 owing. Others have washed as above and 

 wheat into a steep of blue vitriol ; others 

 ed a strong brine of salt, as strong as it can 

 '. with hot water and salt, and after washing 

 n cold water have put it into that, which is 

 t eftoctual way if well rinsed, to clear it of 

 light and sickly wheat; then limed, plas- 

 id sowed, all of which are pretty sure re- 

 fer rust. 



brother farmers, do not complain if you 

 mutty wheat, but acknowledge it the just 

 lent of Providence for the unfaithful and 

 f preparation of your seed. 



A.N Old Wheat Raiser. 

 J 2, 184.3. 



[f the writer of the above has discovered the 

 nedy for "amul" in wheat, his assumption 

 aps, pardonable; — but it seems to us that 

 question in regard to which there has been, 

 .V exists, a contrariety of opinion, he speaks 

 too authoritatively. Not a very dissimilar 

 to that which he recommends, has been 

 [ without beneficial effect, in preventing the 

 ' in wheat — and this too by farmers who 

 from being " slovens" in their liusbandry. 



However, as, from his signature, the writer may be 

 presumed to speak from the wisdom which e.vpc. 

 rience is supposed to give to age, it may be well to 

 prove hi:i remedy by tlriclly following his pre- 

 scriptions. — Com. 



lilinils on Horsts. — A writer in the Alban-y Cul- 

 tivator s:iys: "Let me say to all who have skittish 

 horses, cut off" your blinds, and if your horses scare 

 at a leaf, let them see that it is only a leaf. A 

 horse is a reasonable [?] animal — and if he has a 

 chance to lodk around him, ho is not going to run 

 unless sonirlhing shows a disposition to hurt him. 

 If drivers would take the precautmn to turn a 

 horse's head quick towards the danger from which 

 he cannot bo reined, and let the animal see his 

 danger, he would be as ready to shun the danger 

 as his driver. Two years since, I had a pair of 

 horses that would run away at every unnatural 

 toueh or noise, until I cut off the blinds of the 

 bridles, and they have never run away since. To 

 test the truth of this, put a blind bridle on a skit- 

 tish ox, and he will be almost unmanageable.'' 



Relief of Choked Callle. — A correspondent of 

 the Albany Cultivator says : "Some two or three 

 years ago, I began to feed potatoes to my cows, 

 and the first time I fed them, one of them got 

 choked, and bloated like a bladder. I took my 

 knife and stuck it into her, just forward of the hip 

 bone on the left side ; the wind poured out; the 

 bloat went immediately down ; I turned her out of 

 the stable, end she went to the field. After some 

 two or three hours, I went to see her ; she was ly- 

 ing down, and the potato was lying on the ground 

 before her. Some two or three days after, I had 

 another cow choked. She went through the same 

 process, and with the same result. Sometime af- 

 ter that, one of my neighbors called on me, and 

 said one of his best cows was choked with a pota- 

 to. I went with him and tapped her as before de- 

 scribed. I found the hole inclined to stop up by 

 the moving of her skin. I took a goose quill, cut 

 off both ends, and put it into the hole ; the bloat 

 went down, and I left her. Two or three days af- 

 ter, I saw him, and he told me she threw out the 

 potato after two or three hours, and was well. I 

 have since fed a good many potatoes, and no acci- 

 dent has happened. I am of the opinion that this 

 is the surest and most expeditious way of relieving 

 dumb beasts, as well as the safest; at least it is 

 the best way that I know of. Try it. 



P. Otis." 



From tli« Maine Karmer. 



TlIK ROLLKR. 



J\fr Ifolmes — I am aware that it is niucli cneisr 

 to ask questicms than to answer them correctly ; or 

 at least, I have e»er found it to be so. Yet I am 

 induced to ask one, hoping that you, or some of 

 the " knowing ones" among your correspondents, 

 will give the readers of the Farmer some light up- 

 on the subject. 



Maj. Conant, of this town, planted a piece of 

 corn containing some two or three acres, in tho 

 spring of 18;39. In the spring of 1840, he sowed 

 the same piece of ground to wheat and grass seed. 

 After harrowing in the seed, he applied the roller 

 to about one-half of the piece, leaving the other 

 half without rolling. I was in the field in July, 

 1841, and could tell to a foot what part of the 

 piece had been rolled ; there being twice as much 

 grass on that part which was not rolled the pre- 

 vious year, as there was on the other part. And 

 Maj. Conant informed me that the wheat"grew 

 much better on that part where the roller was not 

 used, than on the other. The weather was dry for 

 some days immediately after sowing. The land is 

 a deep loamy soil and there was no difference in 

 the seed, nor in the preparation or cultivation, ex- 

 cept rolling, both parts having been manured, plow- 

 ed and harvested equally alike and at the same 

 time. 



Now, sir, I wish to know why the rolling should 

 injure the crop of wheat and grass in this case. Is 

 the use of the roller detrimental in all cases, or on- 

 ly in particular ones ? Please let us know the 

 whys and wherefores, and oblige 



Turner, Jan. 1843. Job Prince." 



Note. — The whys and wherefores are not so 

 easily explained in this case. We once had a case 

 somewhat similar to the above, and we never knew 

 the cause of it, for the roller was clearly servicea- 

 ble in all other instances. If any of our readers 

 can solve the diflicuUy, we should be pleased to 

 have them. — Ed. Me. Far. 



For Bad Breath. — Mrs. Child recommends chew, 

 ing a bit of charcoal after every meal, as a sover- 

 eign remedy for an offensive breath. "The action 

 is purely chemical. It counteracts the acid aris- 

 ing from a disordered stomach, or food decaying 

 about the gums, and it is this acid which destroys 

 the teeth." She adds : " A friend of ours had, 

 when about twenty years of age, a front tooth that 

 turned black gradually, crumbled, and broke off 

 piecemeal. By frequently chewing charcoal, tho 

 progress of decay was not only arrested, but nature 

 set vigorously to work to restore the breach, and 

 the crumbled portion grew again, till the whole 

 tooth was sound as before. Every one knows that 

 charcoal is an antiputrescent. It thus tends to 

 preserve the teeth and sweeten the breath." 



A number of the trees in Penn Square, Phila- 

 pelphia, are already in bud. 



Potatoes. — M. Aiiberi, of France, states, as the 

 result of experiments continued through three sea- 

 sons, that abundant crops of potatoes may be grown 

 in poor clayey soils, by simply strewing the sets 

 plentifully with rye chaff previous to covering them 

 with earth at planting. 



Professor Voelker, of Germany, covers his pota- 

 to sets with a layer of tanner's spent bark, two or 

 three inches thick, before turning a furrow over 

 them. He says he tliu.^ provides a loose, spongy 

 bed for the young tubers ; prevents weeds from 

 springing up and growing in immediate contact 

 with the plants, and secures an abundant supply of 

 moisture during the season, if but one soaking rain 

 occur after planting, as the spent bark, covered by 

 the surface soil, will retain water during the most 

 protracted drought. — Selected. 



Big Pip; We are informed that Mr Aze! Per- 

 kins, of East Winthrop, killed a pig a few days 

 since, which was 275 days old, and which weighed 

 .353 lbs. That was an industrious pig. He must 

 have gained more than a pound of pork a day, from 

 the day of his birth to the day of his death, and 

 very nearly 40 lbs. per month. — Maine Far. 



Curious Tliere will be no new moonthiwDonth, 



(February,) but two next. 



