310 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



BIAKCII » 9, )84 S 



AND HORTICULTDRAL RF.GISTER. 



Boston, Wednesday, March 29, 1843. 



SPRING WORK. 



The colJ and snovva of the present month, will cause 

 ftirnners to be later than usual in commencing the opera- 

 tions of plovvinjr, sowing and planting. For this reason, 

 there is nintu than ordinary need of laying the most 

 economical plans that are possible in the way of saving 

 labor. Such work as can be done while the snow is on 

 the ground, should be attended to forthwith. 



The tools may be looked up and put in good order ; 

 fencing stuff may be fitted for use ; the topping of wil- 

 lows, poplars, &c. to obtain summer fuel, may be done; 

 old apple trees, &c. may have their dead branches re- 

 moved and worked up. 



Tho.so who have their manure under cover, may per- 

 haps take it, or at least a part of it, to the fields. Wheth- 

 er this will be a good course, may turn upon the proba- 

 ble driving or press of woik upon the team in the latter 

 part of April and in May. There will be some waste 

 to the manure if laken out now and dropped upon the 

 snow, but tlipn it is not improbable that this loss will 

 be compensated by the better opportunity to plow 

 and harrow thoroughly, and lo get the seed in the ground 

 at the best season. As to this, each fanner must judge 

 for himself. The manure, if put in a compact and well 

 formed heap, and covered with snow eno.igh to prevent 

 much evaporation until the probable time when a coat- 

 wig of soil or meadow mud can be applied io :t, probably 

 will not wa.ste much. We have put ouf'tha most of 

 GUIS already in small heaps, to be spread •Sni plowed 

 in as soon as the state of the land will fermit. We 

 have two reasons for this — our learn will' not be ade- 

 quate to carrying it out comfortably while the ground is 

 soft — and our work will be thrown back loo much by 

 delaying the carting of the manure until the time of 

 planting We will not maintain that we have practiced 

 good husbandry in doing as we have done — but we were 

 willing to make the experiment. 



The Compost Heap. 

 Those who provided swamp mud or peaty matters 

 last autiimn or during the past winter, may put their 

 manure in a heap and cover it well with the mud ; after 

 the manure has become warm, let the whole be thrown 

 over, and a lillle dry slaked lime or some ashes be even- 

 ly mixed in ; then put a thin coating of mud or soil over 

 the whole and pat it with the shovel. The mud that is 

 intermi,\ed and that that makes the covering, will be 

 penetrated by the gaseous ammonia of the dung and 

 will make good manure. By processes like this, the 

 manure heap may be much increased in value. The 

 common representation is that where tho process of 

 composting is properly conducted, one load of dung, a 

 cask of linn: or its equivalent in ashes, and two load of 

 iiwainp muck, will be as valuable as three loads of dung. 

 We presume it is ; but we would not advise inexperi- 

 enced hands to put more mud than they do dung ; es- 

 pecially where the compost is to be ui^ed this spring. 



Early Peas. 

 We would say lo farmers who raise peas only for their 

 own use, and who yet like to get them in pretty good 

 season, plow your land well as soon as it is in a good 

 Hlnle fur working ; then cover the ground well with 

 horse dung or other warm manure; then back-furrow 

 or ridgo up tho ground, and put the peas on the ridge — 

 they will do much better up there, than they will put 

 upon manure that is buried in a furrow. Or if you will 



have all the manure in the drill, then just make a little 

 mark along the surface of the ground and cover the 

 mark with the manure ; then with the plow turn up 

 the soil and make a ndge over the manure and put your 

 sei^d on the ridgo. Hill's Early and the Ccdo nulli are 

 the earliest. 



Early Potatoes. 



Prepare your ground in the same way, and set your 

 seed, the small or seed end up. Let this end conic near 

 the surface of the ridge. Tliese early vegetables will 

 do much better if the seed is put up on a ridge than if 

 put down in tho furrow. 



If you are anxious to get them quite early, you may 

 sprout them in a box, set in some warm placu, and 

 when you come to plant, be careful not to break off. the 

 sprouts. 



THOROUGH WORKING OF THE SOIL. 



It is a commoi) fault with our farmers to plant and 

 sow before they properly prepare the ground. There is 

 too much of the " cut and cover ' system in our plowing : 

 we generally take too wide furrows and of too little 

 depth. Thorough plowing, excepting on some new 

 and light lands, is highly serviceable lo the after growth. 

 The English and Scotch mode is to plow not more than 

 9 inches wide, where the furrows are 8 or 9 deep. We 

 should do well to conform our practices in this respect 

 much more nearly lo theirs than we now do. But tho 

 slighting is not limited to the work by the plow ; we 

 do not use the roller and harrow (or drag) enough. We 

 mention the roller here, because this instrument ought 

 in most casrs to follow the phuv immediately ; where it 

 does it crushes lumps and puts the soil in a state to be 

 well pulverized by the harrow. A harrowing, after the 

 roller, we know is much more serviceable than it is 

 where the roller has not passed. The common habit 

 too, of considering the ground as having been harrowed 

 enough, when the team has drawn over Ihe ground once 

 a frame in which teeth are set six inches apart, is a bad 

 one. The hat row should go North and South, East and 

 West, North cast and South-west, North-west and South- 

 east. When this has been well done, the land may be 

 fitted lo receive ihe seed. 



This thorough pulverizing of the soil, we recommend 

 as a process that gives a speedy return ; we believe that 

 the first crop is enough larger to pay fur the extra labor. 



We had the curiosity, the other day, to look into a 

 book upon the homojopalhic system of medicine. What 

 we think of the system, is of po consequence. But we 

 there found the advocates of that system maintaining 

 that the thorough grindings or rubbings to which they 

 subject their medicines, greatly develope their latent 

 powers, and cause them to be highly efficacious in ex- 

 ceedingly minute doses. Whether this be so or not, 

 we could not help thinking that the grinding down and 

 thorough pulverization of the soil would greatly multi- 

 ply the powers of that, and cause wonders as great as 

 any of the many astonishing medical cures of the day. 



the last drawn quart is much richer in cream than the 

 first. Did Dr. Playfair regard this fact and take a fail 

 average.' We know nothing lo the contrary. If h( 

 did, the analyses may be of much value — but if he di; 

 not, we should regard them as woithless. PresuiniUf 

 that he did, his inference that the cow will make mort 

 butter from the same quantity of milk, if kept in tht 

 stall, than if lurned out to pasture, secuis to be perfectly 

 fair. 



There comes up a question here, which we are inclin 

 ed to put to dairymen, though we can make no answei 

 to it. As exercise lakes the butler from the milk, anc 

 as the last drawn milk is the richest, we wish to ask 

 whether (i?ne may not cause the butter to dimini>h . 

 The milk that is drawn last, is, more likely than other- 

 wise, the last that is formed. Now, may it not be tha 

 from the time it is formed in he cow until it is drawr 

 fiotn her, the milk is giving ofV a part of its butter to be 

 consumed by the oxygen of the cow's breath ? tShould 

 it be so, then there will be much economy in milking 

 often. 



The assertion in that article that " potatoes aro par 

 ticularly favorable to the production of butler, from tht 

 starch they contain," we receive with murh distrust 

 That they contain much starch, and therefore ought or 

 the principles of Liebig and Playfair, to produce mucl 

 butter, is obviously correct; but that they do furnisl 

 milk that is rich in cream, is, we think, opposed to lh( 

 common observation of those who are accustomed K 

 feed and tnilk cows. 



That the milk is formed, not from the food directly 

 but that the food first becomes flesh, a»d is then chang 

 cd from tissues into milk, we are not surprised to hea 

 advanced, because we know that when cows are firs 

 removed from a short pasture to abundant feed, there i 

 but little if any increase of milk at llie first milking- 

 even at the second the increase is much less than oi 

 the following day. 



All these deductions of science are inlpresting ani 

 valuable. Those who are trying to throw light upoi 

 agriculture from the laboratory, are already helping u 

 to understand many things that have been mysterious 

 and they give promise of furnishing more and more in 

 struction every year. 



PLAYFAIR ON MILK. 

 The article on our first page, copied from the London 

 Athcnffium, is apparently only a concise and hasty re- 

 port of the leading points of an extended lecture. We 

 should be glad to learn a few things more than this arti- 

 cle states, before we can estimate the value of its de- 

 ductions. Was the whole of the milk which was drawn 

 at evening or in the morning, well mixed together be- 

 fore a portion was taken out for analysis, or did Dr. 

 Playfair take out what he wanted for his purpose, with- 

 out not cing whether it was of tlie first or of the last 

 drawn .' All who are fanailiar with the dairy, know that 



MR BARTLETTS ARTICLE ON FERTILIZERS 



We have given much space to the article of Mr Barl 

 lett of Warner, N. H., because the accounis we hav 

 received of him, lead us to suppose that he is the moi 

 thorouihly scientific of all the laboring farmers of Nei 

 England; and because the article itself contains man 

 valuable opinions and facts. The suggestion that th 

 exposure I'f the dried tu_rf of a sandy soil to the actio 

 of fire, will give us a very valuable fertilizer, is worth 

 of remerahrance, and of being put into practice next At 

 gust or September, by hundreds of farmers. 



(IT"It will be seen by the adverlismcnl, that the pric 

 of Dr. Dana's Muck Manual has been reduced lo 62 1- 

 cts. Cheap enough for so valuable a work. For sal 

 at Breck & Co.'s Agricultural Warehouse. 



He that to what he sees, adds observation, and I 

 what ho reads reflection, is in the light road to know 

 edge, provided that, in scrutinizing the hearts of other 

 he neglects not his own. — iMcon. 



Nothing more completely baffles one who is foil ( 

 trick and duplicity himself, than straight-forward an 

 simple integrity in another. — lb. 



