i\EW ENCjJLiAND- FAMMl^ll 



AND GARDENER'S JOURNAL. 



l'lIBI.ISlli:i» liV (iEOKCiE C. lUKKKTT, NO. 52 iNOIll'H MAUKri;'!' S lltKlVI', (AcKitui.TUiiAL Wakkhousk.) — T. G. FI':sSF.NI)l!;N, KDITDB. 



rut.. XIV. 



BOSTON, WKDNKSDAY EVENING, MAY 4, 1836. 



NO. 43. 



(From tho .New Vork Cultivator.) 

 CORN, CARROT AND RUTA RAGA CROPS. 



Jkli IJuKL, — Dear Sir: Being unwilling to hide 

 ly liillit under a bnsliel, however hiinil)le it may 

 e, whiMi thousands of others are shining so 

 right around ine, ilhiniinating my path and ren- 

 leriiig my labors more easy, more productive, and 

 nore peasant, I hive taken the liberty of forward- 

 ng for your disposal, an nrcount of my past sea- 

 oii's airricultural labors, so far as they are con- 

 lected witli the rultivation of the corn, the carrot, 

 iiid the ruta baga crops. 



Under the influence of a strong disposition to 

 iinovate upon old theories and practices, and lo 

 nark out a new and untrodden path, where there 

 ppears to be room for improvement ; with no 

 everence for usages whose merits are founded 

 ipon mere antiquity, I have commenced the agri- 

 u'.tiiral life, prepared to think and to act for 

 nyself. With such a disposition, and knowing, 

 s every man of reflection must know, that there 

 great degree of ignorance on agricultural 

 cicnce 1(1 our country, you may well iniagine 

 hat 1 see many things among our hard-working 

 nd deserving farmers, that most emphatically 

 ■equire a thorough and railical change ; that there 

 a vast amount of labor — of hard, back-aching 

 bor, which from improj.er application, produces 

 lot its suitable reward — and that there are many 

 icres of fine productive soil, which by improper 

 iianagement are not maile to yield a return of 

 implc interest upon their cost. 



I will acquaint you with my experiment upon 

 he cultivation of a field of corn, of three and one 

 Ihird acres. The land was of the kind here 

 lenomiiialed the oak timbered land ; a strong, 

 cam soil with a clay bottom. It had been three 

 ears down after wheat, without seeding, and- had 

 jeen previoiisly worked pretty close. In IViay I 

 arted on about thirty loads of rotted manure upon 

 wo acres of the )iooresl part of laud, and the rest 

 was without manure. I then ploughed it very 

 carefidly, being particular to turn the sward all 

 under. I then dragged it twice with the harrow 

 across the furrows, and then with a hand-marki.'r 

 having seven trails, I marked out for the rows, 

 three feet six inches one way, by one foot nine 

 inches the other. The ground by this time had, 

 owing to the drought, become very dry. It was 

 DOW the 19th of May ; I had intended to have 

 planted by iht; 12tli, by which I should have 

 avoided the bud efliects of the drought. 



I soaked my corn, and rolled it in plaster; it 

 was of the twelve rowed kind ; I put from five to 

 eight kernels in a hill, and covered with nioij-t 

 earth. The corn came up unevenly, some not till 

 three or four weeks after planting. On the 2 i 

 June, I put on thirtyfive busliels per acre of 

 leached ashes. On the 11th, ploughed out the 

 corn with the cultivator, and hoed, throwing a 

 little fresh earth around each hill, first thinning it 



out to four of the best spears in each hill. It came 

 forward now very fast. On the 23d, went through 

 the st^cond lime with the ctdtivator, but owing to 

 11 press of other business, did not hoe it. July 2d, 

 userl the cultivalor the third time, and hoed the 

 second, throwing little fresh earth in each hill. 

 This was all the labor bestowed in the tillage of 

 the corn ; it now piesented a most healthy and 

 thriving appearance, atui almost completely shaded 

 the grourul. At this period my neighbors began 

 to prophecy the result of my experiment, and with 

 no very flattering terms. Without a single excefi- 

 tion, they told me I would have but little corn, 

 and that that little would be poor, as it grew too 

 thick, and was too much shaded. With this array 

 of i>rophetic judgment, from old and young, 

 against me, I almost began to doubt the wisdom 

 of my experiment, and to repent having wandered 

 from the footstops of my fathers. Some advised 

 me to cut out every other row, but as I had begun 

 the experiment, I thought it proper to carry it 

 through. The corn grew rapidly, grew strong, 

 and maintained its healthy color. On the 3d of 

 October, after an unusually cold and unfavorable 

 season, with frost every month, and one particu- 

 larly on the 4th of August, which materially in- 

 jured the corn crop, anil one on the 16th Septem- 

 ber, which put a slop to its growth, I cut up my 

 corn by the roots and stouted it oft" the field, and 

 left it till the l€lh of November, when I completed 

 the husking, and stored into my granary three 

 hundred and twentytwo bushels of ears of good 

 corn, besides sixty of soft or pig corn : being at 

 the rate of about 50 bushels of corn per acre. 

 Besides the corn, 1 had double the irsiial quantity 

 of stalks, which, in this season of scarcity, I have 

 found very valuable. 



I will now inform you of the carrot crop. — 

 Early in the spring I carteil eight loads of long 

 manur! on lo one eighth of an acre of tolerable 

 rich bottom land, deep and loose, and ploughed it 

 under; and on the 12th of May put the seed in 

 the ground by hand, in drills 14 inches apart. — 

 The seed did not come up well, there being fre- 

 quent vacaiicies of from one to ten feet in length. 

 In the course of the season the carrots were hoed 

 twice and weeded three times by hand. On the 

 29th October I harvested the crop, which turned 

 out two hundred and ten bushels of carrots, at the 

 rate of 1680 bushels per acre. The whole cost of 

 tillage and harvesting was .$14, including interest 

 on land at $50 per acre ; the value of crop at two 

 shillings ])er bushel, $.52,50, from which, deducting 

 cost, leaver a balance of .$38,50 nett gain from 

 one eighth of an acre. 1 have no doubt, that had 

 the seed come up uniformly over the field, I should 

 have had 250 bushels, which would have been 

 2000 bushels per acre. 



.Adjoining the carrot field, and of the same kind 

 of land, and prepared in the same way, I had one 

 tenth of an acre devoted to the culture of the ruta 

 baga. The ground was made perfectly level, and 

 on the 21th June the seed was sown in drills from 

 eighteen to twenty inches apart, and came up 



well, as the weather was very favorable. On iho 

 first hoeing they were thinned to twelvi' inche.'j 

 apart. They were hoe<l biu twice ; anil on tho 

 12th November, I harvested one hundred and 

 tvveiuvtvvo hushes; being at the rate of 1,220 

 bushels per acre. Value of crop at 18 pence per 

 bushel, $22,87 ; tillage and harvesting, .*6,20, 

 leaving a balance of .$"16,62 nett gain from one 

 tenth of an acre. 



With regard to the carrots, they were not 

 thinned, but left to grow as they came frmn tho 

 seed ; but the looseness of the soil allowed them 

 to spread, and they grew to a very great size ; 

 some measuring 174 inches in circumference, by 

 30 inches in length, weighing 7i lbs. The largest 

 turnip measured 25 inches in circumference, and 

 weighed 11 lbs. ; very few weighing less than 5 

 and 6. 



1 would respectfully solicit the attention of youi 

 correspondent, Thomas Midfijrd, to the account 

 of ruta baga culture, as exhibiting there.su't of th»i 

 level system, which he considers the least enlight- 

 ene<l and the lea.st productive. 



Kespeclfully yoiir.s, 



Edward Miller. 



KITCHEN GARDEN. 



Pii.4S. — Tiie early Washington is the kind in j^ 

 common use for early crops in this part of thoN^T 

 country. But the American Gardener say.«, " tho 

 charltons are not only very early, but great bearers, 

 and excellent peas for the table." F'^or late peas, 

 the blue imperial and marrowfat, aro excellent. 

 They should be .sown as soon as the frost is out of 

 the ground, in diills, from two to three feet apart, 

 and from a half inch lo an inch between the peas in 

 the drill, according to their size. "Pea-', that are 

 to grow without sticks, require the least room." 

 They should be covered about an inch deep. — 

 "The soil should be moderately rich. Peas are 

 ;iot assisted, but hurt, by unreduced manure, re- 

 cently turned in. A fresh, sandy loam, or road 

 sftff, and a little decomposed vegetable matter, is 

 the best manure. The soil for the early crop'S 

 should be very dry, and renrlered so by mixing 

 sand with the earth in the drills, where the ground 

 is moist." 



Cucumbers. — The <jiardener's Assistant says — 

 "The most suitable kinds of cucumbers for early 

 planting, are the early frame, short prickly, and 

 long prickly. These may be in the open ground 

 the first week in May, in hills four feet apart. — 

 Previous to | laming, the ground should be pre- 

 pared by incorporating a shovel-full of rotted dung 

 with the earth in each hi I, after which four orfivo 

 seeds may be planted, half an inch deep. Cucum- 

 bers are liable to he attacked by a yellow fly, which 

 sometimes devour all the young plants ; these 

 and other insects may be killed by sowing tobacco 

 dust, soot, or powdered charcoal, round about the 

 vines, when they first come up. After this be • 

 done, the plants may be thinned to two or three in 

 a hi 1, anil the ground carefully hoed, drawing a 



