554 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



ported into this country," and those few spoiled by ignorance and want of atten- 

 tion, we must take the liberty of excepting to such wholesale assertions. 



Two years since, a flock was imported into Connecticut by Mr. Tayntor, se- 

 lected with infinite care from the best to be found in Europe. 



THE OSAGE ORANGE FOR HEDGES. 



Tn¥.Osa.^,e OY?in^e (Madura aurantiaca), knov^^l also, by the names of " Osa^e Ap- 

 ple," " Bow-wood," and Bois iVarc, is indigenous to Arkansas, Texas, and Upper Missouri, 

 and may be safely cultivated for hedges or ornament wherever the IsabeUa grape vine will 

 thrive and mature its fruit in open air. In its natural habitat, the Osage Orange forms a 

 beautiful, deciduous-leaved tree, often growing to a hight of twenty-five to thirty feet, with 

 a trunk from twelve to eighteen inches in diameter ; and in very favorable situations, it 

 sometimes attains double these dimensions. The general appearance of this tree greatly re- 

 sembles that of the common Orange ; and when we view the beauty and splendor of its dark, 

 fihinmg foilage, large, golden fruit, and the luunerous sharp spines which the branches pre- 

 sent, we are strongly impressed by the comparison. The juice of the young wood, leaves, 

 and fi'uit, consists of a milky fluid, of an acrid or insipid taste, which soon dries on exposure 

 to the air, and contains a considerable proportion of an elastic gum. The fruit, however, in 

 open culture, docs not ripen its seeds north of Philadelphia. 



The most important use to which the Osage Orange ca» be applied is for the formation 

 of hedges, and there is no plant, in our estimation, better adapted for this puipose,in any part 

 of the country where this tree will thrive. Apprehensions have been expressed by some 

 that, from its rapid growth, it will soon become too large for live hedges, which, it is thought, 

 will not endure for a great length of time. This, however, remains yet to be proved. We 

 have no doubt, in our own minds, that, if a judicious system be pursued, in trimming 

 and heading dotcn, they will serve an excellent purpose for twenty and perhaps thirty years ; 

 for there are hedges of this plant in the vicinity of Cincinnati, which are ten years old, and 

 have thus far proved perfectly hardy, very uniform, neat, and handsome in their appearance, 

 and free from the attacks of insects or disease. 



The Osage Orange may readily be propagated by seeds, from which it will grow suffi- 

 ciently large in three years to form a hedge. It succeeds best on land moderately rich, such, 

 for instance, as will produce good Indian Corn ; but it will grow in almost any soil that is 

 not too moist. The line of ground, intended for a hedge, should first be dug and well pul- 

 verized, say from 19. to 15 inches deep, and 2 feet wide, along the center of which the plants 

 ■may be set at a distance of one foot apart. 



The seeds, before sowing, shtjuld be soaked in water, in a warm room, for four or five 

 days; or they may be mixed with equal parts, by measure, of sand, and exposed a few 

 weeks, in open boxes, to wintry weather, on the sunny side of a building, in order to freeze 

 and thaw. It is preferable to sow them early in the spring, in a garden or nursery, where 

 they will shortly germinate and form young plants. These should carefully be weeded or 

 hoed during the first season's growth, and transplanted in the hedge-line in the month of 

 March or April of the following year. 



NOTES ON. MANURE. 



Liquid Manure. — As liquid manure is likely to become in general use by our agricul- 

 turists, and as Govennnent has issued an order that manure-tanks shall be established in the 

 yards of the different cavalry barracks throughout the United Kingdom, the following 

 memoire on dung-pits and the treatment and great advantage of liquid manure, so long neg- 

 lected on the Continent and in this country, has been presented to the Society of Sciences, 

 Agriculture and Arts of the Department of the Lower Rhine, by Ch. H. Schattenmann, 

 Member of the General Council of the Lower Rhine, and Director of the mines of Boux- 

 willer. After giving a description and a plan of his model dung-tanks, which can be made 

 to any size, from an old sunken cask to a well-bricked pit, with a filti-ating-vessel, and pump 

 with irrigating tubes, to disperse it over the land, he then gives his method of treatment : — 

 The dung is submitted to a fermentation, so that the straw becomes decomposed and the 

 ammonia developed. This fermentation is extremely violent for horse-dung, producing a 

 gi'eat heat. It is therefore requisite to overcome it, which is easily accomplished by pack 

 ing the dung as closely as possible, and well watering it once or twice a week ; as the con 

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