J34 

 NEW ENGLAND FAR MER. 



BOSTON, FRIDAY, MAY 11, 1827. 



MELONS. 



Those ivlio wish to rear melons in perfection, 

 must be careful in the first place, to procure good 

 seed ; secondly to plant them remote from an in- 

 ferior sort, from cucumbers, squnshes, gourds and 

 pumpliins ; as degeneracy will infallibly be the 

 consequence of inattention to those directions. — 

 Both the musk melon and vvntcr melon with all 

 their varieties succeed best in a hot climate and a 

 ■sandy soil. .\ good nianuie to bo put under mel- 

 ons or cucunil'ers, is an old compost of good loam, 

 with the dung of neat cattle or swine. 



The author of" Gleanings from Books of Hus- 

 bandry," directs when the melons have gotten 

 four leaves, to pinch off the tops with the finger 

 and thumb ; and again when they have two or 

 more lateral shoots, and two or n:ore joints : sec- 

 ondly, to have a fine f. uit to permit but one to re- 

 niain on a stalk, and to pincii off the end of the 

 runner at the third joint above the fruit, and also 

 new runners that appear before the fruit sliould be i 

 checked. In a Treatise on Gardening, liy J. Aim- 

 strong, of Duchess County, New York, it is re- 

 marked that " There is mucli controversy among 

 gardeners and savanis on this point — ror are the 

 pinchers entirely united in opinion, how far this 

 practice should be carried. Soma content them- 

 selves with taking off the cotyledons, when the 

 plant has acquired tliree or four leaves — while 

 others take off the principal bunches at tho first 

 eye above tlie fruit, and suppress all tlic seconda 

 ry branches, male flowers and tendrils. " These 

 operations (says .Mr Bose) aro founded on bad 

 reasoning. A cutting which suppresses two 

 thirds of the plant at once, cannot fail to disor- 

 ganize what remains." 



In Honfleur they leave two or'tiireo melons only 

 to each vine, and under each of these place a slate 

 without which tho upper side and under side will 

 not ripen together. Two months are required to 

 mature them. " Tlio people at Honfleur attribute 

 their success in melon-raising to the sea vapour 

 which surrounds them, and to the saline parlirlts 

 contained in it — an advantage to be any where 

 commanded, by dissolving a little salt in the wa- 

 ter employed to moisten them." 



VVhether a bed of slate miirht not prove loo 

 warm for the melon in our climate is more than 

 we can say ; and have never known salt, either in 

 solution or substance used as manure forTnclons, 

 but think it would not bo amiss to try its effect. 

 But care will be necessary not to use too strong 

 a solution, nor too much of the substance of salt, 



le.?t the plant be destroyed by tlie application 



Probably a compost in wliich salt should form a 

 pait might be found useful as a manure for mel- 

 ons. 



STRAWBERRY. 



It is said tliat this fruit has the power cf dissolv- 

 ing the tartai' which accumulates and hardens on 

 the teeth. Likewise that persons afflicted with 

 gout or stone iiave derived great benefit ftom eat- 

 ing strawberries freely. 



FORCING YOUNG FRUIT TREES TO BEAR. 



If you have young fruit trees, and are hesitat- 

 ing whether to graft them or not, you may force 

 them to exhibit specimens of the "fruit they will 

 .yoduce by making a cut in the bark a quarter of 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



May 11, ]B-27. 



an inch wide, round the branch or bough, which 

 you wish to compel to bear fruit. The branch, 

 however, is always injured and sometimes des- 

 troyed by this process. The best and safest way 

 to effect the early e.Nhibition of fruit in young 

 trees or barren boughs, is to tie wires or strings 

 about them so tight as to impede, in some degree 

 the circulation of tho sap. This is less likely to 

 injure the tree or branch than cutting off the 

 bark, and is said to be equally effectual in caus- 

 ing the production of fruit. It is not best, as a 

 general rule, to graft a young fruit tree, till you 

 have ascertained what sort of fruit it will produce, 

 naturally ; because, by so doing you may insert a 

 graft, which will give fruit of less value than the 

 tree would have afforded without grafting. 



.■VIAKI>'G YELLOW BUTTKR. 



In Scotland,- we are told, the dairy women give 

 a fine colour and flavour to their butter, by grat- 

 ing some orange carrots, the juice of which, after 

 being strained, is mixed with the cream previous 

 to churning. The quantity of carrot juice neces- 

 sary for this has not been prescribed, so fiir as 

 our observation extends, but the judgement of the 

 manufacturer cannot fail to suggest very nearly 

 the quantity necessary to give tie butter a proper 

 colour. While cows have fresh feed in the spring, 

 probably, their butter would not be much, if in any 



degree improved by the addition of carrot juice 



But when grass becomes short, or the dairy stock 

 is fed on hay, carrot juice may produce a good 

 effect. 



GREATEST POSSIBLE PRODUCT OF INDIAN CORN. 



An able writer for the American Farmer in vol. 

 ii. page 27 of that work says " I risk it as an 

 opinion confessedly, without actual experiment to 

 support it, that as a matter of curiosity it mi^hl be 

 possible to make some fraction of an acre of 

 ground so deep and perfect in its soil as to pro- 

 duce, and maintain to maturity, one stalk of In- 

 dian corn upon every 24 inches of square surface. 

 If so, and wo allow one good car to each stalk, 

 and half a pint of grain to each ear, tlie product 

 would be abo\it at the rale of one hundred and 

 sixty-eight bushels to tlie acre." 



It would be a very easy matter to try the ex- 

 periment above alluded to, by making hills of In- 

 dian c orn two feet apart, eacii way, planting 3 or 

 4 kernels in a I.i'.l, and leaving, at the first or sec- 

 ond time of hoting but one stalk in a hill. Care 

 should be taken, however, in planting, to place 

 each kernel at such a distance from its next 

 neighbor tiiat it may be pulled out, and not de- 

 range the economy of the hill. 



TO PRESERVE ISDIA?» CORN AND POTATOES 

 AGAINST THE GRUE WORM. 



Tlie farmers of Rensselaer county. New York, 

 sny that ashes or quick lime ought always to be 

 applied to the top of corn hills immediately after 

 planting, if it foliow sward, to prevent grub larvae 

 from destroying it. The same application will 

 have a similar effect, if applied to the top of pota- 

 toe hills. But neither unleached ashes nor lime 

 in its quick or caustic state, should in any case, 

 come in contact either with the seed corn or the 

 young plants. [Memoirs of the New York Board 

 of Agriculture, vol. ii. page 25.] Ashes or lime, 

 applied as above, would not perhaps be so much 

 needed where tho seed corn had been soaked in 

 copperas water, as has been repeatedly recommen- 

 deil in the New England Farmer. Still, ashes and 



Jlf 



y. 



lime may be valuable as manures, even when notnfe 

 cessary to preserve against insects ; when potato 

 are planted on land not perfectly free from worn \ 

 (such for instance as land lately cleared from '■ 

 forest, with what is called a good burn,) wc shoi 

 think no prudent farmer would neglect to cap | , ■" 

 hills or ridges with a good top dressing of qu[ 

 lime or unleached ashes. 



ANOTHER WAY TO PLANT POTATOES. 



Wo have been told that tho following mode' 

 raising potatoes has been successfully practised 

 some pa rts of New England, hut have no persoi 

 knowledge of this kind of cultivation. 



On an even and smooth piece of mowing or pi 

 turc land, make deep single furrows with a ploa. 

 at 3 feet distance. Fill these furrows with t 

 straw, or some other straw, and drop your po 

 toes 6 or 8 inches apart on the straw. Then wi 

 a hoe cover tho potatoes by turning down tj 

 ploughed fu!rows upon them. They will rcqui 

 no more attention till they are grown. No ho 

 ing will he necessary. The same land may be i* 

 proved as a pasture for sheep, as those animJi 

 will not eat, nor materially injure the tops of tH 

 potatoes. I 



HESSIAN FLY. I 



We cannot say w hether tliis insect has, or wiil 

 make its appearance in our wlioat fields. Butif 

 it should, !i remedy for its ravages, heretotofe 

 pointed out by a correspondent, may be worth tiw 

 trial. As soon as you discover that the fly 

 deposited its eggs in the first joint of the sti 

 turn sheep into your wheat field and let the 

 the plants to the ground. An experiment of ti 

 kind was made some years since, in Maine, wh 

 seems to have been successful ; a stateinen 

 v.hich may be seen in the New England Farnii 

 vol. i. page 347. The efficacy of this remedy h 

 however, been doubted by some who say that 

 egg of the fly is deposited below the reacbi 

 sheep — and that there are successive generatii 

 of flies, so that destroying one race might not 

 sure the plants against a succeeding tribe of t] 

 same insects. It is therefore an object of com 

 quence to ascertain by new experiments, whet 

 feeding down wheat after the fly has made its 

 pearance will prove a remedy against that di 

 tructive insect. 



BURNING CLAY AND SURFACE SOIL BY II.ME WIT] 

 GOT FUEL. 



Mounds of seven yards in length and three al 

 a half in breadth, are kindled with .seventy-t 

 bushels of lime. First a layer of dry sods or pi 

 ings, on which a quantity of lime is spread, mi! 

 ing sods with it, then a covering of eight inchu_ 

 of sods, on which the other half of the lime Ii 

 spread and covered a foot ; the heighth of the 

 mound being about a yard. In twenty-four houm 

 it will take fire. The lime should be iaimediatelj 

 from the kiln. It is belter to suffer it to ignite id 

 self, than to effect it by the operation of wateil 

 When the fire is fairly kindled, fresh sods inusl 

 be applied Mr Curwen recommends obtaining 

 sufficient body of ashes before any clay was pul 

 on the mounds. The fire naturally ri.«es to the 

 top. It takes less time and does more work to' 

 draw down the ashes from the top, and not to sufj 

 fer it to rise above six feet. The former practici 

 of burning in kilns was more expensive ; did mucl 

 less work ; and in many instances, calcined the 

 ashes and rendered them of no value. 



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