NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Piiblislieil by Joii.n B. Rcsseli. nt No. 'i'i ISortli Market. Street, (over tlie Agricultural VVnrehoiisc.) — Thomas G. Fessenden, Editor. 



VOL. V 



BOSTON, FRIDAY, JULY 20, 1827. 



No. 52. 



hohticulturl:. 



TEMS, FROM LOVDON's O.VRDENER's MAGAZINE. 



Pruning Vines mid dtnuding them of (htxr 

 icavcs in Seplembir. — A correspondent who aigris 

 'hilalethes, says, if yoti will have tlie goodness to 

 efer to Hales' Vegetable Statics, vol. i. page ;37;', 

 ou will find the following passage, which shows 

 iiat the practice of priming the vine in Septcui-I 

 er, described in your last number by Mr Salis- 

 tirv, was perfectly well known to gardeners in 

 !ie neighborhood of London, a hundred years 

 go. 



'■ And the reasonableness of this practice is fur- 

 her confirmed by the experience of Mr Palmer, a 

 :urious gentleman of Chelsea, who has found thai 

 )y pruning his vines, and pulling all t!ie leaves of! 

 hem in September, as soon as the fruit was off, 

 hey have borne greater plenty of grapes tliai 

 )ther vines, particularly in the year 173G, whei 

 'jy reason of the e.\treme wetness and coldnes.s of 

 the preceding summer, the unripe shoots produc- 

 ed generally very little fruit. 



Betaining good Varieties of Apples in the Coui- 

 i.ry. — A correspondent in the Mechanic's Magt- 

 zine makes a very easy matter of what Mr Kniglt 

 and other physiologists considei- very difficult, if 

 not impossible. It is no wonder, he says, that the 

 finest apples have degenerated, because '' every 

 successive grafting is a new pejoration of the 

 fruit engrafted." To retain good apples in '.he 

 country, " without the pains of grafting," he ;r'iies 

 the following directions ; on which we would ob- 

 serve, that as he mentions only " good fruits," and 

 not "any particular variety of fruit," he may prob- 

 ably be correct ; or, at any rate, under that form 

 of v.-ords he evades the question of perpetuating 

 the peculiar qualities of a variety : say, for in- 

 stance, of the golden pippin. 



" In every perfectly ripe apple there will be 

 found one, and sometimes two, round seeds ; the 

 others will have one or more flatted sides. The 

 round ones will produce the improved fruit from 

 which they are taken ; and those with flatted 

 iides will produce the fruit of the crab upon which 

 the graft was inserted. It requires not a long 

 time to ascertain the difference : for if a circle is 

 drawn in rich ground, and the flatted-sided seeds 

 planted therein, and the round seeds in the centre, 

 the variation of the quality will be discovered in 

 two or three years ; the first will throw out the 

 leaves of the crab ; and the latter the leaves of 

 an improved tree, distinguished in shape, fibre, 

 and a lanuginous appearance ; and in due time the 

 fruit of each will put every thing beyond a doubt. 

 " It is to be observed, moreover, that the seeds 

 of crabs (being originals) are inostly, if not alto- 

 gether, round." 



We should be happy to hear the result of a few 

 trials. Take a bud from the seedling the first 

 summer, insert it in the extremity of a branch of 

 an old tree, and it iviil probably blossom the third 

 spring. Thus three or at most four years will suf- 

 fice to prove this theory true or false. 



Suhsiitute for Ringing. — As oil is well known 

 to indurate the bark of irees and prevent its swel- 



I ling, we would suggest the idea of trying oiling a 

 broad zone of bark, as a sub.stitutc for ringing. 



Remarks on the Choice of Seed Potatoes, and on 

 the general Principles of cltoosiii':; Seed and pre- 

 serving Friiil.<;. B;i n Denbighshire Gardener. — 

 Preferring unripe potatoes for seed is not new in 

 practice — it has for ages prevailed ; for wliore do 

 the farmers of the rich soils and warm countries 

 send for their seed-wheat and seed -potatoes .' — 

 To the cold, hilly countries, where they do not, 

 one season in throe, thoroughly and perfectly 

 ripen their seed. In Denbighshire, we call the 

 hilly or unripe potato the u>et potatoes ; and those 

 from the rich soils and warm situations, whore 

 they ripen perfectly, we call the dry potatoes, al- 

 though exactly the same variety : the wet, or un- 

 ripe, are reckoned best for seed, and the dry for 

 food. The potato tuber is a perfect organised 

 system, in which the circulation regularly pro- 

 ceeds, and if suffered to ripen, will then tend to 

 decay ; but if separated, before ripe, from the 

 stem or stalk, which furnishes it with blood or 

 fruit-sap descending from the leaves, the circula- 

 tion of the blood-sap is suddenly arrested. The 

 ripe potato, having performed all its operations, 

 becomes more inert ; but the circulation of the 

 sap in the unripe tuber having been stopped, it 

 starts more readily, and with greater vigor when 

 planted : — the one seems to die, worn out with 

 age, the other seems accidentally to have fallen 

 asleep, and when awoke, possesses an unspent 

 vigor and energy. This is the case not only with 

 the potato, but also with the apple, pear and other 

 fruits, whose life, if I may so express it, you wish 

 to prolong or extend beyond the time naturally al- 

 lotted to it; you take them off the tree long be- 

 fore they are ripe, and experience has taught us 

 that they will keep much longer, and eat much 

 fresher, than those suffered to grov; ripe upon the 

 tree : the same is the case with the potatoes taken 

 up before ripe. Placing the potatoes upon the 

 gravel, or any dry but not grass walk, in the sun, 

 has the efi'cct of stopping the circulation in the 

 tuber, in which nature has provided resources to 

 carry it on to an extraordinary degree, unless so 

 stopped. 



If you will examine the potato stem or plant, 

 when the tubers are beginning to be formed, you 

 will find that the potatoes are placed upon the 

 runners pushed or issuing out from the plant or 

 stem above the set : the functions of the set are 

 to push out roots to gather food from the soil to 

 supply the plant and leaves with that food ; and 

 from the leaves the blood or fruit-sap flows down 

 to form the runners and new potatoes ; and the 

 more you earth up the plant or stem, the more 

 rurwiers are formed higher up on the stem, and 

 the more potatoes are produced. 



Permit me to add, that all the best farmers in 

 the warm and rich soils and warm climates find 

 their account m changing their seed-wheat ; for 

 that they send to the poor soils and cold climates, 

 often to the poor cold chalk-hills in Oxfordshire 

 and Gloucestershire ; and uhat is the sample of 

 the wheat they obtain from thence ? — notoriously 

 the most shrivelled, from being cut before ripe. — 

 If farmers op rich soils would reap their wheat. 



preserved for seed, before ripe, they need not he 

 at the expense, trouble and inconvenience of send 

 ing 100 miles for their seed wheat, which is often 

 the case. 



The present season of the year being favorable 

 to you and your readers putting my observations 

 in this and my former letter to the test, viz. earth- 

 ing up the potatoes, causing them to be later ; 

 earthing them up, after taking away a few of the 

 earliest, causing them to throw out new runners 

 and produce more potatoes ; the top or eye-cuts 

 producing potatoes a fortnight earlier than the 

 bottoms of the same tubers, £ic. I trust that I 

 shall see the results of their observations in the 

 ninth Number of your interesting publication. 



Writing for plain, unlearned men like myself, I 

 deem it unnecessary to hunt in dictionaries, and 

 other such learned books, for scientific or philo- 

 sophical terms to garnish my tale, the want of 

 which, I trust, will not render it less useful, or 

 less acceptable to you and your readers. 

 I am Sir, &c. 

 A Di;nbighshi!ie Gardener. 



Simple node of Destroying Smoke A corres- 

 pondent of the Birmingham Chronicle says," Many 

 years ago, I had occasion to make a number of 

 experiments, on an extensive scale, on the evaptf- 

 ration of liquids, and in one of these a large boil- 

 er was covered with boards, and a communication 

 made between the covered space and the flue of 

 the chimney, so that the steam might be drawn 

 up by the heated air and the smokfe. One effect, 

 produced was the complete destruction of the 

 smoke, aiir. sicarcely any steam issued from the 

 top of the chimney. A small boiler which might 

 be heated by the fire from the main boiler, or; 

 when necessary, a very small pipe from the en- 

 gine boiler, to throw a quantity of steam into the 

 chimney, would perfectly prevent the neighbor- 

 hood from being annoyed by the clouds of smoke, 

 as is now the case. 



I have sent the above for insertion in your pa- 

 per, that the world may not be pestered with pat- 

 ents, in a matter where every man who has an en- 

 gine may be his own chimney-doctor." 



THE CANKER WORM. 

 A correspondent suggests the propriety of re- 

 minding our farmers of the utility of adopting 

 timely measures to preserve their orchards from 

 the desperate ravages of the Canker Worm, at 

 this season of the year too, when the trees are in 

 a tliriving and prosperous state of cultivation. It 

 must be recollected what destruction was made 

 last year auiong the fruit trees on this island, by 

 this loathsome insect, and how many orchards 

 there were totally stripped of every leaf — while 

 others were aifected in a trifling less degree — 

 leaving them as naked as do the blasts of Au- 

 tumn, and exhibiting a florid and famished ap- 

 pearance almost indescribable. The correspond- 

 ent informs us that he has visited the orchard of 

 Geo. Irish, Esq. in Middletown, and witnessed the 

 beneficial effects produced by the means he has 

 taken to preserve his trees. Last season, Mr Irish 

 was one among the number who suffered very 

 materially from this consuming insect, when h*} 



