216 



GENESEE FARMER. 



Sept. 



Ilecis from S. W., of Seneca County. 



THE WEATHER, CHOi'S, CflEESE, CORN, &c. 



Dear Doctor: — Our farmers are in the midst 

 of their wlieat harvest; crop is hardly an aver- 

 age. If you would lielieve the croakers, it has 

 been more than half winter killed. The tropi- 

 cal regionn might envy us our long hot days, and 

 dry, calm, stilling, warm, short nights, during 

 the last three weeks; corn can't grow in their 

 12 hour cool nights as it does here in our 8 hour 

 hot ones. Now and then I hear an ignorant 

 lazy farmer say that his corn is suffering for 

 water — while all those who planted early and put 

 fresh manure at the root, boast how fast it grov/s. 



I never saw the good effect of artificial water, 

 made by the union ot the hydrogen of stable ma- 

 nure with the air's oxygen, as during this hot dry 

 ■weather. Had Ptetzholdt lived in our hot dry 

 climate, he would have said less about burning 

 vegetable matter for the benefit of its salts alone. 

 As our seasons are, it seems to be indispensable 

 to a good garden to spade in long manure every 

 spring for its water forming agency alone. I 

 believe that one half the benefit fruit trees in 

 our climate receive from artificial manure, is 

 from the water it forms during our summer 

 drouths. 



Why is it that of all the trades and callings 

 pursued by man in this country, farming is the 

 one doomed to traditionary error, and the vaga- 

 ries of the crazy moon? It is precisely the re- 

 verse of this in China, for there the earth is im- 

 proved to its utmost capacity, in the productions 

 thereof; while the unwieldy Junk, now exhibit- 

 ing at New- York, shows thattheir naval architec- 

 ture is the same it was before the Christian era. 

 Many a man has lost his labor, and a crop with 

 it, waiting to plant in the new or the o]d of the 

 moon. Three farmers out of five, will tell you 

 that Indian corn will yield more with suckers on 

 than off; yet actual experiment, at the same 

 time, in the same row, proves that with the suck- 

 ers off the ears form earlier, and that both ears 

 and stalk are much larger. 



I have heard one farmer of long practice sav 

 that sandy land should never be plowed deep, \ 

 while anoth.er farmer whose farm is a very light 

 sandy loam, says that his wheat failed entirely, 

 until he commenced deep plowing, and that this 

 alone has restored the foraier yield to his 'land. 

 But if the economy of farming was committed 

 to farmers' wives, I cannot but feel that there 

 would be less stolid prejudice, and iriore of mod- 

 ern progress in it— if I may judge from the 

 adroitness with which some of them contrive to 

 sell salt and buttermilk for butter, and the quan- 

 tity ©f cream others abstract from their cheese. 

 I defy organic chemistry with ils alkali's and 

 acids to bleach a cheese so thoroughly of its 

 oily coloring maftei', as some good farmer's 

 wife has done to a heavy, well bandaged indi- 



vidual of the cosine family, lately imported 

 here from Buffalo. 1 fear such frauds will be 

 as long as our naughty, though thriftless coun- 

 try merchants continue to offer their tempting 

 merchandise in exchange for poor butter and 

 worse cheese. 



I believe there are twice as many acres of 

 corn in Seneca county this season as usual; with 

 the aid of the present rain the crop is certain to 

 be good. Prices of breadstuffs and provisions 

 must be very low the coming season, unless there 

 is another short crop in Europe. 'Tis true that 

 the keeping open of the English ports until Feb- 

 ruary, will induce larger shipments from this 

 country as soon as freights fall to correspond 

 with the fall in produce; but what market can 

 maintain even moderately low prices, in the face 

 of such an avalanche of produce as our great west 

 is now growing to send forward. S, W, 



Walcr/oo, Sen. Co., July, 1847. 



"Slobbers'' in Horses. 



I WAS not a little surprised on reading, in vol. 

 VI of the " Farmer," that the cause of this trou- 

 blesome malady, (or whatever it may be called,) 

 is unknown to farmers. I had supposed, and I 

 still think, that the "Slobbers" were caused by 

 the plant called by Botanists, '■'■Lobelia ivftata,'" 

 generally known by the name of '• Wild Tobac- 

 co," "ludiau Tobacco," &.c. It grows, accord- 

 ing to the quality of the soil, from 6 to 18 inches 

 high, is branching, hirsute; has a pale blue, ir- 

 leguiar corol; capsule, or seed-vessel, bladder- 

 like, i. e. inflated, whence its name "inflata;" 

 has a sharp, biting taste, and if eaten causes tem- 

 poi'ary sickness at the stomach, and generally a 

 flow of water from the mouth. It is used by 

 some physicians as an emetic. It generally 

 grows in thin grass, particularly on poor soils, 

 and appears in flower in July, about the time 

 when horses begin to be troubled with the "Slob- 

 bers." H. 



Fairport, July, 1847. 



Nkw Era in Navigation. — On the 20th May, 

 a three masted schooner anchored outside Chica- 

 go harbor, loaded with 10,000 bushels of wheat, 

 with which she had cleared for Liverpool. She 

 goes by the way of the Welland Canal and St. 

 Lawrence. This is the first clearance of the 

 kind ever made from the inland waters of the 

 great lakes for a European port, and constitutes 

 a new era in the history of navigation. 



To Relieve Colic in Horses. — Rub spirits 

 of turpentine on the breast of the horse, and if 

 he be drenched with it, also, he will be relieved. 

 Horses should never be put to severe work on 

 an empty stomach ; but more horses are hui-t by 

 hard driving after a full feed, than by a full feed 

 after hard driving. 



