1853. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



277 



brought to England from the continent. The home 

 production was also estimated. I had the curios- 

 ity to reduce the quintals, bushels, hampers, etc., 

 enumerated, to the size of peach baskets, and 

 found that the whole amount of fruit consumed in 

 Great Britain in one year was not as great as the 

 amount of peaches and strawberries carried into 

 the New York market from the State of New Jer- 

 sey in one week. The Amboy railroad has re- 

 ceived in one day, $1100 as freight on peaches, at 

 8 cents per basket, and this is only one of the 

 many channels through which peaches are car- 

 ried to New York from New Jersey. Ninety thou- 

 sand baskets of strawberries have crossed the Jer- 

 sey city ferry in a single day. A steamboat from 

 New Brunswick, carries daily many thousands bas- 

 kets of peaches on her deck. Steamboats are dai- 

 ly plying during the peach season from Delaware 

 to New York, and one grower, Mr Reybold, owns 

 two steamboats used exclusively for this trade." 



Near the cities and large towns of New Eng- 

 land, there is a pretty fair supply of good fruit. — 

 But iu tiie country towns, beyond guud apples and 

 a few indifferent pears and cherries, there is little 

 or nothing in the way of cultivated fruit. There 

 is room for the effort of a thousand minds and 

 hands among us, on the subject of gardening. — 

 Comparatively few farmers have any of the small- 

 er fruits on their tables, such as strawberries, 

 gooseberries, raspberries, blackberries, plums, ap- 

 ricots, peaches, and the finer pears. They have 

 not learned their value as articles Of diet or as 

 crops profitable for the market. And the love of 

 home, the contentment, and the influence over 

 the morals and heart which a well-ordered garden 

 creates, has, Avith most farmers, never been taken 

 into the account at all. There are two or three 

 hundred thousand, perhaps half a million people 

 in the State of Massachusetts alone, who raise no 

 fruit. To afford them a fair supply, such as health 

 demands in hot weather, — to say nothing of ap- 

 petite, — requires vastly more than is produced 

 among us. The New Jersey peaches are brought 

 to us in large quantities ; but as they must be 

 plucked some time before they are ripe, in order 

 to get them here with any of their fair proportions, 

 they undergo an acetous fermentation which ren- 

 ders them unhealthy. 



USES OF THE ATMOSPHERE. 



"In all maniputations of the soil, ^he agricul- 

 turist should bear in mind that the atmosphere 

 ■plays an important part in all vegetable growth. 

 Without its influences, none of the chemical chan 

 ges necessary for the creation of plants or the 

 meliorations of soil can take place. Subsoiling, 

 plowing and underdraining, are mere adjuncts to 

 facilitate the meliorating influences of the atmos- 

 phere. The hoe, and the rake, cultivator, and 

 every other agricultural tool used for disturbing 

 the soil, are for the common purpose of permitting 



the atmosphere to pass between the particles. Its 

 uses above and below the surface of the soil are 

 equally efficient. On top it is the vehicle for the 

 reception of moisture and of gases arising from de- 

 ciying vegetation which it holds until the descent 

 of dews and rains, carrying them into the soil. 

 Oxygen, one of its constituents, is necessary to 

 cause the ultimate particles of the soil to yield up 

 their constituents for the use of plants. Without 

 oxydation, the soil would be destitute of many of 

 these materials, which are rendered soluble and 

 fit food for plants by atmospheric agency. The 

 great constituent of all plants, carbon, exists in 

 the atmosphere as carbonic acid, and is received 

 from the decomposition of farm crops, animal res- 

 piration, etc. ; hence the great mass of all plants 

 is derived from the atmosphere, and if it be shut 

 out from freely circulating in the soil, we cannot 

 hope for profitable results. In the compost heap, 

 it is equally valuable, for both in it and the soil, 

 it is the vehicle, transferring heat and moisture. 

 The slightest reflection, therefore, will show the 

 farmer how necessary it is to manipulate his soil 

 so as to insure the easy ingress and egress of atmo- 

 spheric air. 



VALUE OF CARROTS. 



"Cattle become accustomed, during summer, to 

 green food, and when kept altogether on hay and 

 other dry fodder, they cease to take on flesh with 

 great rapidity. 



"The use of carrots, particularly, should be in- 

 troduced. Carrots for horses are now the ordina- 

 ry practice of even the livery stable keepers of the 

 larger cities. 



"A bushel of carrots and a bushel of oats fully 

 equal as food for the horse two bushels of oats ; 

 for although carrots do not contain the same 

 amount of nutriment by measure as the oats, still 

 their pectic acid gelatinizes the contents of the 

 stomach of the animal, and enables the oats to be 

 entirely digested." 



Too much money is paid out by farmers for 

 grain for their milch cows. There must be a more 

 general resort to roots to be fed with good Eng- 

 lish hay ; when these are in sufficient quantity to 

 carry the stock through the winter, there maybe 

 profit in producing milk for the market. 



Vegetables. — Put in the seed liberally for veg- 

 etables for winter feed for stock. They will pro- 

 mote the health of your cattle, save hay, and ena- 

 ble the milk-producer to keep his money, instead 

 of paying it out for grain. Sow various kinds, — 

 carrots, beets, parsnips, mangel wurzels and ruta 

 bagas; sow in small patches on diflerent soils, and 

 then, whether the season be wet or dry, a fair 

 crop may be expected. 



Buggy Peas. — Before sowing peas, immerse them 

 in hot water for a minute or two, by which means 



