[^ ) 802 THE GENESEE FAEMEE. U -^ 



^ound. Tillage increases the solubility and solution of these substances, which are the 

 food of plants ; and hence tillage at the time of planting and afterwards augments the 

 feeding and growth of crops. 



Having decided to plow a field in the fall, we should not hesitate to break up the 

 subsoil a little deeper than it was ever before exposed to the light, heat, frost, and 

 atmospheric gases above ground. These are powerful chemical agencies, and admirably 

 adapted to deepen and improve a soil. If one can turn under a good coat of grass, 

 weeds, mold, or manure, so much the better for the land. Break the ground fine — 

 that is, cut narrow furrows, as well as deep ones, that the tillage may be perfect. 



Interesting Experiments in Pork-Making. — The L'ish Farmers^ Gazette contains 

 an interesting experiment in ftvttening hogs by feeding one lot on cooked turnips and 

 barley meal, and another on raw turnips crushed, adding meal, and permitting the mass 

 to ferment before being fed. There were four hogs in each lot. Those fed on cooked 

 turnips weighed, when the experiment commenced, on the 27th November, 1852, 816 

 pounds. This lot were fed three times a day, and consumed 280 pounds daily, steamed 

 and mixed with 12 lbs. of bran and barley meal. In thirty-nine days they had gained 

 an average each of 103 lbs., or an aggregate of 412 lbs. To produce this gain there 

 were consumed 9,920 lbs. of turnips, and 468 lbs. of bran and barley meal. The other 

 lot of four hogs weighed, at the commencement of the experiment, 792 lbs. They, 

 too, were fed three times a day, and consumed 140 lbs. pulped turnips, fermented and 

 mixed with 12 lbs of bran and meal. It will be seen that the hogs fed on raw turnips 

 consumed just half the quantity given to the others, while they gained an average each 

 of 110 lbs, and 28 lbs. more than those fed on cooked turnips. In cooking the latter, 

 just a ton of coal was consumed in the thirty-nine days. How the turnips were crushed 

 to a pulp is not stated ; it might be done in a bark-mill, or other machine made for the 

 purpose. The pulped turnips, bran, and meal stood three or four days before feeding. 

 E;ich tub had an orifice in the bottom for a part of the water in the turnips to run out 

 into troughs, which otherwise was found to check the fermentation. The liquor received 

 in the troughs was fed to young pigs. We suspect that turnips naturally contain too 

 much water (over 90 per cent.) to fatten hogs economically. A part of the nutritive 

 element in the turnips passes out of the system by the bowels, and a part from the thin 

 blood, by the kidneys, dissolved in an excess of urine. A little less of the roots, and 

 more barley, oat, or corn meal, would be cheaper and better feed. 



i!) 



Washtngton AoRicuLTtiRAL IxsTiTTmE. — It 18 known to our readers that the Monnt Yernon estate, 

 the home of Washington, has recently been contracted to a comjiany at the round sum of $200,000, 

 with the reservation that if Consjress shall decide to purchase at the same price, it is to bo trans- 

 ferred to the Government. Public sentiment has been directed to the subject in a considerable 

 degree since tliis proposition was made public, and we tliink there has been a very general approval 

 of the project of inirchase by the Government. Should this question be settled affirmatively by 

 the next Congress, the question will then arise as to the disposition which shall be made of the 

 grounds, and in what manner they shall be improved. With a proper system of management and 

 appropriate improvements, Mount Vernon might become a great place of resort for all who revere 

 the memory of the Father of his Country. 



Among the propositions suljmitted through the public press, is one from the Rochester American 

 which seems to merit more attention than has been given to any other suggestions wo have seen 

 upon the subject. We quote from that pajier as follows : ; 



"It \i well known that the jirofesson which WAsniNotoN loved above all others was that of the 

 farmer. Ho jirosscd upon the attention of Congress in his List annual message the importance of 

 agriculture, and the duty of Government to ])romoto it.s improvement by proper pecuniary assist- 

 ance. For reasons that we need not discuss, the wise and patriotic suggestions of the illustrious 

 Farmer of Mount Vernon in behalf of agriculture were never acted on by an American Congress, 

 and the sciences of tillage and husbandry have never been fostered in the United States. We can 

 not believe that this gc^ieral neglect of the study of agriculture is much longer to continue ; and if 

 a beginning b ever to bo made for the solid advancement of rural knowledge, it is eminently fitting 



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