THE GENESEE FARMER. 



333 



Fair at St. Lonis, the Wisconsin State Fair, as well 

 as the hundreds of equally useful town and country 

 fairs all deserve notice, but our space forbids. 



SPIRIT OF THE AGRICULTUEAL PRESS. 



Feuit Trees in the Vicinity of Barn- Yards. — 

 It would be well, says the Saratoga Farmer^ if 

 farmers would surround their barn-yards and pig- 

 pens with fruit trees. Such trees bear abundant- 

 ly, and heavy crops of plums can often be obtained 

 in such places, as the stung fruit is sure to be picked 

 up and devoured as soon as it falls, thus preventing 

 the increase of the curculio. Apples, pears, cher- 

 ries, and all other fruit, do well for the same rea- 

 son, and they are also provided with a plentiful 

 amount of liquid manure from the drainage of the 

 barn-yard. 



ChanctE of Seed. — The Irish Farmer''s Gazette 

 says, that " barley seed requires to be frequently 

 changed ; and if this is neglected, the result will be 

 a deterioration in the quality, which, of course less- 

 ens the value. In an article on the culture of flax 

 the editor of the Irish Agricultural Review, says 

 that a change of seed has proved "decidedly bene- 

 ficial." A correspondent of the Country Gentle- 

 viayi recently stated that he had found a change of 

 oats so important that he now imports his seed 

 trienuially from Prince Edwards Island, Canada. 



Ice Houses. — A correspondent of the Country 

 Gentleman says he had an ice house made two 

 years ago, 16 feet deep and 16 feet in diameter per- 

 fectly round, made of stone, plenty sand at the 

 bottom to take off all water. He filled it last win- 

 ter with snow ice, just threw it in without placing 

 it and covered with straw, (put straw at the bottom 

 on rails first.) more on the sides, and he had all the 

 ice he wanted and plenty left yet. 



Hemp in Minnesota. — During the past season, 

 says the American Agriculturist, many farmers 

 in Minnesota have undertaken the cultivation of 

 hemp, with very promising results. Heretofore this 

 crop has been mainly confined to Missouri and 

 Kentucky, where it forms a staple. The demand 

 exceeding the home grown supply, makes this a 

 profitable article where it succeeds. 



Preservation of Cut Flowers. — A French 

 Provincial paper states that cut flowers may be kept 

 fresh for a long time by the introduction of a spoon- 

 ful of powdered charcoal into the water contained 

 in the vessel in which they are placed. Neither the 

 charcoal nor the water requires renewal, the latter 

 remaining limpid. 



Mulching Wheat. — Dr C. Harlan of Wilming- 

 ton, Del. advocates mulching wheat. One way of 

 doing tliis is to sow buckwheat with the wheat in 

 the fall. He says the buckwheat " will often grow 2 

 feet high before the frost kills it. It will catch the 

 driving snows, and prevent the winds from sweep- 

 ing the earth away from the tender roots. It will 

 prevent the frosts from throwing out the crop ; and 

 when Spring returns, it will rot down, and assist 

 to nourish the young plant when it most needs it. 



This application of buckwheat, is not an untried 

 experiment. It was followed, and strongly recom- 

 mended, nearly 20 years ago, by Jas. Gaskins, who 

 published a valuable little work, in defence of this 

 practice." 



MAINE ITEMS. 



The Weather. — The last part of September was 

 very windy and cold, for successive days ; on the 

 equinox the wind blew a gale ; heavy "frosts were 

 prevalent, water congealed and the ground froze on 

 the night of the 2Sth and 29th : on the morning of 

 the 29th at sunrise, the thermometer indicated 28°. 

 The first killing frost of the season was on the 

 night of the 23rd ; the mean for September was 55.6°, 

 extremes 28'^ and 77°. 



Dahlias. — In the September Farmer you speak 

 of dahlias measuring upward of eight feet ; my 

 neighbor grew one- -a maroon color — the present 

 year which reached the length of eleven feet, but 

 the cold of last month ''laid it low." Isn't that 

 some dahlias for away down east ? 



Keeping Rats from Granaries. — Some grana- 

 ries in this section — where plenty of rjits do con- 

 gregate — are built upon round posts, tlie posts 

 covered with smooth sheet zinc or tin, to prevent 

 the rats climbing up, and provided with moveable 

 steps. 



Fattening Turkets. — The manner in which we 

 fatten turkeys hereabouts is to place them in a dark 

 pen furnished with a roost, and keep them stuffed 

 with corn meal dough, without giving them water ; 

 in nine days they are fit for market. Turkey raising 

 is not as a general result very profitable, they are 

 so liable to disease when young, and very trouble- 

 some to the farmer from their strong propensities 

 for ranging. 



Saving Corn. — It is the practice of farmers in 

 this vicinity who raise small amounts of corn, to 

 leave part of the husks upon all of the sound corn 

 that can be conveniently left when husking, and to 

 trace or braid tiie ears so left into strings, or traces 

 containing from forty to fifty ears to tlie trace, and 

 then hang upon poles in the garret or chamber. 



The superiority of this method consists in the 

 corn requiring no more trouble after it is hung up 

 — will not mold — and is free from the attack of rats 

 and mice. 



The weather for October, so fiir, has been capri- 

 cious and varied, warm rains, heavy winds, caim 

 days, alternating. There was a slight snow squall 

 on the evening of the 6 th, during a strong gale of 



wind. G. B. BBAOKETT. 



Belfast, Maine, 



