190 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



fertilizers based on sound principles, like the Stockbridge 

 fertilizers, that have been discussed here this morning. But 

 to ensure good crops of onions, or of any vegetable, we must 

 have good manure, and plenty of it. We must have good 

 land, we must have good culture, and, above all, we must 

 have good seed, without which success is impossible. 



I had got as far as manuring the land ■in the fall of the year. 

 If you have manure, put it on in the fall of the year, and 

 plough it in ; and. in the spring, as soon as the land is dry 

 enough to work in a comfortable way, — never work land in 

 the spring when it will work clammy, — go over the ground 

 with a revolving harrow (we call them pulverizing harrows), 

 which will do the work sufficiently, without any ploughing, 

 and do it very effectively, leaving the land in perfect condi- 

 tion for after-cultivation. After this pulverizing harrow has 

 done its work, then go on with the drag, which I shall explain 

 directly, drag the ground down smooth, and sow the seed, 

 sowing from two and a half to three and a half pounds to the 

 acre. After that, of course, the crop requires careful culture, 

 and I will pursue the weeding and harvesting of the onion 

 crop at this time, and finish it up, which will bring out an 

 explanation of some of the implements that are used. 



I will commence with the drag. I have made a small model 

 of a drag, for the reason that I found it rather difficult by 

 words to make myself clearly understood by persons who had 

 never seen a drag of this kind. This model is supposed to 

 be eight feet long, and three and a half feet from that point 

 to this, in width. This turned part, representing the front 

 part of a sled, is one foot wide, made of two-inch spruce 

 plank. Here are three by four or three by five joist, spiked 

 across the drag at equal distance from the ends, with a staple 

 in each, to which the chain is attached. The horses are 

 hitched to the centre, the man riding here. This drag will 

 break up the lumps and leave the ground in better condition 

 than it can be put by raking, and with very little labor. And 

 above all, do not forget, in the construction of this drag, to 

 nail a narrow cleat lengthwise of the centre of the drag, which 

 may be a strip of board, one inch by three. The importance 

 of that is, that it fills all the tracks of the horses. That little 

 cleat drags the surface of the ground before it, and tills all the 





