FARMS. 13 



with birch branches tied on the teeth ; it does the work in a 

 better manner than the old-fashioned bush harrow. 



I have sometimes used lime and plaster on the land as an 

 experiment, but never with any good success. Guano I con- 

 sider too expensive for a farm. I plough from ten to eleven 

 and a half inches deep with the Michigan plough. I consider 

 deep ploughing as absolutely essential to a good crop, particu- 

 larly in a dry season. 



I kept the last season eight cows, one yoke of oxen, two 

 horses, and from six to ten swine. Each fall I am in the habit 

 of purchasing fifteen heifers with calf, to keep over, to eat up 

 the corn stover, oat straw, &c, and to make manure. These I 

 sell again in the spring at a liberal advance. To do the work 

 on the farm, I require and use one pair of horses and one yoke 

 of oxen. The kind of swine I prefer is a cross of one-half 

 native and one-half Suffolk. For cows, I have found the native 

 and Ayrshire half bloods the best for dairy purposes. 



In 1853 my wheat field consisted of about four acres, from 

 which I received one hundred and two bushels of wheat, which 

 I sold for one hundred seventy-eight dollars and forty-six cents, 

 and the straw, of which there were six tons, for eighty-five dol- 

 lars and sixty-five cents, making the whole amount of receipts 

 from this single field two hundred sixty-four dollars and eleven 

 cents. My wheat I sow about the tenth of September, two 

 bushels to the acre. I do not approve of using manure as a 

 top dressing. I think that, by this mode of applying manure, 

 at least fifty per cent, of the strength is lost by evaporation. 



I keep a journal of all my farming operations, under various 

 heads. The farm is divided into nine different lots. I keep a 

 separate account, debt and credit for each lot, charging it with 

 the amount expended upon it day by day, by way of labor, or 

 for manure and seed, and crediting it with the products re- 

 ceived from it. At the close of the year the balance is struck, 

 showing at a glance the gain or loss for the season. 



In the statement below I give the result of my farming opera- 

 tions for the year 1853, taken from my books. The results of 

 the present year I, of course, cannot as yet ascertain ; I can 

 guess how much corn and wheat, <fec, I am going to have. But 

 as the committee observed, I have no column in my book for 



