1880.] 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



Messrs. Lawes and Gill)ert, in fattening pig.s, 

 the average weight of the "offal parts" in 

 fifty-nine, modei-ately fat, was as follows, per 

 hundred pounds of live wciirlit : 



Stomach, intestines, bladder and their con- 

 tents, 7 lbs. '.H oz. ; liearl, lungs, liver and 

 sweet-bread, 2"lbs. 14 o/. ; caul and intestinal 

 fats, 1 lb. iU 07,. ; blood, :i lbs. 10 oz. ; other 

 parts and evaporation, 1 lb. l'2i oz. This 

 makes a total of about 17.4 pounds, and as the 

 pigs were only nioderately fat we would 

 probably have to alnite the weight a lil'th, or, 

 even a fourth in those tliat were <iuitc fat. 



The percentage of shrinkage is also much 

 influenced as to the time Ihe liogs are weighed 

 when alive. The th-st six in tlie table were 

 weighed just before feeding time,all the others 

 had been fasted, I think, perliaps, for as long 

 a time as .twenty-four hours. .Sncli a course 

 of fasting of course lessens the gross shrinkage 

 a great deal, and if now innjlhimj thai xci// or 

 canbe UKed be w^Mghed we have no doulit tliat 

 the shrinkage might be reduced to something 

 like six per cent. 



The usual published statement of the 

 shrinkage of hogs is of little value on account 

 of the vagueness of the term "offal." The 

 customary practice in buying and selling live 

 and dressed hogs weald serve as an excellent 

 standard, and would be something like the 

 following ; 



1. Weigh the hog just before feeding time. 



2. Weigh the dressed carcass only. 



This is fair for iill, for we know that the 

 carcass is used by all; in the other parts there 

 is this or that rejected as the fancy or the 

 taste of the person dictates. — A. £. K. 



For The Lancaster Farmer. 

 PROF. BLOUNT'S WHITE PROLIFIC 

 CORN. 



lu a late farm journal the announcement 

 was made that Prof. Blount's white prolific 

 corn should properly be named Blount's folly. 

 If such a notice had met my eye before I in- 

 vested fifty cents for a quarter of a pound of 

 said seed I probably would have left it alone. 

 But I have a turn for experimenting with 

 new varieties of seed, and where the "folly" 

 comes in in this experiment I am unable to 

 see. In order that the corn might be as much 

 as possible out of the reach of poUeu of other 

 varieties 1 was under the necessity of taking 

 a patch that was poor and otherwise unsnited 

 for a corn crop. The manure given the patch 

 was from 000 to 800 pounds of Acid South 

 Carolina Rock to the acre, and a handful of 

 hen manure to each stalk at hoeing time. 

 The ground was marked out three feet apart 

 about the middle of May, and the seed drop- 

 ped simply about two feet ai'iart. Owing to 

 the rough condition of the ^niund nearly one 

 third of the seed failed to grow, and after re- 

 planting there was still about one sixth of a 

 failure. 



The cultivation was thorough — deep 

 enough to satisfy the most radical root 

 pruner. 



Size of plot one-twelfth acre ; yield thirteen 

 bushels of ears which shelled .32 pounds to 

 the bushel, making at the rate of over eighty 

 five bushels per acre. If the set had been full 

 the yield would have been nearly one hundred 

 bushels per acre. Many of the plants had 

 from 2 to .5 and even more ears, eipiivalent to 

 ears from 20 to 40 inches long. There is 

 nothing extraordinaiy in the yield. One 

 hundred bushels of corn have often been 

 grown on an acre, and should much oftener 

 be grown. But m this case, taking into con- 

 sideration the quality of the land, fifty bushels 

 of our common varieties of corn would have 

 been an extra crop. 



In very rich soil this corn will have a ten- 

 dency to make immense stalks, and in this 

 probably the farm journal's "folly" lays. 



But, surely, the intelligent cultivator 

 knows that this exuberant plant growth can 

 by proper cultivation be checked, or I should 

 rather .say changed into a seed forming power. 

 If it should ever be practicable to doul)le om- 

 present yield of corn per acre, the result will 

 be attained by Blount's prolific, or by an im- 

 provement on it. 



A good sot, with .'50 inches of corn to each 

 stalk will make a yield of over l.'iO bushels 

 per acre. Who will be the first to accom- 

 l>lish it ? — Cnsifrr lliUer. 



BOTANY.* 



\Ve unquestionably live in an age of pro- 

 gress and improvement in the arts and 

 sciences, and wo are striving to effect a cor- 

 responding imiirovement in all that relates to 

 agriculture. We are inquiring how to in- 

 crease the products of the soil, and especially 

 our cereals. 



We meet on this occasion, however, more 

 particularly to discuss questions relating to 

 the improvement and increase in the quantity 

 and quality of our fruit; an occupation that 

 yields its pleasures, and at the same time its 

 compensations, not only to ourselves, but also 

 to the communities in which we live. It will 

 be generally admitted that the work in which 

 we are engaged is a praiseworthy one, an 

 object of pursuit in which more of our rising 

 generation ougnt to be engaged. The ques- 

 ti(jn arises, how to induce our boys and girls to 

 take an interest in tlie production of fruit, 

 and in general what may be termed the "■Staff 

 of Life." I am of the opinion that the study 

 of liotany in our public sch(X)ls would go very 

 far in familiarizing our children with plant- 

 life, and engender an interest in horticulture 

 and fioriculture at least. I would exalt botany 

 to a conspicuous position in the ciincuban of 

 the school, even if I were compelled to have a 

 little less astronomy, geography and geology. 

 A knowledge of the length of the River Nile, 

 or the Amazon; the height of the Himalayas, 

 or the Andes ; the depth of the Polar Sea, or 

 the German Ocean ; the distance from the 

 earth to the sun or moon ; the nature of 

 Saturn's rings, or the composition of Venus, 

 are all well enough in their way, and useful 

 as elements of knowledge, but it is a poor 

 compliment to knowledge to know all these 

 things and yet be totally ignorant of the 

 name, the habits and the development of the 

 commonest plant beneath your feet. The 

 first step to get the young folks interested in 

 liotany is to give them practical lessons on 

 dowers, plants, shrubs and trees. A small 

 garden should be attached to every play- 

 ground wherever it may be, and the.se .should 

 also occupy the campu.'i of every school. If 

 the scholars were to engage understandingly 

 in the cultivation of flowers, plants and 

 shrubbery, a majority of them, no doubt, 

 would become more or less interested in these 

 pleasant labors, which would ultimately re- 

 sult in a love for the occupation, and beget, as 

 it were, a "second nature," for 



"T'is education that forms the common miud, 

 Just as the twig is bent tlie tree's inclined." 



One of our greatest florists in the United 

 States was professionally a druggist. He 

 commenced the cultivation of a few flowers 

 as a first essay in floriculture, and from that 

 small- beginning he pressed onward and 

 upward until he attained the highest floral 

 fame. A German professor on the continent 

 of Europe commenced the cultivation of a few 

 flowers as a recreation and apleasuie, and 

 from that little beginning he continueii on step 

 by step increasing his knowledge of plant-life 

 and agricultural products until he became 

 famous. He made a special studj' of how to 

 improve poor and unproductive land.s. He 

 offered to start an agricultural school with a 

 special understanding that its canqms should 

 consist of 200 acres of what was considered 

 "wornout" land. He went to work on it, 

 and made it a fertile plantation, and that too 

 from fertilizing material which he found on 

 the place. He did not rely upon buying fer- 

 tilizers in order to enrich his soil. We are 

 not only not advancing in botany, but on the 

 contrary we .seem to be going backward in the 

 knowledge of plants and the nature and culti- 



•Re*d before the PennaylT*ia Fruit Orower*' Socist;, tt 

 Betblohem, Pa. 



vation of onr American forests. The reason 

 we are behind our German and English 

 cousins on the other side of the Atlantic is 

 that we have all imbibed too much of the 

 .spirit of "Young America'' — merely pecuni- 

 ary interests — or in plain English, making 

 money has almost absorbed our entire 

 thoughts and puiposes. The first question 

 asked is, "does it pay V" So I apprehend it 

 will be in regard to botany. Tlie question 

 will be asked "■does it paij ' not so much will 

 it pay lurenfter, but will it pay here and noic — 

 we want the golden eggs without waiting on 

 them — ^just iiour. 



As oni! of the evidences that we are going 

 backward — at least not forward — in botany, 

 I may mention that 1 know of a German 

 work on botany, published in Germany in 

 17:!1; it is well preserved, has 1200 pages 

 and ;5000 illustrations of the plants of Europe. 

 It is indexed in nine dill'erent languages, and 

 is a botanical and medical work combined. I 

 saw another work on the same subject, and 

 of the same size, in the librai^ of Abraham 

 Cassel, of Montgomery county, also indMced 

 in difl'erent languagesj which treats of vege- 

 tables, plants and fruit and forest trees, 

 published in 1741. I may also mention Philip 

 Miller's "Gardener's Dictionary," published 

 in Eondon in 1732. It is a folio of about 1,000 

 pages, without an index, but the subjects are 

 arranged alphabetically, and when compared 

 with modern works of the same character it 

 is difiicult to determine the amount and char- 

 acter of the progress we have made in 148 

 years, if any. Such valuable books were 

 never, to my knowledge, published in Ameri- 

 ca. If some of those old books were translat- 

 ed into the English Language, or the most 

 valuable extracts from them published in 

 volumes of smaller size, or were condensed 

 into common handbooks with the English 

 names attached to all the plants, shrubbery 

 and forest trees, it would be a benefit to the 

 agricultural community. 



Although the Latin names in botany, as a 

 general thing, are distasteful to those who 

 have received only a common school educa- 

 tion, and are not easily kept in memory, yet 

 I would not entirely discard them. They 

 might be so pareuthecised in italics that the 

 composition could be read without pronoun- 

 cing them, and still the sense be preserved; 

 because, however, objectionable they may be 

 they still perform an important use where 

 there is a different common name in different 

 localities for the same object. Ko doubt 

 these technical names have kept many young 

 folks from taking up botany as a study. I 

 have a variety of trees and shrubbery in my 

 enclosures, and veiy few would comprehend 

 such classical names as Conifer, Quercus, 

 ropuhm or lietnta, but the familiar names of 

 Pines, Oaks, Poplars or Birches, they would 

 readily luiderstand. These difliculties would, 

 however, in time be overcome if the study of 

 plants, shrubbery and fruit and forest trees 

 was introduced into our common, or public 

 schools. It would introduce a new era in our 

 system of education, in the engagements of 

 domestic life, and at the same time result in a 

 pecuniary benefit to the community and the 

 country. It would be the advent, as it were, 

 of a new creative power, and scripturally 

 assist the earth tn "bringing forth its 

 increase." It doubtless would also have a 

 tendency to keep our rising generation from 

 leaving their country homes and hankering 

 after the uncertain and im.satisfying bland- 

 ishments of city life, those homes where they 

 spent their earliest, their healthiest and their 

 happiest days, and where, instead of being 

 mere dependents, they could continue to be 

 local producers of the needed stufl" to feed a 

 hungry world. To benefit himself and supply 

 his city cousins with the "staff of life," 

 would "in all probability secure the country- 

 man the enjoyment of better health, and a 

 green old age," make December as pleasant 

 as May. " It might also eftect beneficially the 

 young folks who have been raised in cities and 

 towns; it might induce them to remove to and 

 settle in the country, where cheap lands could 



