7S 



in the season ; and if by any accident of drought or insect of 

 blight the early plant is destroyed, the seasons here are not long 

 enough to give a good crop from late sowing. Not that we 

 would undervalue either of these roots. For dairy purposes 

 the Mangel is invaluable ; and careful experiments have shown 

 that feeding it is often attended with results superior to those 

 following the use of vSwedes, especially in fattening full-grown 

 cattle. Still the seed germinates with difficulty, the youno- 

 plants are tender, and less weight is obtained per acre than 

 from Swedes. So too of the carrot, when cultivated properly, 

 and selected well, there is no more useful crop, and perhaps 

 none more profitable. It is needless to enlarge upon this root 

 in Essex County, where our farmers have surpassed all others 

 in the size of their carrot crop, and where feeders have already 

 learned its value for horses, cattle and sheep. 



Bat it seems to us that the true value of the Ruta Baga or 

 Swedish turnip, is not yet fully known among us. It is to a 

 very considerable degree a substitute for the potatoe, which 

 formerly gave an ample reward for a small outlay of land, la- 

 bor, and capital, but which has now become one of the most 

 uncertain of all field-crops. It furnishes excellent food for 

 man as well as animals, can be cultivated at a very small ex- 

 pense, and is admirably adapted to much of the light soil of 

 the county. It grows with great luxuriance on new land. It 

 may be sown late in June, after other crops have had one hoe- 

 ing, and just before the busy season of haying begins, — in fact 

 Swedes for winter-store should not be sown earlier. The crop 

 may be easily managed with the horse-cultivator ; and, inas- 

 much as it will bear rough usage in early life with impunity, it 

 can be thinned with great rapidity with the common hoe — facts 

 worthy of consideration in the present scarcity and expense of 

 labor. 



The value of the turnip in English husbandry is so well 

 known, that it need only be referred to. A desire to impress 

 its value upon the minds of farmers here, induces us to enter 

 10 



