212 PLAIN AND PLEASANT TALK 



SUN-FLOWER SEED. 



To some extent this is likely to become a profitable crop. 

 Medium lands will yield, on an average, fifty bushels; 

 while first-rate lands will yield from seventy to a hundred 

 bushels. 



Mode of Cultivation. — ^The ground is prepared in all 

 respects as for a corn crop, and the seed sown in drills four 

 feet apart — one plant to every eighteen inches in the drill. 

 It is to be plowed and tended in all respects like a crop of 

 corn. 



Harvesting. — ^As the heads ripen, they are gathered, 

 laid on a bam floor and threshed with a flail. The seed 

 shells very easily. 



Use. — The seed may be employed in fattening hogs, feed- 

 ing poultry, etc., and for this last purpose it is better than 

 grain. But the seed is more valuable at the oil-mill than 

 elsewhere. It will yield a gallon to the bushel without 

 trouble ; and by careful working, more than this. Hemp 

 yields one and a fourth gallons to the bushel, and flax-seed 

 one and a half by ordinary pressure ; but two gallons under 

 the hydraulic press. 



The oil has, as yet, no established market price. It will 

 range from seventy cents to a dollar, according as its value 

 shall be established as an article for lamps and for painters' 

 use. But at seventy cents a gallon for oil, the seed would 

 command fifty-five cents a bushel, which is a much higher 

 price than can be had for corn. 



It is stated, but upon how sufiicient proof we know not, 

 that sun-flower oil is excellent for burning in lamps. It has 

 also been tried by our painters to some extent; and for 

 inside work, it is said to be as good as linseed oil. Mr. 

 Hannaman, who has kindly put us in possession of these 

 facts, says, that the oil resembles an animal, rather than 

 a vegetable oil ; that it has not the varnish properties 

 of the linseed oil. We suppose by varnish is meant, 



