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The Canadian Horticulturist. 



VINEGAR MAKING. 



HE Farmers' Call gives the following hints on vinegar making, 

 which, it says, are based on years of practical experience : — One 

 of the common uses now made of the apple crop in many sec- 

 tions, is to convert a large part of it into vinegar. With many 

 farmers this has entirely superseded making cider for a beverage, 

 and from the fact that less care is necessary in gathering the fruit, it is found 

 fully as profitable. When made in large quantities the process begins as soon 

 as enough apples have fallen from the trees to furnish a supply. 



The apples are ground in mills, as for cider, and the juice may be expressed 

 at once, but more commonly the pomace is kept in vats or hogsheads until it 

 has fermented and become quite sour before the pressing is done. This sour 

 cider is then allowed to settle and is run into barrels, but not quite full. 

 Throughout the fall season these barrels should be kept in the sun, covered 

 with loose boards as a protection to the cooperage, and the bungs should be 

 left out until it is necessary to remove them for the winter. The bungholes 

 should be covered with bits of thin netting that will keep out insects without 

 excluding the air. 



Experience has demonstrated that a barrel contains about the right quantity 

 of liquid, and an open bunghole gives sufficient exposure to the atmosphere for 

 making vinegar of the best quality by this slow, natural process. Some dilution 

 with water is often necessary where the cider is so rich in saccharine matter as to 

 prevent its turning to vinegar in a reasonable length of time. 



Vinegar barrels should be iron-hooped and be kept well painted to resist 

 exposure and prevent leakage. The natural process will require a year or more 

 of time to produce an article acid enough to meet the requirements of the 

 market, but it will continue to grow stronger by age, and will admit of sufficient 

 dilution to compensate for loss by evaporation and leakage. 



The natural process of vinegar making may be accelerated by occasionally 

 running the cider from one barrel into another, and thus exposing it for a time 

 more fully to the air. Adding a gallon or two of strong vinegar or a little 

 mother to each barrel of sour cider is another method. Still another method 

 is trickling it down through beech chips or shavings, and corncobs saturated 

 with strong old vinegar. 



Summer pruning is desirable because the wound heals rapidly, and is 

 not followed by an excessive growth of water sprouts. The objection to summer 

 pruning is the supposed shock to the tree by cutting away boughs in the growing 

 season. The objection is mostly avoided by annual pruning and a little atten- 

 tion to water sprouts. 



