CULTURE AND CURING IN NEW YORK. 



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This barn is built with gable roof, which sometimes contains ventilators, and doors are made in each end large 

 enough for the entrance of a wagon and team. Side or ventilating doors are made horizontal, and not vertical, 



and are hung with strap-binges, so as to be raised and hooked up. The siding is made of a good quality of pine 

 timber and painted. Blocks and tackle are arranged in the top, supporting a platform, on which the laths are placed 

 and hoisted to the tiers, generally by horse-power, the horse being hitched to the end of a rope. A room is built in 

 one corner, 12 by 14 feet, for stripping and assorting. This room is ceiled tightly and floored, and contains a stove, 

 on which a vessel of water is placed, to preserve a proper moisture in the air. Plenty of light and ample ventilation 

 are secured by doors and windows in the end and sides of the room. - This barn cost about $CO(, and the regulation 

 of its admirable ventilation is entirely within the control of the owner. The medium shed in general use costs less, 

 and is often merely a common farm barn altered to a tobacco-barn, and when not occupied with tobacco is used for 

 sheep and cattle. It is without a stripping and assorting room, and is a rude structure of unplatted boards. The 

 ventilating doors are vertical and hook back into staples. Sometimes these sheds are used for hay and grain, 

 and are often half full of hay and grain when a crop of tobacco is stored in the top for curing. One-third or 

 one-half of the sheds in Onondaga and Big Flats are of inferior or medium class, and their average cost is from 

 $200 to $300. They are too diversified in structure to be described. 



Sli3ds of a third class, of poor construction and badly adapted for the housing and curing of even a small 

 quantity of tobacco, are found in large numbers throughout the district, but a description of these is unnecessary. / 



In such f barn as the first described, 28 by 80, with 24-feet posts and five tiers, four acres of 6,000 plants to 

 the acre can be housed. The best sheds are ventilated in the top, so the ascending moist air from the green plants 

 can be liberated and a free current circulated through the tobacco from bottom to top. Experience alone can 

 teach when this is needed in the process of curing. 



CURING OF TOBACCO. 



Seed-Leaf raised upon Rome soils cannot be cured dark, while other soils will grow a plant which, with any 

 ordinary care, will make a c. k tobacco. The curer can do a great deal to regulate the process and secure the color 

 desired if the shed is properly constructed, so that the ventilation can be perfectly controlled. It must be kept 

 closed in hot, dry weather, or the rays of the sun will bleach the leaves, and neither light nor air should be 

 admitted. Sometimes moisture is lacking, and it is necessary to place straw on the ground, and to keep it moist. 

 One of the most experienced growers, however, declares that tobacco must never be cured over a plank floor or 

 over straw, but, if necessary, the earthen floor must be moistened. When the crop is first housed, or when the 

 weather is very moist and warm, the ventilators are kept open, and with continual watchfulness and proper 

 regulation of them extremes of dryness and dampness may be avoided. Daring and after curing great care is 

 necessary to obtain and preserve the colors of a good leaf, to avoid poio-sweat and stem-rot, and, while there is tnucli 

 badly-cured tobacco, it is almost all found to come from poorly-constructed, badly-ventilated sheds. Insiifiirient or 

 badly-managed ventilation is the chief cause of bad curing. The part of the crop next the door is often bleached by 

 too much air or sunshine, and other parts show house-burned spots or "fat stem". Stem-rot is indicated by a moldy, 



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