NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



blibhed every Saturday, by THOMAS W. SHI:FA1U), Holers' liuildinj:, C;oii,2:ri-ss t^trK t, Boslo 



it S-',50 per anil, in advaiin-, or $3,00 at the close of the year. 



i-^OL. I. 



BOSTOiN, SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 1822. 



No. 3. 



From the American Farmer. I 



le immense importance pf durable timber for farming ] 

 as well as naval purposes, gives an interest to every 

 judicious, or even plausible speculation on the sub- 

 ject. The communication from a person of Commo- 

 dore Porter's intelligence, will of course attract at- 

 t'lition : especially when viewed in connexion with 

 hi, .nHcial station, which peculiarly demands the best 

 attainable knowledge of the matter. Believing the 

 opinion he has given, which is, and probably has 

 been for ages that generally received, to be errone- 

 ous ; and thinking it possible that 1 might throw 

 some light on the subject ; — I submit to your readers 

 the following observations on the 



FELLING OF TREES FOR TIMBER. 



In the 22d number, volume III, of the Amer- 

 an Fanner, is a letter from D. Porter, (com- 

 otlorc Porter) on " The best time to fellTim- 

 ;r with a view to its (hirability" ; in answer 



one from the Editor, requesting a communi- 

 ition on the subject. The commodore, " avail- 

 Ef himself (as he says) of the knowledge and 

 iiperience of others, in support of his opinion," 

 ates this to be, that " the most proper season 

 if felling timber with a view to its durability, 



in the winter, when the sap has ceased to cir- 

 ilate." This corresponds with the opinion 1 

 ave heard generally expressed, ever since I 

 Dticed observations on the subject ; and the 

 recise time in the winter is fixed, by tradition, to 

 the old of the moon in February." 



Many years (perhaps half a century) have 

 (lapsed, since 1 have been inclined to doubt 

 'hether the animal and vegetable kingdoms 



ere under the government of the moon. The 

 jmmodore thinks its " influence nearly if not 

 luite as powerful as [that of] the sun." He 

 Bks, " why that body [the moon] whose attrac- 

 ons can raise the tides and influence all animal 

 reation, should not have the power to put the 

 ip of vegetables into circulation, assisted as it is 

 y capillary attraction ?" — As heat is essentia) 

 J give motion to the sap in plants, and the hea. 

 f the sun is adequate to that effect, it is not ne 

 essary to seek for any other cause ; still less ti 

 esort to one merely conjectural. No means yei 

 ried have discovered any heat in the rays o. 

 ight from the moon. 



If any effects on vegetation were ascribable to 

 he moons attraction, yet in an entire revolution, 

 ts diflerent distances are not so considerable, a- 

 produce very different effects. Besides coni- 

 lining its different periods, it is as near the earth 

 n its decrease, as in its increase ; and its pow- 

 ;r of attraction must be the same in both cases. 

 The sowing of seeds, therefore, and their vege- 

 ation, and the growth of the plants proceeding 

 "rem them, cannot, (as the commodore seems to 

 suppose) be influenced by the phases or appear- 

 mces of the moon. The notion of the moon"'; 

 'influence on all animal creation," if not a nov- 

 jlty, I believe to be altogether visionary. An- 

 iently, indeed, mad people were supposed to 

 be affected or influenced by the moon ; and 

 thence were called lunatics : but that opinion 

 seems now to be exploded. I am indeed satis'l- 

 ed (contrary to the general belief) that ckanges in 

 the weather have no dependence on the moon ; 

 but happen indifferently at all periods of its in- 

 Srease and decrease. It has not heat to raise wa- 



tery vapours from the earth, or to suspend them 

 in the air ; and under the same aspect of the 

 moon, the weather is fair at one place and foul 

 in another. 



No one can doubt that " dryness is favorable 

 and moisture unfavorable to the durability of 

 timber ;" and in winter the sap of trees is prob- 

 ably inspissated to a considerable degree ; but 

 no living tree is then '• devoid of sap." — The 

 important question, therefore, in relation to the 

 felting of timber trees, is, I am inclined to think, 

 not simply Xi'he7i trees have the smallest quantUy of 

 sap ; but at Xii/iaf season the sap they Contain -jcill 

 most easily escape or be expelled. The facts 1 am 

 going to state may show this to be in the spring, 

 wlien the sap is thinnest and flowing in the 

 greatest abundance. 



In the year 1800, divested of public employ- 

 ment, and about to commence husbandman, I 

 made a visit to the late Joseph Cooper, of New 

 .lersey, one of the most intelligent farmers I ev- 

 er knew, to converse with him on the subject 

 of his vocation. Among other things, he spoke 

 of timber ; and stated the following facts. His 

 farm lying on the Delaware river nearly oppo- 

 site to Philadelphia, was exposed to the rava- 

 ges of the British army while occupying that 

 city. Pressed for fuel, his fences first fell a prey 

 to their necessities. In the month of May 1778, 

 they cut down a quantity of his white oak trees : 

 but circumstances requiring their sudden evacu- 

 ation of the city, his fallen timber was saved. — 

 The trees he split into posts and rails. The 

 ensuing winter, in the old of the moon in Februa- 

 ry, he felled an additional quantity of his white 

 oaks, and split them also into posts and rails to 

 carry on his fencing. It is now, said he two 

 uid twenty years since the fences made of 

 the May-felled timber were put up, and Ihey 

 are yet sound ; whereas those made of the 

 trees felled in February, were rotting in about 

 1:2 years. He then pronounced confidently, that 

 the best time for Jelling timber trees, for durability, 

 .cas when their sap ■aas vigorously Jloiuing. He 

 ^aid, also, that white oak and hickory trees foil- 

 ed at that season, would not be attacked by the 

 ivorms, producing what is called " powder post." 

 And added that hoop-poles of oak and hickory 

 ought, for this reason to be cut the same season. 



In the same year, accident threw in my way 

 •.he late Oliver Evans' book on the construction 

 of mills ; to which was subjoined a treatise of a 

 Mr. Ellicot, a mill wright, on the same subject. 

 Turning over some of the leaves of this trea- 

 tise, I lighted on the passage in which the au- 

 thor directed hickory timber, intended for the 

 cogs of wheels, to be cut when the sap was run- 

 ning, that they might not become powder post. — In 

 the following winter (1801) being in Boston, 

 and conversing with a friend from the country 

 on subjects of husbandry, I repeated Mr. Coop- 

 er"'s observations, as aliove stated. This friend 

 then mentioned a farmer, the well pole (or 

 sweep) of whose well happened to break at a very 

 '>usy time : that to supply its place, he cut down 

 the first small tree that came to hand , and this 

 was a white birch. The sap then running free- 

 ly, he stripped off the bark, and put up his pole ; 

 and it lasted seventeen years. Had he put it up 



with the bark on, it would probably have rotted 

 in a year ; the closeness of the birch hark present- 

 ing the escape of the .sap. A close coat of jiaint, 

 laid on unseasoned wood, operates like the close 

 birch bark, by confining the sap, and hastening 

 its decay.* 



More than fifty years* ago, feeing a quantify 

 of logs with the bark on, piled up by a chair 

 maker's shop, 1 asked him why he did not split 

 them, that they might the sooner get seasoned. 

 He answered, that so long as the bark remain- 

 ed on the logs the sap remained in them, and 

 they were more easy to be dressed and turned. 

 0:;5"Un!ess timber trees he cut when the sap i.= 

 running, the bark cannot be stripped ofl ; tho' 

 with considerable labor it may be removed by 

 the axe and drawing knife ; but less porfectlj'. 



The late Mr. Bordley (who was vice-presi- 

 dent of the Philadelphia Society of Agriculture, 

 from its formation in 1785, until his death) once 

 told me, that when riding in the vicinity of 

 Philadelphia, he met a master ship-builder, who 

 had been viewing some trees for ship timber. 

 Mr. Bordley mentioned to him the greater val- 

 ue of ships built with the tinibt'r of trees allow- 

 ed to remain gfandiiig a length of time after 

 their bark had been stripped oft". The ship- 

 wright said he was fully sensible of it ; the ships 

 would last so much longer. Why then, asked 

 Mr. Bordley, do you not adopt that practice ? 

 Because, said the shipwright, such timber be- 

 comes very hard, and costs much more labor to 

 work it. — ^I have heard new settlers dispute, 

 which was the best way of clearing woodlands ; 

 whether by girdling (chopping the bark all 

 round the trees to stop the circulation of the 

 sap, when the}' gradually die) and letting the 

 tree stand ; and at once seeding the land for 

 a crop : or by cutting all down at first, and burn- 

 ing. The advocates of the latter mode, said, 

 that by girdling and letting the trees stand, they 

 became dry, and so hard as greatly to increase 

 the labor of afterwards cutting them down. 



"Dr. Plott [who wrote in the 17th century] 

 says, it is found by long experience, that the 

 trunks or bodies of trees when barked in the 

 spring, and left standing naked all the summer, 

 exposed to the sun and the wind, are so dried 

 and hardened, that the sappy part in a manner 

 becomes as firm and durable as the heart itself'i 

 This is confirmed by M. Bufl'on, who in 1738, 

 presented to the Royal Academy of Sciences at 

 Paris, a memoir, entitled " An easy method of 

 increasing the solidit}', strength and duration of 

 timber ;" for which purpose he observes, " noth- 

 ing more is necessary than to strip the tree en- 

 tirely of its bark during the season of the rising 

 of the sap, and to leave it to dry before it be 

 cut dowii."t 



* In confirmation of the opinions advanced by Col. 

 Pickering, we can add, that poles cut from the green 

 willow, the tenderest and least durable of our trees, in 

 June, and stripped, became extremely tough and hard, 

 so as to be applicable to many uses, such as ladders, 

 &c. for which spruce is used. The loppings of all trees 

 cut off in .lime become extremely hard, and will endure 

 for years without rotting. These we know to be facts. 



Editors. 



t See British Encyclopaedia, article Tree ; also Rees' 

 Cyclopedia, article Timber. 



