I¥EW ENOtAIVD FARMER, 



AND GARDENER'S JOURNAT, 



i^:::f:!:!L!i^f!:!.i^^^ 



VOL. XIII. 



G. FESSENDEN, EDITOR. 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, APRIL I, 1835. 



Ilou. S. LATIIROP'S ADDRESS 



BBFOIIE THE 



HAMPSHIBE, HAMPDE.f AND FRAWKLIN 

 AGRICULTURAt, SOCIETY. 

 (Concluded from page 290.] 



There can be no doubt of the utility, I will not 

 »y in.lispensable necessity, but of the great util- 

 ity of the application of stimulants, even upon our 

 ?ood land. Those most commonly used for the 

 >urpose, arc Gy|)sum and Lime. 



Gypsum, or Plaster of Paris has contributed 

 jreatly to the improvement of our husbandry and 

 o the fertility of our soils. In the use of it, we 

 lave been enabled to increase the quantity of our 

 lay, and thus to increase the quantity of manure, 

 nd in the application of the Utter, to add dma- 

 'le fertility to our .soils. In years past, it has 

 ieen considered as an almost indispensable requi- 

 ite to the successful culture of wheat, cither by 

 owing it with grain, or by applying it afterwards. 

 .ut the stunulating properties of gypsum seem to 

 e wholly lost upon those lands to which it has 

 >ng been applied, and for some years past it has 

 roved as inert and useless as any other substance, 

 a our experience, plaster has nearly lost its value, 

 id its use is discontinued. Whether, after a 

 w years' discontinuance, the soil has not under- 

 >ne such modifications as to be again prepared <o 

 ceive it, and to rencv/ the evidence of its utility 

 deserving of an experiment. ' 



Lime, in some parts of our own country, as well as 

 Europe, is used with great success in the wheat 

 r.sl>andry, and is considered by some -writers, as 

 esseutial ingredient to the perfect maturity' of 

 B grain. Some small portions of this article, or 

 other substances intimately allied to it, are 

 lud to exist in all our sandy loams ; and these 



found to be among our best soils for the wheat 



). The application of additional quantities 

 sowing it with the grain, or as a top dressing 

 the spnng of the year, will contribute to the 

 rease of the crop. The expense attending its 



in this part of our country, will prevent its 

 ilication to any very considerable extent. But 

 t should be used in the manner in which we 

 ^e been accustomed to use plaster, we shall find 

 ole remuneration for the expense, 

 ^fter all, our chief resources for keeping up 

 increasing the fertility of our good soils, 

 he restoration of our exhausted soils, must be 

 :ed upon the barn, and upon green crops. 

 :3C will add much fertility to the soil. Their 

 lizing properties will not be exhausted with a 

 le crop ; and the prudent and economical 

 Mnduian will give such a rotation to his crops 



this increase of fertility, when once acquired, 

 I never be exhausted, but go on increasing 



every succession of his course. 



has been made a question, whether animal 

 ure, that of our stables and yards, is suited to 

 growth of wheat. A gentleman who has 

 itained a high standing among the learned 



of our country, and of whom our neighbors 

 orthamptou take pride in having given him 



NO. 38. 



hirth, has advanced his opinion that it is delete- 

 rious,—" that it induces plethora in the plant, or 

 an excess of sap in the stalk, which, not finding a 

 ready pjissage in warm and damp weather, rup- 

 tures the sap vessels, flows out uj.on the surface, 

 becomes acrid, corrodes the straw, induces . rust 

 and blasts the grain." Perhaps no man was a 

 inore minute and accurate observer of men and 

 tliing.s, and of everything, than the late president 

 Dwiglu. But I should be willing to place a 

 much greater reliance upon his opinion in theol- 

 o.ffy, than in practical husbandrv. He has with 

 great accuracy, described the process by which 

 the grain becomes blasted, but I apprehend that 

 he has wholly mistaken the cause. More than 

 tliirty years of personal experience, (the experi- 

 ence of every year during that period) has afford- 

 ed me satisfactory evidence (an.l many of my 

 neighbors can say the same) that the manure of 

 tlie barn may most suceessfullv be applied in the 

 culture of wheat. Its application, however, is 

 commonly made to the preceding crop, and, be- 

 fore the seed of the wheat crop is committed to the 

 earth, has nearly gone through the process of fer- 

 mentation and decomposition. Whether there 

 "light not be some truth in Dr. Dwight's observa- 

 lion, if confined in its application to dun-r in its 

 green and unf.^rmented state, is a point upon which 

 i have had no experience. But at the season for 

 sowing wheat, very little manure of that description 

 can be found. If it has been suffered to lie about 

 our barns through the summer, it has gone through 

 lie principal part of the process of fermentation 

 has become decomposed, and iu that state may 

 profitably be applied with the newly sown grain 

 Numerous instances of its application at the time 

 of sowing, have come under my observation, and 

 uniformly it has been applied with great success. 

 VVhile I dissent from the conclusion drawn bv 

 Mus eminent divine, respecting the influence of 

 animal manure, I should, with gqual confidence 

 differ m opinion with one of the most distinguish- 

 ed agriculturists of the present day, who, in com- 

 menting upon that conclusion, ascribes the fi-e 

 quent failure of the wheat crop in New En<rland 

 to the want of the specific food of the plant, L the' 

 soil. Now I believe it would be difficult for any 

 one to show that wheat is more liable to blast in 

 New England, than in other districts of our coun- 

 try. In my own experience wheat has not been 

 more subject to blast than rye. This blight upon 

 our hopes is of rare occurrence, and public opin- 

 ion has j.robably settled the question correctly as 

 to the true cause of the blast on our English grain 

 It IS atmospheric, and is produced by an exces 

 sive degree of lieat and moisture, when the .^rain 

 IS in a particular stage of its formation. If the 

 blast IS to be attributed to the want of food in the 

 soil, why should the same field, under precisely 

 the same course of husbandry, at one time pro- 

 duce a liberal crop, and at another experience a I 

 partial or total failure 'i It is not my iiuention, 

 however, to intimate that our soil ia as favorable 

 to the culture of this grain, as the wheat districts ' 



of New York and of some of the other States • 

 I hey are more sure of an abundant croj., and thi- 

 may be attributed to the more abundant supply of 

 the specific food of the plant in the .soil. At the 

 same time, it must be observed, that, with us 

 when the .soil is in proper condition, well prepar- 

 ed for the seed, and the grain is sown in season 

 It seldom fails of rewarding the confidence of the 

 agriculturist, with a fair return. Cases of failure 

 may generally be accounted fo.-, either from th- 

 poverty or the want of life and activity in the soil 

 —from an msiiflicient preparation of "the ground 

 by a parsimonious withholding of the degree o-^ 

 labor requisite to its pulverization, or by sowing ii 

 at a very late season of the year. More failure, 

 of crops may probably be attributed to the latter 

 cause, than to all others. Much of your wheat is 

 sown after corn. It has been found difficult in 

 ordinary seasons, and impossible in unfavorable 

 seasons to gather the latter crop in season to .sow 

 the seed of the former. It gains but a slender 

 hold of the soil before the setting in of winter 

 and the roots are easily loosened or broken, by the 

 freezings and Ihawings of autumn and spring. 



The manure heap ia the farmer's gold mine 

 and o^ this he must place his chief reliance. K 

 difference of opinion, as well as a diversity of 

 pr.-,c-,.-.e ;revails, relative to the state or condition 

 of the manure, previous to its application to the 

 soil, that IS, whether it is most useful to apply it in 

 Its raw state, without subjecting it to the process 

 of fermentation, or whether it will produce a 

 greater effect by previous decomposition— by be- 

 ing thoroughly rotted. In some ,.arts of our state 

 the manure made in winter is considered as unfit 

 for the soil, till the subsequent autumn, and among 

 us It IS a common practice to deposit the manure 

 in large heaps, on the field where it is to be used 

 with the intention that it shall go tlirough a partial 

 fermentation. I have frequently adopted this 

 practice, in imitation of those, whom I considered * 

 among our most judicious faimers. But experi- 

 ence, observation, reflection, and attention to the 

 observations of others, have convinced me, that 

 every degree of fijrmcntation in manure des'igned 

 tor ploughed land, is absolute waste. True the 

 decomposition must take place before it can be 

 taken up as food for the plants, but then this 

 process may be carried on in the soil, while the 

 seeds are vegetating and putting forth their roots 

 and blades, with equal advantages, and by their 

 gradual decay, fresh food will be furnished to the 

 plants, as they advance in their growth, and when 

 this takes place beneath the ground, there is a 

 great saving of the strength and nutritious power 

 of the manure. Whoever has stood to the lee- 

 ward of a dung heap, when in a state of fermen- 

 tation, and witnessed the evaporation, and per- 

 ceived the strong effluvia escaping from the heap, 

 must have been impres.sed with the fact that no' 

 small portion of its strength and virtue is passing 

 off into the air. That which thus escapes, is the 

 most subtile and nutritive part, the most enrichino. 

 to the soil— it is that which imparts the most life" 



