244 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER 



FEBRUARY 8, ISi'?. 



RAISING AVHEAT. 



, Mr Holmes : — 1 am pleased to find the ];eo- 

 ple of this section of the country awake to the 

 siil)ject of raisins wheat. In regard to the snh. 

 ject I will relate to you a little of my exuerierice. 

 I have followed farmin;; for upwards of 30 years, 

 and have senerally raised my wheat from land that 

 had been planted the year previous ; hut within a 

 few years, I find tliat good wheat can be raised by 

 a differnit method to a better advanlage. In Sep- 

 tember, 1833, I broke op one acre of liirht loamy 

 land (not by any means my best) which had been 

 pastiu'ed three years with sheep, intending to jdant 

 it the next year with corn. The ensuing spring 

 being cold and backward, I conchided to sow it 

 to wheat. I accordingly spread seven or eight 

 loads of old mellow niamn'e, which I intended to 

 have put into the hill if I had jilanted it with corn. 

 I sowed two bushels of wlieat on th<! acre of 

 ground and gave it a thorough, harrowing. It 

 came up and did well. )n the following Decem- 

 ber 1 thrashed it, and had 52 bushels of wheat — 

 no mistake. 



From the above 1 am led to make the follow- 

 ing caleuliition. Wheat at that time was worth 

 •SI, 50 to grind into flour, the amount would be 

 $78,00, if the straw would pay for thrasldng, eight 

 dollars would cover all the expenses of growing 

 it; this would leave me .$70,00. If I had planted 

 this piece of ground with coi-n, I should probably 

 have had about ten bushels (as it was killed that 

 year by an early frost) worth $10,00, with an ex- 

 pense of 12 or 15 dollars growing it. 



Since the seasons have become so cold, and the 

 corn crop so uncertain, I think farmers had better 

 jdant less corn, and sew more wheat, and what 

 corn they do ))lant, manure the ground well, and 

 instead of pasturing their sheep upon broken rocky 

 mortgage land, as is frefpiently the case, put them 

 upon some better land that they can plough once 

 in three or fonryears. Kenelksi Marston. 



WaiervUk, Dec. 21, 1836. [Maine Far. 



a process requiring no labor, at $5 for a family, 

 or he will sell the right of a City or District, and 

 he may be addressed by letter, as follows : — 

 Charles A. Harrison, Mulberry St., Newark, New 

 Jersey. 



But Mr Harrison will undoubtedly visit Phila- 

 delphia next fall, in the grape season, when per- 

 sons are nuire in mood of discussing such matters, 

 and when the rich clusters tempt the wish that 

 the lucious fruit might beenjoyed the year round. 

 — Pliil. paper. 



GRAPES. 



Mr Harrison, of Newark, New Jersey, has dis- 

 covered a method of preserving the common grapes 

 of our vines, tiie Powell and Catawba grapes, for 

 many months, with all the freshness of flavor, taste 

 and appearance, that they had the moment they 

 were taken from the vine. The experiment has 

 been fairly tested : in the fall of 1S35, .Mr Josiali 

 Dow, of Brooklyn, Long Island, who has a most 

 extensive vineyard, adopted Mr Harrison's [dan, 

 and as a consequence, bad the luxury of fresh 

 grapes ujion his table all winter, and last fall he 

 repeated the trial, no longer an experiment, and 

 finds the same happy re^ult. 



We have now before ns a bunch of Catawba 

 grapes, which Mr Harrison ()reserved last Septem- 

 ber, and they taste as well as they would have 

 tasted directly from the vine. There are iuunense 

 quantities of grapes of tije richest kinds raised in 

 and near Philadel|)hia, as the exhibition last fall 

 at the Kranklin institute fully testified ; and the 

 quantities would undoubteilly be greatly increased, 

 if a mode of preserving the fruit for ttie winter 

 was generally known. It seems to us that the 

 discovery of Sir Harrison will meet the wishes of 

 the grape growers and gra|ie eaters, and that here- 

 after we may expect to see native grapes placed 

 on our dinner and supper tables, during the fall 

 and winter months. 



Mr Harrison sells rights to prejiare the grapes. 



SIZE OF FARMS. 



We made some reinarks a few months since 

 relative to the proper size of Farms, endeavoring 

 to show that the greatest profit is derived from 

 farms of considerable size, or where division of 

 labor could be adopted. It is our object at this 

 time to show that farmers generally, by cultivating 

 too much land, actually lessen their profits by los- 

 ing the ;:dvantage of a division of labor; while, if 

 they should cultivate a smaller quantity in a prop- 

 er manner, they would in j-eality arrive at those 

 advantages much more readily. 



To make money by fin-ming requires, ^^r.?*, as 

 great an amount of product from crops as possi- 

 ble ; secoiuHy, that thi."; be produced by as little 

 expense or labor as ]iossih!e ; and iltirdly, that as 

 little capital as possible be invested. 'Jo arrive at 

 all of these points together, it is necessary to raise 

 large crops, to effect a division of labor, and use 

 labor saving implements and machines, and till no 

 more lan<l than can be done to the best advantage. 

 That this is to he effected by a course different 

 from that generally pursued, only require an ex- 

 hibition of facts to ;)rove. 



It will perhaps he generally adndtted, that much 

 larger crops than are usually raised, may be ob- 

 tained by taking the necessary pains. If the ex- 

 pense of raising the same quantity on a small piece 

 of ground is no more than raising it on a larger 

 piece, the former would, of course, be the more 

 profitable, for it would require less ca])it!d in land ; 

 but if it is in reality found to be less exi)ensive, 

 then it becomes doubly profitable. 'J'he qiustion 

 arises, what are the relative expenses and profits 

 of the two methods, and if the practice of raising 

 large crops is found to be most profitable, what is 

 the amount of produce which we may reasonably 

 expect from a given quantity of land. The best 

 w.ay to determine these points, is to look at what 

 has already been ilone, to examine the experi- 

 ments v/hich have been made in this kind of farm- 

 ing. 



Numerous trials have proved, that at least one 

 hundred biishe!.^ of corn may be expected from 

 an acre with jn-oper culture ; Earl Stinson's croj) 

 averaged this quantity for ten successive years ; 

 and nmch larger crops h.-ive often been obtained. 

 By the experiments of Gen. Barnum, ho is confi- 

 dently of opinion that by the method he employed 

 in cultivating the potato, from eight hundred to 

 1000 bushels may he reasonably expected. Sat- 

 isfactory evidence exists that five tons of hay per 

 acre 1 ave been obtained ; and no less than thiee 

 tons should be calculated upon, when a proper 

 system of farming is adopted. Repeated ex])eri- 

 ments with ruta h?.ga have shown that with good 

 culture, from 500 to 800 bushels may he obtained 

 with certainty; and from the statement of others, 

 as well as from om'ovvn observations, we are con- 

 vinced that from 1200 to 1500 bushels of mangel 

 wurtzel may be produced with equal certainty. — 



Now, if corn is worth seventy-five cents per 

 bushel, potatoes twenty-five cents, hay eight dol- 

 lars per ton, ruta baga twelve and a half cents a 

 bushel for feeding stock, and two and a half tons 

 of mangel wintzel worth on an average one ton of 

 hay, as has been found by ex|)eriment; then the 

 product of twenty acres may be considered as fil- 

 lows : — 



5 acres of corn, 500 bushels, 



6 acres of hay, 24 tons. 

 1 acre of potatoes, 100 bushels, 

 3 acres of ruta baga, 1800 bushels, 

 3 acres of mangel wurtzel, 4000 



bushels, 40 bushels to a ton, 

 100 tons, 





$375 00 

 192 00 

 250 00 

 225 00 



320 00 



$1362 00 

 The expenses of cultivating the land and secur- 

 ing the crops, judging from the experiments above 

 alhuled to, would.be about as follows: — 

 5 acres of corn, $20 per acre, 100 00 



1 acre of (lotatoes, 50 00 



3 acres ruta baga, $20 per acre, 60 00 



3 acres of mangel wurtzel, do. 60 00 



8 acresof hay, cut and cured ac- ^ 

 cording to the best mode we > 16 00 



have seen and described before. } 



Genesee Far.] ' $286 00 



TREATMENT OF MILCH COWS. 



There is, peihaps, no part of the husbandry of 

 our country so much neglected, as that which re- 

 lates to the providing of provender for the milch 

 cows on our farms. On many estates, even those 

 of magnitude, the chief part of the food, if not the 

 erltire, which they get, are the blades, the tops and 

 the husks of the corn, with an occasional gratuity 

 of nubbins by way of a holiday feast. The con- 

 sequence IS, that if the winter be severe and pro- 

 tracted, there is nine chances out often, that ev- 

 ery cow, long before spring arrives, is either dry, 

 or so near it, that the milk she will give is not 

 worth the tiouble and cost of stripjiing, so that 

 many farmers with half a dozen or more cows 

 have neither nn\k nor butter sufficient for the do- 

 mestic uses of their tables, during the latter part 

 of each winter, and by the tiirje that the cold and 

 bleak winds of March arrive, many of the cows 

 are on the lift. How is it jiossible it can be oth- 

 erwise ? There is little or no succulent in the 

 food we have described in its dry state, and con- 

 sequently cows fed upon it, must, for the want of 

 ruatter ( onvertible into ra Ik, cease to yield it. In 

 every other country save our own, it forms a part 

 of the business of every farmer or planter, to pro- 

 vide full supplies of nutritious food for his stock 

 of every kind, aial for those which comprise the 

 <!airy cows, especial pains and caie are taken to 

 provide a sufficient quantity of such roots as are, 

 heartening and succ;ilent, so that by thus provi- 

 ding a substitute for the grasses of the pasture, or 

 the soiling stalls or yarils, his dairy, even through 

 the dreary and inclement period of the winter, 

 may continue to contribute largely to the comfort 

 of his family, and to the increase of his fortune. 

 No good farmer, then, will keep more cows than 

 he can keep welland in so keeping them, he finds 

 his trouble rewarded, «nd has besides the satisfac- 

 tion of knowing, that in thus acting he has fulfil- 

 led an obligation imposed on him by every hu- 

 mane consideration, and discharged a duty requir- 

 ed by Him, who, in placing the beasts of the field 



