332 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



APRIL, a*, 1839. 



xvere grass, and we have often cut t»o of these in of good sprinir wht-at— not yet threshed— e.^timate of buckwheat in a season. When this is well don 

 a season. Last summer I sold the standing grass HO bushels. Last yoar the crop was Indian corn, it is equal to 20 loadsof stable duno- to the acre. 



on this acre, for two tons, without wcig-hing, the 



purchaser paid, within a fraction, twenty dollars for 

 it. Since that, in August, we cut oni: load for a 

 liorse, of rowtn, on the same, and now the cattle 

 are takinfr from it a third crop. Tlie soil is a black 

 light mould, three to four feet deep — so light and 

 puffy that we were obliged to carry on 20 loads of 

 loam from the roadside, before the seed would veg- 

 etate. Since that, we have applied three or four 

 loads of leeched ashes to the surface. This acre 

 has been kept thus productive, by merely ploughing 

 in the rowen, oi- second crop once in three or four 

 years, and sowing grass-seed on the fuirow in Sep- 

 tember. Thus I kill the sour grasses without go- 

 ing through the unprofitable process of planting and 

 sowing wet lands. 



In reclaiming meadows that are tolerably even 

 on the surface, I first drain them — then cart on 

 loam, &c., enough to cover up the grasses com- 

 pletely, not having moioeil the grass — ^tliis long grass 

 helps to fill up the cavities, and much l^ss loam is 

 required to cover it. We lose the .grass, but it 

 is soon turned to manure, and we are not so likely 

 to hear from it again as if wc had cut it close. It 

 is my rule to convert one or two acres annually in- 

 to English. By the time the coarse grass makes 

 its second appearance, the sward below becomes 

 BO rotten that a common plough will turn it up. 



1-3. I planted but one acre of corn this season ; 

 expect from it 60 bushels : spread on the manure 

 and ploughed it in — put ashes in the hilis. I now 

 plant my rows one-tifth of a rod apart, and the hills 

 two feet distant in the rows. I can thus obtain 

 more corn, and as I have a machine for planting it, 

 the labor of planting seven thousand hills in° an 

 acre rather than four thousand, is not increased. 



In the spring the ground was first harrowed thor- | 19. I k«ep one yoke of o.xen, two horses 

 oughly and the cultivator was run over the corn four cows, and young cattle enough to consume irt 

 stubbs— then the ground was nicely plouirhed, once ] coarse hay. I have wintered 40 head, and soh 

 only, for I did not wish, after burying up all the : four hundred dollars worth of hay the same season 

 rubbish, to uncover it again. We covered the i I usually keep from 35 to 40 head thruui^h th, 

 t<.l...uf .,-;»i, „.. ; *..„.!. 1 *i 1 .i_ _ .... . _ . o 



heat with an iron toolh harrow — then sowed the 

 grass-seed and covered with a bush. 



I have a newly invented machine that sows grain 

 and all kinds of grass-seed very even. It is a box 

 placed on a pair of small wheels, and the harrow is 

 hitched to the hind side of it, so that the team sows 

 the grain or the grass-seed very nicely, and harrows 

 it in at one operation. This may be seen at David 

 Prouty & Co.'s store, Boston. 



Wi! sowed one and a half bushels to the acre of 

 the tea wheat — first having washed thoroughly and 

 limed it with two or three quarts to the bushel — 

 slacked lime ; — after the wheat was up, fifteen bush- 

 els of wood ashes were spread on an acre. These 

 gave the wheat a fine start and kept the surface 

 moist through the summer, and kept all the grass 

 alive, that was sown in spring, through the drought 

 of August. The soil is a gravelly loam. A bush- 

 el of slacked lime was sown on one part of the 

 field, but we could not perceive tliat the kernel was 

 better here than elsewhere. 



17. In addition to this seeding with grass, I 

 have sowed grass-seed, viz. : clover, honey-suckle, 

 herds grass and red top, on my ten acres of rye, 

 for pasturage. The clover and Dutch honey-suckle 

 were not sown till last spring — some of it on the 

 snow — it promises well. In September last, I 

 ploughed about an acre of low interval, that had 

 never been ploughed, and rolled it down close, then 

 sowed grass-seed. It lay too low to be planted, 

 and therefore it was never ploughed, and it has nev- 



With this machine I can plant an acre completely I er yielded the value of one-fourth of a ton of good 

 in one hour and mark it out. Without it, I was | hay to the acre. I put on eight loads of manure. 



twenty hours in doing the same labor, 



14. I plant less than an acre of potatoes this 

 season — consider them an exhausting crop on light 

 loams, and can always obtain better grass after 

 corn than after them. I spread on the manure and 

 plough it in— hill them a little at the first hoeing, 

 but not afterwards — use the cultivator for these 

 and for corn — do not hill up the corn except with 

 the mould thrown up by the cultivator. This in- 

 strument performs nearly the whole labor of tilling 

 corn, when that is planted perfectly straight, as the 

 machine does it. Our potatoes are unusually small. 

 Mine will not yield 75 bushels to the acre', and I 

 see many fields that were manured in the hill yield- 

 ing much less. I plant the long red and the Che- 

 nango — some blue noses. 



15. I have now growing one acre and a half 

 of rutabaga and half an acre of English turnips, 

 planted to give to cattle — expect to gather 800 

 bushels from one acre; — can raise four" bushels of 

 these at less expense than one of potatoes. I plant- 

 ed one acre with eighteen thousand hills, in fifty- 

 five minutes, with a new machine drawn by one 

 liorse. It marked out and planted, most perfectly, 

 two rows at a time. I had no help but a boy to ride 

 the horse. Here was fortyeight hours work per- 

 formed in one, and only one pound and a quarter of 

 seed used. 



16. I have raised this season 200 bushels winter 

 rye, sown last fall on newly cleared land;_seed 

 was harrowed in— ground not ploughed— one bush- 

 el of seed to the acre. This was raised from less 

 than ten acres. Have raised one acre and a half 



mixed with as many more of sandy loam. If this 

 does as well as the adjoining acre, which was seed- 

 ed in the same way last year, I shall mow two tons 

 from it. I have also seeded down about an acre 

 of common meadow land, first draining it and then 

 carting on loam on to the standing grass, and com- 

 pletely covering it up — ten loads of compost was 

 then applied and the seed sown. Between thirteen 

 and fourteen acres have been thus seeded this sea- 

 son. By planting but little of corn or potatoes, I 

 have manure for my grass lands, so that by merely 

 turning them over in September and covering up a 

 green crop, I am enabled to keep all the mowing 

 land in good order, turning it over as fast as it be- 

 comes bound out ; and every time I thus turn it, 

 whether I apply manure or not, I make the land 

 richer, because I take no grain from it, but help it 

 to a green dressing under the sod. I raise grain 



year. I have three barns, and each has a cella; 



under the whole area. One is 70 feet by 40 one 



is 40 by 30, and the other is 33 feet square. Th< 

 young cattle go loose under these barns and the 

 sheds attached to them, all winter, and are raucl: 

 more comfortable than when tied up by the head 

 They can always choose a dry place to lie in, am 

 they eat coarse hay better when loose. They an 

 watered in the yards and are never suffered tc 

 roam in winter. Not one pint of the liquid manure 

 is lost, for it is absorbed in the loam and in the ref- 

 use hay. My cows also lie loose under a barn by 

 themselves. They lie much cleaner through the 

 winter than in stalls ; their bags are clean, and 

 their milk is as sweet in winter as in summer. One- 

 half the labor of tending is thus saved, and the cat- 

 tle winter better. 



20. I purchase most of my cattle from the 

 Vermont droves — a mi.xed breed. 



21. When liaise calves, I suffer them to such 

 the first part of the milk for three months, and milh 

 the last part for butter ; they are then not so likely 

 to be pod-bellied as when taken immediately from 

 the cow. 



22. Mine is not a dairy farm. Most of my 

 pasturage is too distant to drive cows. We make 

 our own butter. 



Th.e profits of my farm arise principally from the 

 sale of cattle and hay. We reckon the value of 

 the milk from four cows, at $35 each $140. 



23. I ivintered 4 breeding sows, and raised 

 from them 28 pigs — sold most of them at eight 

 weeks old. 



24. I keep them in summer on the refuse of 

 the dairy — give them very little grain — had the 

 breed originally from New- York,— cannot afford to 

 raise or to buy much grain for pork ; rutabaga 

 roots are cheaper than potatoes to feed them with. 



25. The best article to be thrown into the 

 hog-pen to increase and to preserve the manure, is 

 loam. We should not throw them peat muck ; they 

 will not fatten so well, and-they become very filthy 

 in rooting it over. Straw and refuse hay is better 

 to be put under cattle than hogs. Hogs mix up 

 manure very industriously, and. turn it many times. 

 They prepare it for immediate effect in the field; 

 but it is much overrated: it looks richer than it is: 

 it has been stirred so much, it is ripe for immediate 

 action ; but it lasts not so long as manure from 

 neat cattle or from horses ; its strength is gone the 

 first season. Horse manure, if kept from heating 



m sufficient quantity for my family and hogs, but too much, is more lasting and more valuable, 



annot afford to raise grain for the market. 

 18. To increase the manure and to preserve 

 it, I put the best soil I can procure from the road- 

 side into the hog-pen and into the cow-yards, and 

 under the sheds and the barns where the cattle lie. 



26 My mode of farming requires very little 

 labor: one man can perform the whole, except the 

 haying. I hired this summer, one man for seven 

 months, at .$16 per month; one-sixth of this time 

 he had lost, taking one day each week to himself. 



Soil IS thrown into the hog-stye twice a week— al- j For three weeks in hay time, I hired on *he aver- 

 so under the privy, which is set high ; by this age, three additional hands— nine weeks. My son, 

 means, all disagreeable effluvia from these places | a lad of eighteen, has assisted two-thirds of Iris 

 neutralized, and a large quantity of manure 1 time, and I have done but little on the farm my- 



saved from evaporation. Still, my cheapest mode ! self, e.xcept in hay time, about one monti 

 of making manure is, to turn the sod with a ' 

 plough when it has a coat of grass on it — if it has 

 none, give it a coat of buckwiieat, which 



when I 

 labored half the time. 



In hay time I gave one dollar a day on the aver- 

 One steady man aiid a boy twelve years old. 



on very poor land. I sometimes turn in two crops [ would do ray work for the seven months after April 



