1860. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



251 



tances, strike the axe in the ground, and after 

 dropping the kernels in the cleft, closi itAvith the 

 heel of the boot. Such corn seldom grows high 

 and yields from thirty to forty bushels per acre. 

 The ears are generally small, and the stalks and 

 ears are generally cut up together, and fed out to 

 the stock during the winter. There will be large 

 quantities of sod corn planted this year. But if 

 the corn is planted on ground plowed the second 

 time, at the distance of two feet apart, and each 

 hill hoed over or plowed between, twice during the 

 Slimmer, we have a crop of from sixty to eighty 

 bushels per acre. The cars are enormously long, 

 large and full, and the stalks often grow to the 

 height of twenty-two feet. No such corn grows in 

 the east, I know. Last year a New Hampshire 

 man brought out some of that small yellow corn of 

 the East, and planted a field of it, and he could 

 not sell it, because it did not yield so much per 

 acre ; and the stock did not '"take to it," as they 

 do to the large white corn of the West. 



Next week we are going "over into Missouri," 

 as we say on the Kansas borders, and I will then 

 give you an account of the farms, and the manner 

 in which they force cultivation out of an earth 

 covered with the blot of slavedom ; where the 

 A'ery air seems close, because freedom is con- 

 fined. Susie Vogl. 



Sumner, K. T., April 23, 1860. 



For tlie New England Farmer. 

 HOW A JSRSEYMAIQ" TREATS HIS COWS. 



In conversation lately with a gentleman resid- 

 ing in New Jersey, near Philadelphia, I learned 

 something of their manner of stabling their milk 

 cows, and the cows kept awhile to be got ready 

 for market. The stable is made very much upon 

 the plan recommended by Mr. Holbrook, I think, 

 with a trench running along behind to receive the 

 droppings ; but instead of having a close bottom, 

 has slats, through which the manure drops into 

 the cellar below, and is daily removed and sold 

 to the calico printers. No bedding of any kind is 

 allowed. Behind each coav, at a convenient dis- 

 tance, is fixed in the floor a ring or staple. When 

 milking time comes, a strap with a buckle is 

 passed through the ring, the cow's hind foot on 

 the side of the milker drawn back, as she Avould 

 naturally stand while milking, the strap passed 

 around her ankle and buckled, the neck straps be- 

 ing so arranged as to keep the cow's head wp ; it 

 is impossible for the most kicking cow to overset 

 the pail, or strike the mUker. The most stubborn 

 cows are subdued by this means, and without vi- 

 olence or harm to the cow, or to the temper of the 

 milker. And in the severest fly time, no loss is 

 occasioned by overset pails. 



Cows are each allowed twenty pounds of the 

 best hay per day, tM'o quarts of Indian meal, and 

 a peck of fine feed. The hay is cut, and the meal 

 and feed wet and sprinkled over, or mixed with 

 the hay. They are turned out in the morning, al- 

 lowed to drink, and yarded for a while, tied up at 

 noon, foddered and turned out again for an hour 

 or two. Separate yards are made for different 

 lots, and those animals which are jK'aceable to- 

 gether are put together in the lot-yards. When 

 turned out upon the pasture in summer, they run 

 together. But instead of knocking the droppings 



to pieces as a dressing for the land, a man is em- 

 ployed with a basket or handcart to go over the 

 field and pick up the droppings, which are also 

 sold to the cloth printers, at a rate sufficient to 

 make it profitable to thus dispose of the manure, 

 and with the ])roceeds to buy other fertilizers to 

 keep the land in heart. D. 



April 14, 18G0. 



Fur the New England Farmer. 

 ONIOK" MAGGOT. 



Much has been said and written about the on- 

 ion maggot, and I don't know as there is any 

 cure for him, but I will tell you how I treated 

 mine last year, and with good success for once, 

 and shall try it again this year, and will tell it to 

 you and the fiirmers free of charge ; I don't think 

 I could get "$60,000" for it, if I should ask it. 



I sowed last year in my garden, on good soil, 

 three rows, about thirty feet long each, to onion 

 seeds. I expected the maggots and watched dili- 

 gently their progress. When they were first up 

 about one or two inches high, I put some strong 

 salt and water on about three feet of one row to 

 see if it would kill the onions, and in case it did 

 not, perhaps it might kill the maggots, if they 

 came ; the young onions stood it well, and it did 

 not hurt them. 



After the onions had got about as large as a 

 pail-bail wire, there came a spell of warm, wet 

 weather, and my onions began to be affected. I 

 watched them several days, and they grew worse, 

 and were fast dying out, for about one in every 

 eight or ten were wilting and dying, and I found 

 a maggot at the roots of every one that appeared 

 wilting, and sometimes the maggot was nearly as 

 large as the little stock itself, and had eaten the 

 bottom all away, and was making its way up the 

 stem; at the rate of havoc they were making, it 

 appeared there would not be one onion left in the 

 bed at the end of four weeks more. I took a pail- 

 ful of strong pickle from my pork barrel, and 

 with a watering-pot, put it all on to the thro 

 rows as though I were watering them ; the ( ■ - 

 ions never faltered or changed. The salt kiF d 

 all the grass, young clover and weeds, exci it 

 purslain, which came up later, and the magg rs 

 were entirely killed, and I never saw any aftc/, 

 though the flies continued to lay their eggs down 

 the side of the little plant and between it and the 

 dirt, just as flies will blow a piece of fresh meat ; 

 but the salt prevented their maturing or hatch- 

 ing, and I raised a good crop of fair sized onions. 

 I think they did not ripen as well as usual, but I 

 am not convinced that the salt prevented them, 

 for I have often seen patches remain as green as 

 mine were at harvest time. 



I put on two or three slighter sprinklings of 

 brine after the first, during the summer. 



Maiden, May 7, 1860. A. S. Hall. 



New Bees. — At a meeting of the Apiarian So- 

 ciety of London, the Secretary, ]Mr. Segitmeler, 

 described the successful introduction into Eng- 

 land of the Ligurian bee, a distinct species from 

 the ordinary honey bee. It is regarded as of great 

 value as a honey collector, and has been recently 

 introduced into Germany with great success. Col- 

 onies of the new species were stated to be already 

 at work in Devonshire. 



