34 



NEW ENGLAND FARRIER. 



Jan. 



For the New Unsland Fanner. 



MALE AND FEMALE SQUASHES, AND 

 OTHBB MATTEK.3. 



"An old subscriber," writing in the last num- 

 ber of the Farmer, inquires relative to "the cor- 

 rect way of telling the male squash from the fe- 

 male, of the Hubbard, Marrow and other squash- 

 es, and also of pumpkins." 



A squash or pumpkin is fruit, (of the vine, if 

 you please,) and no fruit has gender, hence there 

 can be no such thing as a male or female squash. 

 Passing from the ftuit to the seed that it usually 

 envelopes, serving first as a nourisher to the same, 

 next as protector, and finally, as food, as the germ 

 within is unrolled and the younger plant appears, 

 we likewise find no gender. Gender is not found 

 in the fruit, is not ibund in tlie seed of any plant, 

 but exists only in the floral development; in oth- 

 er words, the organs of gender are found only in 

 the flower. It is true, that of some trees and 

 vines, certain seed give trees or vines that will 

 yield only male flowers, (the pomegranate is an 

 example among trees, and sometimes the grape 

 vine among vines,) and for theory's sake such 

 seed may be termed male seed, yet practically the 

 distinction is without a difference, or vegetable 

 anatomy has not explored to the depths at which 

 80 nice a structural distinction lies. 



Among all the trees of the orchard, and in most 

 of the products of the farm and garden, we find 

 the male and female organs present in the same 

 flower, the fine threads in the middle of flowers 

 being the organs, the one or more in the centre 

 being the pistil or female, and those surrounding 

 the stamens, or male organs ; but the squash fam- 

 ily is an exception to this general rule ; hence we 

 find the male and female organs in difl'orent flow- 

 ers, though on the same vine. The flovr'er con- 

 taining the stamen appears first, growing on very 

 long stems and are generally called false blos- 

 soms. These can readily be determined by a sin- 

 gle undivided shoot in the centre, sometimes 

 called by children the "candle." Such blossoms 

 can never produce squashes, and yet without the 

 aid of these blossoms no squashes can be pro- 

 duced, as from them come the pollen by which 

 the female or staminate blossoms are fertilized. 

 The female blossoms will be readily recognized 

 by having the centre piece divided in six or eight 

 parts, also by the embryo squash beneath it. This 

 much on "male and female squashes." 



Many questions have occurred to me while cul- 

 tivating squashes, relative to their laws of devel- 

 opment, of all of which I may affirm that I have 

 found more pleasure in the endeavor to determine 

 them by careful experiment than in drawing on 

 the experience of others ; but as to enjoy such 

 pleasure alone is rather selfish, I propose two or 

 three for intelligent, careful experimenters, pre- 

 mising that, as experiments, even after our great- 

 est caro, may still, in their results, look in the 

 wrong direction, by reason of certain conditions 

 that are not fully considered, or, it may be, whol- 

 ly overlooked, therefore we draw our conclusions 

 only after three or more repetitions of the same 

 experiment, a consideration which would throw 

 out many a crude, deceptive result, which, when 

 brought before the people, only confuse or teach 

 error. 



Experiment No. 1. — We are sometimes told 



that if the end of a squash vine is nipped off near 

 a young squash, the growth of the vine being 

 checked, its vigor Avill go into the fruit. It will 

 be found that, sometimes, one succeeds in great- 

 ly increasing the fruit by this process, at other 

 times he meets with a total failure. Now it 

 would be an advantage to know the conditions of 

 success. It may depend on the degree of vigor 

 in the vine, or what is more probable, on the size 

 the young squash has attained, it being stricken 

 with paralysis if very small. 



Question No. 2. — Many farmers hold that old 

 seed gives more squash and less vine than newer 

 seed. Is this so, and if so, what is the greatest 

 advantage obtained ? 



Question No. 3. — There is a theory in the com- 

 munity that seed from the stem end of squashes 

 will yield a different product in form or number 

 from those taken from the other end of the squash, 

 the calyx end. What is the difference, if any ? 



Question No. 4. — If the seed are equally mature 

 or of equal size, will the largest seed in any par- 

 ticular squash produce a better crop than the 

 smallest ? 



These questions might be indefinitely extended. 

 Some may say that to be so minute is to be fool- 

 ish, but I believe that the high standard of agri- 

 culture of our era requires just such minuteness, 

 just such thoroughness. 



James J. H. Gregory. 



Marhleliead, Mass., Bee, 1860. 



Plowing by Steam. — At the St. Louis Fair 

 a machine, invented and manufactured in the 

 State, was put into operation and demonstrated 

 that plowing can be done by steam. The Valley 

 Farmer describes it as — 



"A large Locomotive or Steam Wagon, having 

 four large broad wheels, propelled by a small 

 steam engine located on the wagon, and to this 

 wagon a gang of six plows was attached. The 

 wagon moved on, drawing after it its train of 

 plows, in ground baked nearly as hard as brick 

 by the long severe drought. It would have been 

 impossible to have plowed the ground by any or- 

 dinary team. One of the plows v/as broken by 

 the hardness of the ground, but the other five 

 were forced through the earth, doing the work as 

 well as could be expected under the circumstan- 

 ces. There was no breaking of the machinery, 

 there was no failure in the work — the plowing 

 was done successfully at different trials. A ditch- 

 ing machine was attached to the steam M'agon — 

 the plows having been taken off — and excavating 

 was done more rapidly than we ever saw it done 

 before." 



Pans of Milk. — The Connecticut Homestead 

 republishes from an old Genesee Farmer an ac- 

 count of three carefully conducted experiments 

 for the purpose of determining whether more Ijut- 

 ter is obtained from a given quantity of milk when 

 set in pans partly filled than when full. Contrary 

 to the expectations of the experimenter, from the 

 same quantity of milk in the full pans, some three 

 or four per cent, more butter Avas obtained than 

 when set in pans half full. 



