122 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



March 



with perfect ease and safety, those that won't can 

 be made to, and those that swarm too much or 

 too small — two small ones should be hived to- 

 gether. I have sometimes put three together, 

 all right. 



A poor swarm is not worth keeping, and should 

 be either strengthened or ])ut with another small 

 one ; this can be done early in spring, or late in 

 the fall, in the same apiary, but in summer it is 

 more difHcult, as bees are so attached to their 

 p-irticular locations : yet it can be easily accom- 

 plished by moving one or the other a mile or more 

 distant. 



Perhaps the reader may think such freedom 

 with insects armed with daggers, somewhat diffi- 

 cult, if not dangerous ; but let me assure him that 

 these, and far more difficult operations, can be 

 performed with ])erfect safety and ease ; and that 

 others as well as the writer of this, open their 

 hives any time they choose — cut out combs or 

 honey, divide and double swarms, take out all the 

 contents of hives, the queens, see the brood, larva, 

 eggs, &c., and show to visitors at all times through 

 warm weather. C. 



New Britain, Ct., 1861. 



For the New England Farmer. 



CHABCOAL-BURNING, AND A REMARK 

 ON COB MEAL. 



Messrs. Editors : — Recollections of years 

 long passed by frequently flit through my mind, 

 and among others, that of charcoal burning. At 

 a period extending from 1785 into the present 

 century, coal burning was much more practiced 

 among farmers than at the present day. Till 

 within a few years, wood-land was considered 

 hardly worth taxing. Farmers that owned large 

 wood-lots in this vicinity had no opportunity to 

 dispose of their wood, short of teaming it from 

 fifteen to twenty or thirty miles ; that being the 

 case, those wood-sellers who lived nighest to the 

 cities and large villages could supply them to 

 much better advantage than those from more re- 

 mote towns ; this circumstance was an induce- 

 ment to the more distant farmers to char their 

 wood, for the greater convenience of carrying it 

 to market, it being much lighter for transporta- 

 tion after being made into coal. Three or four 

 cords of charred wood might be carried at a load, 

 probably, which would reduce the expense of 

 teaming, beside the profit of charring the wood. 

 The operation of carbonizing wood, economically, 

 is a very nice chemical operation ; experienced 

 coal-burners, though ignorant of chemical phrases, 

 gain their knowledge, almost to perfection, by 

 practice. They know that too much ventilation 

 causes a rapid combustion, which decomposes the 

 wood, and reduces it to ashes, and that just air 

 enough admitted to continue a slow combustion 

 will insure a good yield of coal. Ignorant and 

 careless coal-burners have burned their wood to 

 ashes, and made a losing business, while others, 

 more careful and scientific, have made coal-burn- 

 ing profitable. 



Coal-burning, in this region, has been on the 

 decline, till we seldom see a coal-pit. Since the 

 •construction of manufacturing establishments, 

 railroads and new villages, the demand for wood 

 has been bo great, and the markets so handy, that 



charring wood is nearly done away. Charcoal- 

 burning was considered a healthy business, not- 

 withstanding the annoyance of smoke. The smoke 

 of a coal-pit has a peculiar smell, which will pen- 

 etrate the air for miles around, and is a sufficient 

 messenger to give intelligence, to distant neigh- 

 bors, that coal-pits are afire. The time of firing 

 these huge piles of wood, covered with turf, was 

 anticipated with eager expectation, as a day of 

 great glee, by the boys and girls of the neighbor- 

 hood, who enjoyed the sport of a circuitous run 

 through the smoke. Charcoal is useful for sev- 

 eral purposes, beside fuel ; it has strong antisep- 

 tic properties, and is useful in staying putrefac- 

 tion ; swine are fond of it at times, to correct a 

 morbid tendency in the maw, which is indicated 

 by the avidity they show in craunching it down ; 

 they will leave their food to eat coal, when the de- 

 sire for coal predominates. 



COBS AND COB MEAL. 



Farmers express different opinions about the 

 value of cobs as food for domestic snimals ; some 

 regard them as no better than saw-dust, while 

 others think they contain nutriment. I agree 

 with the latter, in opinion, from practical obser- 

 vation. Soon after the last corn harvest, I had 

 occasion to shell a quantity of corn before the 

 cobs were fully dry. I sat by our oxen and cows, 

 broke up the cobs, and fed them to the cattle, 

 who devoured them with apparent good relish. 

 I have often fed cattle with cobs before, and ob- 

 served them to feed at a heap of thrashed cobs 

 for a definite time, but as cobs grow dry they be- 

 come tough, and hard to masticate, and there- 

 fore cattle are not so fond of them. Cattle and 

 swine, like human beings, have an instinctive 

 preference for those substances which aff'ord nour- 

 ishment to the body, which is evidence in my 

 mind to prove that cobs are nutritious to cattle. 

 Ruminating animals are furnished with digestive 

 organs capable of extracting nutriment from sub- 

 stances which for swine would be entirely inert. 

 Swine being destitute of the ruminating appar- 

 atus, derive no nutriment from cobs, ground or 

 unground, after the corn is ripe. I have repeat- 

 edly given my hogs ears of corn partially ripe, 

 and they were very careful to avoid as much of 

 the cob as possible. I have occasionally fed 

 my swine, of late, with cob meal, and the poor 

 brutes resented the treatment like a dainty board- 

 er, and would grunt for unadulterated meal. On 

 the whole, I have made up my mind that cob meal 

 is very good for cattle, but worth less for hogs. 

 Cobs, by the pound, are probably of equal value 

 to huts and stalks, and when ground with the 

 corn, are a substitute for chopped fodder for cat- 

 tle and horses. Silas Brown. 



North Wilmington, December, 18G0. 



Yale Agricultural Lectures. — Apprehend- 

 ing the efi"ect of the present state of the country 

 in diminishing the interest and usefulness of an 

 agricultural convention, it has been decided to 

 postpone a repetition of the "Yale Agricultural 

 Lectures" to another year. The regular lectures 

 of the Institution on Agricultural Chemistry and 

 the general principles of Agriculture will be given 

 as usual, commencing Feb. 1st. 



