210 



NEW ENGLAND FARJIER. 



May 



one, feeds so little hay as to be hardly credi- 

 ble. Having three horses and four oxen, he 

 told me the other day how little he had fed to 

 them in three weeks. I think it was not more 

 than fifty pounds each, per week, when they 

 were constantly at work, hauling ship timber, 

 though both horses and cattle were large. At 

 the same time he fed liberally with meal, and 

 kept his cattle gaining. 



I was very much interested, Mr. Editor, in 

 the account you gave, some two months ago, 

 of your mode of cutting and mixing your dif- 

 ferent kinds of feed, but you omitted to state 

 how often you fed, or how much your cows 

 consumed per week. I believe if experiments 

 could be made and published, of how much 

 hay it required to keep the diUerent kinds of 

 stock, when fed uncut and dry, and how much 

 when cut and fed with meal sprinkled on, it 

 •would be found that the last mode was far 

 more economical than the first. In the mean 

 time, till farmers have line upon line, many of 

 them will cling to the old mode, saying that 

 the olden times and the old ways were better 

 than the present. Yours, for improvement, 



L. II. HiLDRETU. 



So. Groton, 2Iass., Feb. 6, 1867. 



For the Kew England Farmer. 

 CULTimE OP THE ISABELLA GKAPE. 



Can anything new be said about grapes ? Sure- 

 ly one would think not, if he read all or even half 

 that is said of them, by those who are interest- 

 ed in selling vines. For when *we see the 

 wonderful variety advertised and highly ex- 

 tolled by one and condemned by another, the 

 wcMider i.-> that any one knows how or what to 

 buy. But in order, I suppose, to make a sure 

 thing of it, very many purchase all the differ- 

 ent varieties that are advertised. Then they 

 think themselves in a fair way of supplying 

 the nearest market with the luscious fruit, and 

 in time intend to drown their customers with 

 wine at a cost, as advertised by California and 

 Ohic^producers, of four to six dollars per gal- 

 lon ! When I am informed, imported wines 

 can be bought for one- third, or half of that, 

 surely the day is far distant when those who 

 drink rum or whiskey will be induced to quit it 

 for the more genteel wine, if such fabulous 

 prices are to rule. 



Why should there be a law forbidding over 

 6 or 8 per cent, on money-borrowing, while 

 wine makers, and in fact many other kind of 

 makers, demand from 50 to 600 per cent, 

 profit, including butchers, bakers, grocers, &c. 

 Think of the groans which escape the mouth of 

 the sick, who are poor in purse, when the doc- 

 tor says, "if you only have a little wine, whiskey 

 or brandy, I think you may get about again," 

 and their minds embrace the impossibility, all 

 owing to their purse being so much weaker 

 than the strength of the article demanded, 

 a very little of which may save life and restore 

 to health, if it were not owing to the exorbitant 



price asked for it, and made so by the accursed 

 Yankee desire to die rich, even if it stopped 

 the breath of hundreds of our fellow-beings to 

 obtain it. 



Every one cannot raise grapes, if they try; 

 yet a great many more can raise grapes than 

 what do. I wish it to be understood I am not 

 referring to vineyard modes. I simply refer 

 to raising two or three good varieties by those 

 who have but a few rods of ground, on which 

 a few hundred pounds of grapes may be raised 

 as well as not for themselves and friends. 



Now I propose simply to give you my experi- 

 ence of IG years with the Isabella, said to be 

 the most difficult grape to ripen, excepting 

 one, in this latitude. j\ly statement can be 

 substantiated by any of my townsmen who 

 have been on my premises in September. I 

 think if my practice were followed by others, 

 we should not hear so much of Jack Frost's de- 

 stroying grapes, neither of the mildew, rot or 

 blight, and "hopes long deferred,'' or destroy- 

 ed, just as we thought in two weeks more we 

 should have the pleasure, for once, of eating 

 as many grapes as we desired, without costing 

 25 to 50 cents a pound ! 



My buildings face to the east, on which are 

 trained two Isabella vines. From one I have 

 taken, by weight, 500 pounds ; from the other 

 300 pounds of merchantable grapes. On the 

 south side of the barn I have two Isabella 

 vines, which average 100 pounds each, and 

 usually ripen about the middle of September. 

 In my garden, trellised to the fence, and up- 

 wards 8 or 10 feet, I have 4 vines, all Isabella, 

 which yield in proportion to the others ; the 

 whole of which take up little or no ground 

 that could be put to any other agricultural use. 



These vines are never pruned simply to please 

 the eye of the passer by. In November, or 

 first of December, I take them <lown, and 

 prune thoroughly even to half of the wood if it 

 is required ; then they are coiled up and laid 

 on the ground until spring is well opened, then 

 with strips of leather and tacks they are firmly 

 nailed to the house and roof, clean to the ridge- 

 pole. Every branch is separated from 2 to 4 

 feet, if possible, and that, of course, is easily 

 done if it is properly pruned out. I never 

 prune a leaf or check a shoot in sunmier or fall, 

 as my experience is, the bunches are the largest, 

 and ripen the quickest where the foliage is the 

 most dense, provided the branches or runners 

 are separated frpm 2 to 4 feet. I am satisfied 

 that these vines would often f;iil to ripen their 

 fruit by the frost striking them, if they had 

 been out in my fields. But when placed 

 against a house or barn, the frost does not 

 have a chance to injure them so early l)y 3 or 

 4 Aveeks. A wheelbarrow load of old barn 

 manure once in two years, with a half bushel 

 of ashes, about as often, spreatl around them, 

 and a weekly washing of suds in hot weather, 

 will, I am confident, force the vines to new 

 wood, and large and luscious grapes, well and 

 early ripened, will be the reward for our in- 



