1870. 



XEW ENGLAND FARRIER. 



655 



an hour, in which time she visited five hundred 

 and eighty-two clover heads, when he lost sight of 

 her in flying over some weeds, and does not know 

 that she was even then fully loaded. 



—The next meeting of the Maine State Board'of 

 Agriculture will be held in Farmington village, at 

 the Court House, about the 1st of January. In 

 connection with this meeting the Farmers' Con- 

 vention will be held. We shall give further par- 

 ticulars hereafter. 



—A few days since, at an auction sale in Ban- 

 gor, Me., 43 000 acres of timber land were sold at 

 prices varying from #1 48 to $1.75 per acre. The 

 aggregate sum realized was about $70,000. This 

 was one of the largest sales of timber land ever 

 made on private account in Maine. 



—Mr. J. A. Harwood of Littleton, Mass., has a 

 fine young peach orchard of nearly two thousand 

 trees, about two hundred of which are in bearing. 

 His crop this year amounts to about one hundred 

 and fifty bushels, which he sold for not less than 

 $6 per bushel, amounting to $900 or more. 



—The cattle disease, which broke out in Egre- 

 mont and the western part of Great Harrington 

 last summer, is still prevailing, and extending its 

 ravages among horses, sheep, and swine as well. 

 George M. Hollenbeck of Egremont has lost nearly 

 $1500 worth of stock, and several other farmers 

 have lost five or six hundred dollars' worth a piece. 



—The farmer who raises produce for a distant 

 market is limited to a few articles, such as wheat, 

 corn, rye, &c., which greatly exhaust the soil- 

 while he who has a market near at hand can cul- 

 tivate any product for which his soil and climate 

 are adapted, and can have a thorough rotation of 

 crops, so necessary to preserve the vitality of the 

 soil. 



—The Maine Farmer discusses the value of saw- 

 dust for bedding as follows : There is a great dif- 

 ference in the value of the dififerent kinds of saw- 

 dust. For example, while hard pine sawdust 

 from the shipyard is pure and sweet, even fragrant, 

 and readily takes up the urine, it is not so valu- 

 able or good for the soil as hard-wood dust, or 

 even our native soft-wood dust from spruce, hem- 

 lock, &c. The reason is, because the pine is full 

 of resin, which is almost water and rot proof. It 

 will last quite a ti.me and not decay, whereas the 

 hard wood readily and rapidly decays, thus fur- 

 nishing a small amount of manure to the soil. 



that the purest strain of carrot seed would some- 

 times produce nothing but seed the first year, but 

 they could give no reason why it should be so. 



Carrots Going to Seed.— In reply to a com- 

 plaint by some one that his carrots went to seed 

 the first year, a correspondent of the Country Gen- 

 tlemaji, who was formerly a seed grower in Eng- 

 land, says, that the best carrot seed will occasion- 

 ally produce nothing but seed the first year is a 

 fact. In 1SG5 a meeting was held in London, Eng., 

 on the above subject, and attended by men who 

 had made a speciality of raising carrot seed for 

 fifty years, and the experience of these men was, 



For the Xew England Farmer, 

 EARIiY FRUITS AND VEGETABLES. 

 It Is a fact that cannot be denied, that with 

 many farmers too little attention is given to 

 the culture of early fruits and vegetables. 

 This is the result arrived at after extensive 

 observation and considerable acquaintance 

 with far.ners. If they plant their usual extent 

 of corn and potatoes; sow their ordinary 

 breadth of oats and rye, and sometimes a 

 piece of wheat ; see that their mowings are 

 in ample order, and make provision for a suit- 

 able supply of fall and winter fruit, they have 

 done all that is netiessary to satisfy their own 

 and their families' future material wants, and 

 to ensure a fair degree of temporal success, — 

 but they do not seem to realize the advantage 

 derived from the culture of the tender and 

 delicate productions of the garden and or- 

 chard, for these are almost wholly vegetables. 

 This is not the case with all farmers. There 

 are those, even in the back country, and far 

 from any market, who make it a matter of 

 prime impoitance to provide themselves with 

 an adequate amount of early fruits and veget- 

 ables. And this they do from a sense of duty 

 as well as pleasure, — not that they will afford 

 a large margin of pecuniary advantage, for 

 they do not cultivate them for sale, so much 

 as for use, though they receive more than their 

 full value in the increased health and happi- 

 ness of their families and friends. They know 

 the luxury and advantage of a liberal supply 

 of early fruits and vegetables and they take 

 the necessary steps to secure them, and gener- 

 ally they are not disappointed. 



While this is the course of some, there are 

 others who, for want of thought or interest, 

 seem utterly indifferent to the whole matter, 

 and practically ignore it. In proof of this we 

 have only to visit their farms in summer. 

 Scarcely an early fruit tree can be found on 

 their premises, and their garden is a mere 

 apology for one. They may have some of the 

 ordinary early potatoes and beans, in some 

 convenient spot ; perhaps a bed of beets arad 

 onions, a few hills of winter squashes, and a 

 row or two of cabbages and turnips, to fill out 

 the allotted space ; of early vegetables there 

 is not a solitary representative. Not that 

 these farmers are idle or lazy ; they are in- 

 tensely active about the weightier matter of 

 agriculture, but of the lighter and minor ones — 

 ; hough of equal importance— they have no 

 just conception, or taste, and so deprive them- 

 selves and families of comforts which, by a 

 little forethought and labor, they could riohly 

 and freely enjoy. 



To show that I do not speak at random, I 

 will briefly relate a conversation I recently had 

 with a young man who came from the city to 



