31(j Transactions of the American Institute. 



hills of the growing corn. Sometimes plaster is applied, but with 

 hardly any perceptible effect. The commercial fertilizers are not 

 used on this farm. For two generations the feeding of beef cattle 

 has been the leading interest here, and during all that time it has 

 been a principle never to pasture close. This old sod accounts for 

 the corn crop ; and it was said by one of the laborers who had worked 

 on this farm for forty years, that, in all his experience, the com crop 

 was uniformly good, even the driest seasons scarcely diminishing it. 



Osage Orange Hedges for the Prairies. 

 A gentleman living at Cambridge, 111., forwarded the subjoined 

 statements in the hope that they may serve as at least partial answers 

 to the various questions which are being asked nowadays about Osage 

 hedging on the prairies. Our soil here is black loam, from one to 

 two feet deep, with a clay subsoil ; it freezes from eighteen inches to 

 three feet of winters. Most every farmer has from one to ten miles 

 of hedge, some of it twenty years old. Twelve years ago a hedge 

 was set near here, and four years ago it was lapped down, and after it 

 was done it looked like a fence of poles two inches in diameter, woven 

 in the bottom ; was cut about half off down close to the ground, 

 except one every four feet for a post ; and the others were laid in with 

 the tops about three feet from the ground ; sprouts grew up from the 

 poles every few inches, and it has been trimmed the last of June and 

 September with a corn knife, making a strong, handsome fence about 

 a foot wide ; we have trimmed most every way, but think this is the 

 best ; here and there one bush was left to grow, and this year part of 

 them had oranges which are four or five inches in diameter, spongy, 

 and on the outside warts, and of a light green color, containing five 

 or six hundred seeds. We throw them in our back rooms and let 

 them freeze and thaw, and in the spring rub out the seeds in a tub of 

 water. Plant in drills two and a half or three inches apart (some use 

 a wheat drill with part of the holes stopped up), three or four seeds 

 to the inch, on rich, clean ground. They are very slow about coming 

 up ; if they could be cultivated before they were up it would be bet- 

 ter, for the easiest time to kill weeds is before you see them. A little 

 white grub makes sad havoc with them just as they are coming up 

 sometimes. They are generally taken up late in the fall by using a 

 plough without a mould board, to cut the roots, and pull with gloves, 

 counting as you go, leaving a hundred in a bunch ; or plough them 

 out with a common plough, keeping the row in the middle of the fur- 

 row, and using a fork to knock some of the dirt off from the roots ; 



