PROCEEDINGS OF THE FARMERS' CLUB. 319 



"In the summer of 1849 we rolled down and plowed under one acre of 

 oats, when in the milky state, for manure for wheat. On this we sowed 

 two bushels of broom corn seed, and harrowed well. When the broom 

 corn attained an average height of five feet, and as thick on the ground as 

 it could possibly grow to advantage — perhaps ten tons or more to the acre — 

 we plowed them under, too, and sowed wheat. On adjoining land in the 

 san.e field we cut the oats when ripe, 50 bushels per acre, and hauled all 

 off except the stubble. This we plowed under without manure or fertilizer 

 of any kind, and sowed with wheat at the same time as the other. At 

 Narvest time, the land without manure or fertilizers of any kind had more 

 and better wheat on it, and larger straw, than the land with the two green 

 crops turned under. We have tried the oat crop alone with the same re- 

 sult. Since that time there has been no perceptible difterence in the crops 

 on the two pieces of land, and both have been treated alike. The land 

 had been covered previously with 400 bushels per acre of soft, friable lime- 

 stone, containing 15 per cent, carbonate of lime, and intermingled with 

 grains of green sand found on the premises. One week of dry weather 

 followed the plowing under of the oats, which was succeeded by heavy 

 rains and fine growing weather. Many of the oats niust have ripened dur- 

 ing the week of dry weather, and then remained sound during the six or 

 eight weeks of wet weather which followed, for, when plowing them up, 

 many grew until killed by the frosts of winter. 



"plant lice injurious to the oat crop. 

 " Soon after our oats headed, last summer, we found, in spots, about our 

 fields, great quantities of plant lice attached to the lower ends of the grains 

 —in many places so numerous as to change the color of the heads to a 

 dh-ty or dingy red. We found them in all stages of growth on the same 

 grain toward harvest. Early-sown oats and those on higher land fared the 

 best. They remained attached to the grains until the straw was cut, when 

 the cradles and other implements used in gathering them were gummed 

 with the aphides mashed in the operation. The stench rising from our 

 fields in the evening, just before harvest, caused by these aphides, was 

 sickening. Our crop does notlf^eigh over twenty pound#to the bushel. 

 The oldest inhabitant here does not remember the like. .Can you give any 

 information of a like occurrence ? 



" SUBSOILING NO ADVANTAGE TO SOME LANDS. 



"On the recommendation of scientific farmers, I purchased a subsoil 

 plow in the winter of 1847, and subsoiled, that year, 30 acres for corn, 

 leaving a strip of about one rod in width through the middle not subsoiled. 

 The difference in the crop that year, if any, was in favor of the strip not 

 subsoiled. We have seen no difierence in the crops since that time. The 

 subsoil was a stiff, yellow clay. ' That was the first and last of my sub- 

 soiling. On deep plowing, for improving lands for grain and grass crops, 

 permit me to offer the following sugge^ions: If the natural inclination of 

 the roots of our grain and grass crops is downward into the subsoil, to 

 luxuriate there, away from the warming and vivifying influence of tho 

 sun— the dews and gentle rains; and if a soil containing a small per cent, 

 of vegetable matter, because deeper, is preferable to one containing twice 



