The Illinois Faemek. 



VOL. VII. 



SPRINGFIELD, MARCH 1862. 



NO. 3. 



March. 



In this latitutde this is the first month of 

 actual spring, as it is the first on the calen- 

 dar, but a few degrees further north and 

 spring waits for April before the time of seed- 

 ing is at hand. The first week in March is 

 the usual time to sow spring wheat, though 

 not always. We generally begin to lift trees 

 in the nursery by the tenth of the month, 

 occasionally before, but seldom later, though 



a cold snap of three or four days will some- 

 time intervene after this. Spring wheat is 



always better for undergoing one or two such 

 tight spells of weather. Oats should not be 

 sown before the last of the month, though 

 barley can follow soon after the spring wheat. 

 Grass and clover seed that has not been 

 sown on the winter grain should be attended 

 to at once. In seeding with spring grain 

 we sow after finishing with the harrow and 

 roll at once after seeding. Sprin g- wheat and 

 barley are the best spring crops to seed with. 

 Oats are not as good, for should the crop be 

 heavy the foliage which is so abundant on 

 this grain, so shades the ground that the 

 grass and clover become slender, sickly 

 plants, and if followed by hot weather for a 

 few days after harvesting the sudden expos- 

 ure is pretty sure to kill them, while on the 

 other hand, if followed by cloudy wet weath- 

 er they soon recover and make a vigorous 

 growth ; for these reasons we do not seed af- 

 ter oats unless compelled to do so. 



The Wood Pile should be carefully 

 looked to, and on such days as the farm work 

 cannot be attended to, advantage should be 

 taken of it to have an abundant supply of 

 good wood ready for the stovC; or kitchen 



fire. It is bad economy to use green wood 

 or to be compelled to stop in the hurry of 

 other work to haul up a load of wood or to 

 cut it for the stove. No good farmer will 

 allow himself to be cutting fire wood when 

 other work is pressing. Coals are extensively 

 used for fuel ; these must be housed and 

 kept dry or a few rains will spoil them. — 

 Corn is also used to some extent, but we 

 doubt its economy; corn cannot be put into 

 the crib at less than fifteen cents a bushel, 

 and from what we have tried it, two bush- 

 els are not worth more than one bushel of 

 first quality Illinois coal. That is at fifteen 

 cents a bushel, it is equal to coal at seven 

 dollars and a half a ton, an aveeage loss of 

 three and a half dollars, or eight cents a 

 bushel, for the corn. It is possible that we 

 are not precisely accurate in this estimate, 

 but it cannot be far from the truth. We 

 know that steam works at this point prefer 

 coal at the current rates to corn at ten cents. 

 We have seen no estimates of its value for 

 steam, though it is often used with coal to 

 get up steam at once, in starting the fire or 

 to suddenly renew it ; it burns freely and 

 produces a large amount of flame, On the 

 whole we cannot consider the use of corn for 

 fuel at all profitable, though if the farmer 

 will persist in supplying green or rotten 

 wood the good wife would be considered at 

 perfect liberty to draw on the corn crib un- 

 der every such provocation. 



Hot Beds should now be looked after ; 

 see that sash is in order and have the ma- 

 nure piled so as to undergo the first process 

 of fermentation before using, this is very 

 important to the stability of a good hot bed. 



