. Queries and Ansisoers. 731 



is, that up to this period of their growth they exhibit every appearance 

 of health ; and the vines continue, even when the grapes are failing, to 

 grow vigorously and luxuriantly. Any information on this subject will be 

 thankfully received by — X. 



Prodigious Mushrooms. — Sir, Having read in the Hampshire Telegraph, 

 in March last, an account of a mushroom raised in the garden of E. Woods, 

 Esq., Shopwick, Chichester, by Mr. Collier, gardener, which measured in 

 circumference 43i in., and weighed 2 lbs. IQa oz., I am extremely anxious 

 to learn the details of the process whereby Mr. Collier has been enabled 

 to grow one so extraordinarily large. The readers of your Magazine 

 would, I am confident, feel grateful to Mr. Collier, were he to give a de- 

 tailed account of the mode adopted by him with such signal success. 1 am. 

 Sir, yours, &c. — J, S. Brighton, April 15. 1831. 



The Pink-eyed Potato of Wales, (p. 249.) — In reply to J. S., both the 

 early and late are common in Glamorganshire, and better varieties of this 

 valuable esculent do not exist. Experience enables me to say this, for 

 I have grown acres of both. The early variety admirably succeeds the 

 Early prolific and the Ash-leaved kidney ; the late variety should not be 

 used until towards the return of spring : they are excellent bearers, are 

 very mealy, and last until June, when young potatoes take their place. 

 Any quantity may be procured from either Mr. Miller's or Mr. Maule's 

 well-conducted nursery, at Bristol, who will forward them to all parts of 

 the kingdom. — P. Lauder. Cardiff, May 23. 1831. 



Barley Bigg. — 1 have been looking in several books to find particulars 

 about the qualities of the species of barley called in Scotland bere or 

 bigg, but without success. Somebody has told me that it will do pretty 

 well on stiff soil ; that it produces more corn, though not of such good 

 quality as common barley, on the acre ; that it may be sown in autumn 

 and fed down by sheep during the winter, or sown in the spring time later 

 than barley ; and that it ripens in a much shorter time. It is also said to 

 yield nearly as much spirit, and to make beer as well, or nearly so. If these 

 things are true, it must be a very valuable grain ; and having some land 

 which is late and heavy, I should like to try it. Can you give any account 

 of its nature and means of cultivation, or where the finest sorts are grown, 

 and how they are to be obtained ? — X. Y. London, Aug. 29. 1831. 



" Winter barley has the grains disposed in four or in six rows, large and 

 thick-skinned. It is chiefly cultivated in the north of England and in 

 Scotland, on account of its hardiness j but, from the thickness of its rind, 

 is ill adapted for malting, and is going out of use. 



" Bigg, byg, or barley big, is a variety of the winter barley, known by 

 always having six rows of grains, by the grains being smaller and the rind 

 thicker, and by its being earlier than the parent variety. Professor Martyn 

 says, he has frequently counted forty-two grains on one ear of bigg, when 

 common, or long-eared, barley had only twenty-two. Bigg may be sown 

 either in autumn to stand the winter, or as late as the first week in June. 

 In England, the winter or four-rowed barley is frequently sown in autumn, 

 and stands the most severe winters. With respect to the lateness at 

 which bigg and summer barley may be sown, much depends on the sort of 

 weather in the first three weeks after sowing." (JEncyclopesdia of Agricul- 

 ture, p. 823, 824. 2d edit.) 



Barley big, or big barley, is occasionally cultivated in the woodland 

 part of Suffolk for feed for sheep, where, I believe, the soil is generally a 

 clayey loam ; in Cambridgeshire, in soils lighter than the above, it occurs 

 mixed with the wheat, but only sparingly, and is deemed deteriorating to the 

 sample of wheat, in consequence of which the reapers are, or used to be, 

 set to glean it out of the sheaves, in weather in which it is too damp to 

 reap thew heat. — J. D. 



