THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
13 
deniially held m reserve by the kind earth to 
produce the next summer. 
in plowinglands that have thusbeen under the 
influence ot irrigation, it is astonishing to see 
the amount of the rich deposit in many places 
underground. It will look as if a large quan- 
tity of manure had been placed there, all of 
which had been deposited in almost impercep- 
tible particles with the raany'bubbles floating in 
the stream. But when we think these mites in 
the course of one hour are innumerable, the 
accumulation of a winter of five or six months 
will make these millions of mites into large and 
valuable deposits, enriching the soil and pre- 
senting an increased and improved product. 
This would appear as if it were designed on- 
ly to produce grass. I will, at so.ne time, show 
my experience in improvinglands by irrigation, 
and the astonishing effect in producing corn, it 
I should have time to devote to writing. As I 
have filled my sheet 1 shall present nothing 
more at this time. 
Irrigation will make parts of South Caroli- 
na productive beyond the conception ol the 
most extravagant. The water will thus be ta- 
ken from where there is too much so as to do 
injur}’’, and placed where it is wanted, increas- 
ing the product ol both. Yours, .‘•incerely, 
D Rei.n’hardt. 
Greenville, So. Ca., Oct. 27, 184.5. 
Improving Soil. 
Mr. Cam.ak: — Y our correspondent, Mr. C. 
D. Davis, has given his proposed plan of im- 
proving the soil, and wishes the readers of the 
Southern Cultivator to point out defects, &c. 
I will not presume to point out delects, but will 
give some of m}’ notions, which I hope wi-ll be 
received, as they are oflered, in a spirit of kind- 
ness. 
In the first place, I would like to have the 
land brotce as deep as possible with a good turn- 
ing plow, drawn bv at least two, it not four 
horses; I would like for a good subsoil plow 
to follow in the same furrow immediately after 
the turning plow’, and for this plow to be drawn 
as de'=p as possible, and by as strong a team as 
the first plow’. Some of the subsoil clay I 
w’ould like to have mixed with the surface sand. 
This w’ould give the soil a better body, it would 
retain moisture better, and the growing crop 
would not suffer so much from the droughts of 
summers. After this plowing, I would pass a 
heavy iron tooth harrow’ over the field to pul- 
verize and level the surface. This done, I 
would sow one bushel of rye per acre, and har- 
row in the seeds. 
If Mr. Davis sows his corn and peas as he 
speaks of doing, and then p'ows sufficiently 
deep to cover the rye well, I think he will be 
very apt to see but little of his corn or peas 
thereafter. They would., in my opinion, he co- 
vered too deep. I would prefer to roll the rye 
down w'ith a heavy roller, and plow in with a 
two horse turning plow, the plow going the 
same way the roller had gone; then harrow 
once, SOW’ one-half bushel Tory peas per acre, 
harrow them in and mil. In September, plow in 
the peas, and again harrow in one bushel rye 
per acre. In February, roll dowm the rye and 
plow it well in ; harrow at least tw'ice and roll 
welL Some two or three weeks thereafter plant 
corn. In the alter cultivation use no plow ex- 
cept the cultivator or sweeper, run shallow, so 
as not to interrupt the sod. After turning in 
each green cron, 1 would like to have some ten 
or twenty bushels of lime sown on each acre 
to correct acidity and hasten decomposition. 
Like Mr. Davis, I wish to obtain inlorum- 
tion. Will Mr. Caraak or some of the readers 
ol the Southern Cultivator correct my de- 
fecs'] Clodhopper. 
P. S. Give mv respects to my friend Bucket, 
and sa}’ to him I am anxious to learn how to 
feed Bet kshires to profit. C. 
Pride goeth before destruction, and a haugh- 
ty spirit before a fall. 
Plantation Economy. 
Mr. Camak: — It is probably known to you 
that I have been something of a correspondent 
lor the Southern Cultivator. Having made 
no communication for it the present year, you 
may perhaps conclude that I have lost my form- 
er relish for its success; it so, let me say to you 
that I am far from that ; so much so, that I felt 
mortified at the commencement of its third vo- 
lume, that I had such poor luck in getting my 
neighbors to subscribe for it. I hope neither you 
or the publishers will despair of making the Cul- 
tivator profitable to yourselves, as it must and 
w'ill be both profitable and instiuciive to the 
greater part of its readers. 
It is know'n to you that we had an uncommon 
drouth through this section of country the last 
summer. The wheat crop was short, on ac- 
count of the w'orm and fly. The oat crop was 
uncommonly short, on account ol a dry spring. 
The corn crop is about iw’o-thirds id' an ave- 
rage one. The cotton crop from a half to tw'o- 
thirds, compared with last year’s crop. The 
potatoe crop is quite indifferent. The pea crop 
almost a complete failure. On the back of all 
this, the army worm, or a kind of caterpillar, 
took possession cd' our fields and pastures about 
the first of September, and made a complete 
sweep of our grass. 
The above named circumstances have put us 
in a proper frame to study and practice econo- 
my. 1 now propose togive you and the readers 
of the Cultivator a sketch of my management 
under present circumstances, having no doubt 
but I shall find such management and economy 
profitable in the most plentiful times. I have 
one of Mr. R.i>we’s natent Crushers in opera- 
tion. I have corn ground with the shuck taken 
off for my pork hogs, and have a boiler made 
by the description given by IMr. A. Greene, of 
Greene county, in the first volume of the South- 
ern Cultivator, dated July 19ih, 1843. There 
is some six or eight of those boilers in use in 
this neighborhood, wliich answer an excellent 
purpose for boiling food lor stock. The benefit 
arising from the use of these boilers, so far 
as we are concerned, must be placed to the cre- 
dit of Mr. Greene, through the instrumentality 
of Ike Cultivator, as w’e should have known 
nothingof the value of so cheap an article had 
the Cultivator never been published. I have 
(alternately) boiled lor my hogs, collards, tur- 
nips, pumpkins, potatoes and artichokes, a cer- 
tain portion of corn and cob meal in every boil- 
ing, using salt freely. By the use of lour bu- 
shels of this corn and cob meal added per day 
to the other articles above named, I find that 
forty-four hogs of good size are fattening very 
kindly. I have my corn ground with the shuck 
on for my mules, horses and work steers. 
The cobs from which the grain is taken for 
bread, we have ground and boiled for our milch 
Cows. Mv mules and tiorses are doing well on 
the kind of feed above spoken of. I am ol the 
opinion that my’ crusher will save me at least 
S’lOO in the way of corn in tw’elve months. 
I planted about three fourths of an acre of ve- 
ry highly manured land, both last year and this, 
in a kind of corn called (about h^ie) Texan 
Corn, which afforded moie feed for my stock 
than any five acres I bad in common corn. We 
commenced feeding with it the first of August, 
by cutting down at the ground, filling up a large 
trough twice a day. If the mules left any of 
the stalk.s, they w’ere thrown out for the hogs, 
which seemed to delight in having them to 
chew on. When we first began to cut the corn 
a second crop came on in the way ol sprouts 
or suckers, which got to be some six feet high 
It grows as thick as a canebrake, has thick and 
soft feeling fodder. The grain comes on the 
top of the stalks in a branch, which is excel- 
lent feed for fowhs or anv kind ot stock. I have 
had some of it ground and bolted, which flour 
makes tolerable good batter cakes or fritters. 
I spoke ol a large trough ; let me describe 
one, as it is worth any planter’s attention ; It 
is made with four pieces of hewn timber, any 
length desired, 18 or 20 inches wide. G inches 
thick ; two blocks of a suitable size, say 6 feet 
long; the blocks are placed on the ground, two 
of the pieces laid on these blocks, the othe-r two 
are set up, one on each side, and the whole 
clamped together. This is done by boring lour 
holes W’ith a large auger, and putting in a pin 
in each hole with a shoulder outside, one in 
each end of those blocks, and wedges drove to 
clamp the timbers which form the trough, 
which is done when the heads are pinned on. 
My trough is 20 feet long and has a shelter built 
over it. 
I forgot to name in its proper place that the 
kind ot corn herein spoken of, remains green 
till frost, and continues to grow’. We have cut 
the last of ours this week. It has been in ibis 
settlement for three years, I believe. The seed 
was brought from Alabama. 
Mr. Pitts, in his communication some time 
since on the subject of Berkshire Hogs, is con- 
sidered to be extravagant, though I have to con- 
fess thatthere has been something of the multi- 
caulis about them with some men, and thatthey 
are not what they have been cracked up to be. 
They are not the hogs for planters, especially 
those that do not allow more than a bushel of 
corn per day to something like a hundred head. 
I am, dear sir, yours respectfully, 
John Farrar. 
Putnam Co., Go,., Nov. 15, 1845. 
Agricultural ilkrting0. 
STATE AGHIC5JETEJXAE SOCiE'2T. 
REPORT 
Of the Committee on the Agriculture oj Georgia. 
The Committee on the Agriculture of Geor- 
gia, conscious of their inability to meet the ex- 
pectations of the Association, will yet endeavor 
to discharge the duty assigned them. For the 
purpose of enabling them to do so, they have ad- 
dressed several scientific and practical agricul- 
turists; they have also consulted the pages of 
that valuable peiiodical, “ The Southern Culti- 
vator.'’ Entertaining but little hope of present- 
ing new' truths, the Committee regret that they 
will be compelled lo pass over many old ones 
that would be interesting. 
From one or two ol the gentlemen addressed 
by them they have received communications: 
from one or two others they had still hoped to 
receive them. 'The communication from Mr. 
Jas Camak, is so pertinent and yet so concise, 
that it will be made the foundation of this re- 
port. From the communications of other gen- 
tlemen, had they been received, we might have 
derived aid bv way of quotation or appendix. 
Mr. Camak reads — 
^‘Athens, Sept. 16, 1845. 
Mr. Turner, Dear Sir : I have been prevent- 
ed by bad health from answering your letter of 
the 15th ult. until now’. 
'• You ask for hints as to the report of your 
Committee to the Agricultural Association of 
the State. I can only make suggestions as to 
the plan of your report. 
“ 1. Take a survey of the present condition of 
the Agriculture of Georgia, and ol the practices 
which have led to it. 
“2. Show how we are to remedy the errors of 
the past and better our condition. 
“Among the causes which have brought 
Georgia to w hat she is, I would dwell emphati- 
cally on the partial action of the General Go- 
vernment as one of the chief of these causes: 
taking care, how’ever, not to meddle with party 
politics. 
“ Among the remedies, I would insist on the 
Legislature enabling our State University to 
give a complete course of instruction in Agri- 
cultural Chemistry and Geology. 
“You may thus make a report that will com- 
mand attenti'm, cotton don’t get up to 
te7i cents. If that takes place, everything like 
improvement stops ai once. 
“ Very truly, yours, James Camak.” 
Assuming these suggestions as the basis of 
our report, we will endeavor, 
1. To take a survey of the present condiiion 
