JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
352 
[ April 26, 1883. 
before the sun reaches the house. As the growth extends the heat should be 
slightly increased, and a minimum of 60° in the morning (65° at ten o’clock at 
night) will be safe during the flowering period. These temperatures may be 
maintained until the crop is ripe. These are low night temperatures, but in 
districts where there is an average amount of sun and early closing is adopted 
they will suffice. The day temperature by fire heat alone should be 5° or 6°, 
and the sun temperature 15° or 20° above the minimum night figures. The 
house should be closed ijs soon as possible in the afternoon, provided the heat 
afterwards does not greatly exceed 85°; the house, if not the Vines, to be 
thoroughly syringed at that time for producing a moist genial atmosphere. 
The top ventilators may be slightly opened afterwards, and left open all night, 
increasing the ventilation in the morning in advance of the temperature as it 
rises with the power of the sun. Too many amateurs permit the maximum 
sun temperature to be reached before admitting air, which is an unsafe, even a 
dangerous practice. We know in some seasons and districts such (drapes as 
the Black Hamburgh will ripen without fire heat, and perhaps your neighbour 
is favourably situated. If there is not sufficient heat for ripening the wood it 
it certain the frost will not ripen it, and unless the wood matures before the 
leaves fall the Vines will fail sooner or later. When Grapes are ripe admit 
abundance of air, and, provided the night temperature does not fall beiow 
50°, you will have no occasion to fire except for maintaining a dry buoyant 
atmosphere. 
Heating a Pit (An Old Devon Subscriber). —You do not trouble ns in the 
least; on the contrary, we are glad to hear from you, and shall be more pleased 
still if we can aid you. The boiler you name is good, and we should certainly 
heat the pit. The plan you sketch would no doubt answer—indeed your past 
experience assures you on this point: but is such an elaborate method neces¬ 
sary ? We are inclined to think not. The requisite bottom heat for Cucumbers 
and Melons could be well supplied in such a pit with fermented manure and 
leaves, and unless there was a scarcity of such material we should only provide 
top heat by the pipes by simply taking a flow and return pipe, one over the 
other, along the front within the space to be formed by your proposed partition. 
Even if we had to supply both bottom and top heat from the hot-water apparatus 
we should prefer n more modern plan of distributing it—namely, by conducting 
the flow pipe as indicated for top heat, and the return pipe to the boiler in a 
chamber under the bed for bottom heat, both these to be 3-inch pipes if the 
pit is to be started in April, 4-inch if you commence in March. If fermenting 
material is sufficiently plentiful and good for affording bottom heat, then two 
2-inch pipes would suffice for top heat. By our plan of arranging the pipes 
more heat with a less consumption of fuel would be supplied to the bed than 
would result by your more elaborate method, which we know by experience 
looks better on paper than it would act in practice. To produce sufficient heat 
for the bed you would have to heat the pipes unduly, and you would con¬ 
sequently invite an attack of red spider. A chamber 2 feet wide and 1 foot 
deep would suffice for distributing heat from the pipe, the space so enclosed to 
be covered with slabs or slates, with the joints left open and protected with 
rubble. 
Names of Plants (F. (7.).— Cerbera Thevetia. See reply above. (IF. 2).).— 
A poor variety of Lycaste Harrisonre. (C. S). —The yellow-flowered specimen is 
Justicia calycotricha, the other is Fuchsia procumbens. (M. B.). —1, Adiantum 
formosum ; 2, Erica codonodes; 3, Ribes speciosa ; 4 will be referred to next week. 
Address (J. E .).—The address you require is Mr. Pettigrew’s, Bowdon, 
Cheshire. Those who have straw Stewarton hives to sell should advertise 
them. 
COVENT GARDEN MARKET. 
The prices of fruit and vegetables remain the same as recorded in the table 
on page 330, last week. 
POULTRY AND PIGEON CHRONICLE. 
PLOUGHING-IN OR FEEDING GREEN CROPS. 
(Continued from page 332.) 
In continuation of our subject we must now refer to another 
kind of vegetation usually grown for a double purpose, first as a 
fallow crop, and secondly the feeding of live stock ; we mean 
the various root crops, such as Mangolds, Swedish and other sorts 
of Turnips, and Carrots. These crops are usually cultivated for 
the purpose of feeding sheep on the land, cattle in their boxes, 
dairy cows in their stalls, and swine in their pens. It is with a 
common consent amongst farmers considered best to do thus, 
and appropriate the bulbous root crops for feeding purposes 
only, and the custom is defended by them and said to be profit¬ 
able, as corn-growing does not pay; and yet they are obliged 
to admit that roots are grown and fed off by stock in order to 
manure the land for corn-growing purposes. In fact, although 
the custom of growing roots and feeding them by sheep stock 
on the land is in full operation in almost every district in the 
kingdom in which capital enough to carry out the system can 
be found for the purpose, still unfortunately it is notorious that 
within the last eight years large numbers of men who were 
considered good stock farmers have failed and succumbed to the 
times whilst carrying out this^favourite style of farming. This 
is a serious state of things when practically considered in the 
interest of landowners, tenant farmers, or 'the agents and home 
farmers throughout the country, and especially upon those 
farms which are occupied under compulsory leases, by which 
the occupiers are bound to carryjout certain systems of cropping 
and stocking not beneficial or suitable to the times in which 
we live. 
Having said thus much we feel bound to endeavour and solve 
the problem, however difficult it may appear to those who have 
not studied the agricultural points involved in an altered style 
of agriculture. It is fortunate that the home farmer is only in 
a few instances allowed to adjust his system to^meet all con¬ 
tingencies either of stocking or cropping,"and thus be enabled to 
utilise his green crops in such a manner as may prove most 
profitable. This brings us to the r point which we desire to 
explain. The question was formerly pretty generally recognised, 
as before stated, amongst intelligent farmers, that ploughing-in 
18 tons of Turnips per acre after [being "properly broken down> 
gave 12 bushels of Barley (and other cereals in proportion) more 
than if the said Turnips had been first passed through the 
animal and the elements required to form’ mutton and wool 
extracted. 
The first experiment which we have to notice is again from 
Mr. Love’s essay before quoted from, in which he says—“ A 
12-acre field of light loam had been manured with 16 tons of 
farmyard dung per acre ploughed into a Wheat stubble, and 
thrice cultivated in the spring, harrowed and rolled, and then 
ridged up, and 2 quarters of bone-dust (well fermented after wetting 
with urine) drilled in per acre under the seed. The produce 
was a little over 18 tons of Turnips per acre. The crop on 3 acres 
was all carted off the land, that on 7^ acres eaten by sheep, and 
that on l£ acre crushed with Crosskill’s clod-crusher and 
ploughed in 6 inches deep. The whole was sown with Oats, and 
produced as follows : Where Turnips were drawn 7 quarters ; 
where eaten 9 quarters, where ploughed in over 11 quarters 
per acre.” 
The next example is that of Mr. G. Murray, of Elvaston, Derby, 
in his “Essay on Ploughing-in Green Crops,” as given in the 
Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society in 1S68. He says— 
“My experience of ploughing-in green crops includes much 
variety of soil and difference'of climate and of rainfall. In the 
north-western counties of Scotland, where dairy farming is 
extensively practised, the whole Turnip crop is got up by the 
middle of November, and all drawn off and consumed by cattle 
in the yards. Here the farmers are very particular to have the 
Turnip-tops regularly spread over the land, and at once 
ploughing-in, the depth of furrow never being less than 5 inches. 
In this state it remains till the month of January or later, when 
the land is generally sown with Wheat, and heavy crops are 
grown. It is, however, generally supposed that green manuring 
is most successful in a dry climate. I find the average weight 
of tops left by a good crop of Mangold or Swedes to be about 
4 tons when taken up duriug the early part of November.” This 
exhibits the value of the greens only if taken when they are at 
the fullest growth and before the roots have arrived at their 
greatest weight per acre. It also shows the value for ploughing-in 
a crop of late-sown or stubble Turnips when in full growth of 
greens, and before they have had time to form anything more 
than small bulbs. We have also to notice that recently, as stated 
in the Hampshire Advertiser, a paper had been read at a meeting 
of the Botley and South Hants Farmers’ Club by Mr. Joseph 
