Agriculture is the most healthful, the most useful, and the most 
noble employment of Man.— Washington. 
VOL. III. NEW YOR K, JUNE , 1844. _ NO. VI. 
A. B. Allen, Editor. Saxton & Miles, Publishers, 205 Broadway. 
CULTURE OF CORN. 
Corn is unquestionably the most valuable grain- 
crop wmcn is raised in the United States. So 
much, however, has lately been written upon its 
culture that little new can be said upon this sub¬ 
ject. It is well known that it is a gross feeder, 
and land can scarcely be made too rich for it. 
Proper hoeing, frequent stirring of the earth with 
the plow or cultivator between the rows, and above 
all, keeping the weeds down, are quite as essential 
as a rich soil. There is one point in the culture 
of corn, and a pretty important one to, which 
seems to remain in dispute, and that is regarding 
the breaking of the roots by deep plowing between 
the rows. The late Judge Buel contended that 
this was very injurious; while an equally eminent 
authority, Judge Beatty of Kentucky, has come to 
the conclusion, after careful experiment, that cut¬ 
ting the smaller roots by the plow, or otherwise, 
to a moderate extent, is not injurious to the crop; 
for, says he, the main roots will thereby throw out 
innumerable others in their place, and to a much 
more diversified extent. We will here make a 
suggestion of our own. Does not the cutting off 
a few of the smaller corn-roots act upon the stalks 
in the same manner as root-pruning of fruit-trees ? 
When the growth of the tree is too rank, we know 
that root-pruning has the effect of checking the 
production of wood in the tree, and of causing it 
to produce more fruit. Why, then, will not the 
root-pruning of corn add to its increase of grain ? 
We should be very glad if some of our readers 
would make a series of experiments on this crop 
the coming season, with a view of testing the 
merits of the two different methods of culture. 
We apprehend that when the soil is very rich, 
and there is a tendency of the corn running too 
much to stalk, cutting the roots would be advan¬ 
tageous ; but where the land was rather poor, and 
no such result likely to ensue, that cutting or 
breaking the roots in its culture would be injuri¬ 
ous. However, this is a mere matter of specula¬ 
tion with us, and till some reliable experiments are 
made in different kinds of soil, the same season, 
and with rows side by side, a mere opinion on this 
subject should have little weight with the prac¬ 
tical farmer. 
Corn for Fodder.— The culture of corn for 
summer soiling and winter fodder is greatly 
on the increase, and demands attention. From 
experiments made by several of our friends last 
season, in growing corn for soiling, they found that 
such as was sown in drills about one foot apart, 
did much better than that sown broad-cast; and 
