164 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
a bill of corn or cucumbers, squashes, pump¬ 
kins, melons, peas, onions, strawberries, or any 
other fruit, vegetable, or grain, and you cannot 
fail to have an improved crop. This is Ameri¬ 
can Guano, and is as good as that brought from 
the island off Peru, at heavy cost. 
HAY MAKING-ARE YOU READY? 
Tiiere is every prospect that Western farm¬ 
ers will, during the coming season, experience 
much difficulty in procuring assistance at har¬ 
vest. For several years past, labor has not 
been as plentiful as was requisite; but at the 
present moment, the making of so many rail¬ 
roads, California and Australia, the increase of 
our mercantile navy, &c., are absorbing all the 
spare hands, and raising wages beyond what 
farmers can well afford to pay. Under these 
circumstances, only three modes of acting ap¬ 
pear to present themselves, viz.: 1, to pay wages 
so high, that men will be tempted to leave their 
present occupations for the summer ; 2, to put in 
a very limited supply of spring crops; or, 3, to 
purchase or hire machines, whereby a few boys 
and men can rapidly accomplish the work of 
many men. Fortunately, there are many farm¬ 
ers in the West, who have no more hay or grain 
to harvest than they and their families can attend 
to; these will experience little or no difficulty; 
but there are very many more who must have 
assistance, or their crops are injured and wasted 
by delay. In every such case, where the fields 
are smooth and sufficiently free from stumps , 
we strongly recommend the use of machines ; 
and we call attention to the subject thus early 
in order that arrangements may be made in time. 
Owing to our peculiar position near a large 
city, where hands are easily procured, and in 
consequence of the stumps yet in our fields, we 
have had no personal experience with hay and 
grain machines; but we have conversed with 
farmers from many localities who have used 
them, and we never met with one who was not 
more than satisfied with them. A few weeks 
ago, we had a long talk with a very intelligent 
farmer from Northern Illinois—one who puts by 
500 to 600 tons of hay annually—and his mode 
of proceeding may prove interesting to our 
readers. He has two hay machines, each work¬ 
ing with a span of horses, and driven by a 
young boy. Each of these will cut twelve to 
fifteen acres a day; or twenty acres, if the 
horses are changed at noon. He begins in the 
morning as soon as the dew is off, and cuts un¬ 
til about noon. As each stalk of grass falls 
where it stood, and is not put in swathe, as 
when cut with a scythe, it dries very rapidly; 
and as soon as dinner is over, two or more re¬ 
volving hay rakes are put on, which rake the 
hay into windrows. A very large, long-toothed 
rake, having two horses, one at each end, and a 
little boy on each horse, is then applied to the 
end of a windrow, and a pile, of 5 to 7 cwt., is 
at once thrown up. The wagon is now ready, 
rigged with a very long wide rack, so that a ton 
of hay when loaded, will only be a few feet high; 
two men pitch and one packs away. All the 
hay is put into barns, where bays are arranged 
for the purpose, and here is a great improve¬ 
ment on the old system. A wooden gallows, 
with a pully at the end of the arm, is so ar¬ 
ranged in front of the bay as to be rapidly 
moved to any position in which it is required; 
a rope is run through the pulley, there being at 
one end of the rope a large fork with long steel 
teeth, and at the other end a horse. The wagon 
is driven into the barn ; the fork stuck into the 
hay so as to lift 2 or 3 cwt. of it; the horse goes 
ahead ; lifts it up; the gallows swing round; 
and the man in the bay, by means of a short 
rope, attached to the fork, tips it where he 
wishes; the horse backs up, and the operation 
is repeated. By this means, a ton of hay can 
be unloaded in three or four minutes; and about 
12 acres put by daily. We leave it to our read¬ 
ers to calculate with how many hands, and at 
what cost, they can in the old way cut and put 
by this quantity in a day. By these machines, 
two boys and four men appear to be quite suffi¬ 
cient, while the cost per ton, every thing inclu¬ 
ded, is reduced, at least, one-half. In case, 
there is less grass to cut, as in the majority of 
instances, one cutter, one revolving rake, and 
one large rake will be sufficient for the field, and 
the number of hands requisite may be smaller. 
If the weather is fine, and there is no danger of 
rain, our informant would cut one day and haul 
the next, especially in the beginning of the sea¬ 
son, when the grass was very green. In this 
case he uses salt as he packs away, but if the 
hay is very dry he uses none. There are now 
many machines in the market both for hay cut¬ 
ting and grain harvesting, each claiming to be 
superior in some particular. In some instances 
the hay-cutters are adapted for this purpose 
alone, costing from $100 to $120, and capable 
of serving, with ease, on an ordinary farm, for 
10 or more years. In other instances, the hay 
and grain machines are combined, slight altera¬ 
tions fitting them for either purpose, and the 
cost being $250 and upwards. Where the price 
is too high for one individual, two or three 
neighbors might unite in the purchase; and we 
believe, in some instances, grain-harvesters are 
carried round fro n farm to farm, in the same 
manner as threshing machines, the owner find¬ 
ing a team, and doing the work. Several of 
the manufacturers require only a small pay¬ 
ment down, content to receive the balance when 
the grain is sold — a mode of purchasing which 
will enable many to procure a machine, while 
they would be precluded by a demand for cash. 
There are now, also, several patterns of horse 
rakes. In the great majority of them, the driver 
walks behind, and regulates the implement wnth 
his hands. The Revolvers , as they are called, 
are decidedly the best of this kind, and for 
rough land they can be had with steel teeth. 
Others are fixed on wheels, the driver standing 
on the rake, and working it with his foot. — 
Farmer's Companion. 
- • • *—- —• 
GAPES. 
I know of no remedy so effectual as that sug¬ 
gested by Mr. Tegetmeier, viz., the obliging 
chickens to inhale the fumes of turpentine, 
which may be accomplished by heating the tur¬ 
pentine and placing it with the chicken in a 
covered vessel of some kind. The turpentine 
may be kept from contact with the chicken by 
placing an inverted flower-pot over the cup or 
vessel that may contain it, or a feather dipped 
in turpentine, and very carefully introduced into 
and twisted round in the windpipe—not the 
gullet—is equally effectual, and I think less 
troublesome; one or two applications are gene¬ 
rally sufficient.— Zenas, in Poultry Chronicle. 
- • - 
Treatment of Gapes. —In one of the numbers 
of your useful publication, I see that a corres¬ 
pondent calls the gapes “ an incurable disease.” 
As I have yearly reared a large number of 
chickens, I think it right to state that I have 
found spirits of turpentine, if not a specific, at 
least an almost certain remedy for this complaint. 
I have administered it in two ways, and both 
successfully. First, with chickens of larger 
growth, by dipping a feather in the spirit and 
passing it down and turning it round in the 
throat of the patient, by which means the little 
worm causing the complaint is sometimes ex¬ 
tracted, but nearly always destroyed; and se¬ 
condly, with young birds, dropping a few very 
small crumbs of bread saturated with the spirit 
into their pens, which, if hungry, they will pick 
up quickly. I know a gentleman, a very large 
breeder of fowls, who always gives his chickens, 
at six weeks old, wheat steeped in turpentine. 
This is given to them once in the morning when 
fasting, and as a prevention against, instead of 
waiting for, the arrival of gapes. I may trou¬ 
ble you again on this and other subjects relating 
to poultry, should you think further communi¬ 
cation likely to prove interesting to your read¬ 
ers.— D. B. y in Poultry Chronicle. 
CLAIMS OF AGRICULTURAL PATENTS 
FOR THE WEEK ENDING MAY 9, 1854. 
Machinery for Dressing Flax. —E. L. Nor¬ 
folk, of Salem, Mass.: I do not claim the em¬ 
ployment of trunks with moveable lids, by the 
rising and falling of which the rate of feed is 
regulated. 
But I claim governing the movements of the 
rollers, which supply the material to the ma¬ 
chine by means of wedges, which are suspended 
in such a way as to be caused by the rising and 
falling of the movable lids, or their equivalents, 
to rise and fall, and thus regulate the position 
of bars, which are acted upon by eccentrics or 
cams for the purpose of transmitting motion to 
the feed, and thereby regulate the amount of 
motion which the said bars receive from the 
said eccentrics or cams, as set forth. 
Pump. —Jacob Edson, of Boston, Mass. : I 
claim, first, the tube, in combination with the 
air chamber, constructed and operating as set 
forth. 
Second, the cup, in combination with the 
holes and the packing, constructed and applied 
to a force pump, as described, and for the pur¬ 
pose set forth. 
Third, the inclined partition in the rear of 
the spout, operating as set forth. 
Cultivators. —C. K. Farr, Hinds Co., Miss. : 
I claim the bed with inclined sides, as described, 
which, following the trace of the coulter, ren¬ 
ders the sides of the furrow compact, and pre¬ 
vents the falling in of the earth, as set forth. 
■Weighing and Printing Butter. —Wm. S. 
Reinert, of Spring Garden, Pa.: I claim the 
combination of the mold or vessel for contain¬ 
ing the butter, suspended to the lever or scale 
beam and its attachments, plunger or piston, 
having the desired configuration on its lower 
surface, and upright rod and button for raising 
the circular plate or piston in the bottom of the 
said vessel or mold, together with the levers for 
operating the same for weighing, forming, and 
branding or imprinting with and desired config¬ 
uration, the butter in parcels, and discharging 
the same from the vessel or mold, as set forth. 
Manure and Sand Loader. —H. G. Marchant, 
of Annisquam, Mass.: I claim the transporta¬ 
ble manure loader, consisting essentially of the 
following elements in combination, viz., the 
body or box, the trough, and the rake, con¬ 
structed, and arranged, as described. 
Seed Planters. —G. S. Enoch, and Daniel 
Wissinger, of Springfield, Ohio: We claim the 
mode of adjusting the tappet wheel, in combi¬ 
nation with the peculiar form of the sliding bar, 
to suit the nicest differences in any desired 
quantity of seed to be sown, as described. 
Arrangement of Friction Roller in Inclined 
Plane Hinges. —Enoch Woolman, of Damasco- 
ville, Ohio : I claim in the described hinge mak¬ 
ing and arranging the roller, so that it can be 
traversed towards and from the pivot of the 
hinge in combination with the scores in the in¬ 
clined places, so that it can be used either as a 
self-shutting or self-retaining hinge when open 
or partially so, as set forth. 
Screw Jacks. —Francis Davis, of Keene, N. 
H., (assignor to J. M. Reed, of Swansey, N. H.:) 
I do not claim the use of a right and left screw, 
as that has been made use of before ; neither 
do I claim constructing a screw-jack entirely of 
iron. 
But I claim as a new tool or instrument for 
the purpose of raising heavy bodies, the jack, 
constructed and operating as set forth.— Scien¬ 
tific American. 
- •«<—■ — 
Where the Grain Goes.— At a Whiskey Man¬ 
ufacturers’ Convention held in Cincinnati last 
week, twenty-three establishments, mostly in 
Ohio, were represented, the whole of which are 
said to consume over 14,000 bushels of grain 
daily, or upwards of four millions per year, out 
of which ten million gallons of whiskey are 
produced. 
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