1877 .] 
291 
AMERICAN. AGRICULTURIST. 
deep-can system of setting milk, during the fir/st 
■years o^-its adoption in this country. I got my;first 
suggestion concerning, it’ from a description in a 
German paper, of the practice-of a Swedish?dairy¬ 
man,.and immediately experimented with it. The 
trial proving satisfactory, I remodelled the dairy at 
Ogden Farm to suit the base, and, have practised it 
ever since. I have never seen occasion to change 
my original opinion, that by this System we get all 
the butter the milk is capable.©! making; that 
there is very much less interference by the; chang¬ 
ing conditions of the-atmosphere,-than, with the 
shallow-pan system; j and that the amount of labor 
needed" is very much'less. . • I have’had the‘satis¬ 
faction of seeing those who argued against it, be¬ 
come its advocates, and finally, ;tb see the method 
adopted by inventors as the basis for patented pro¬ 
cesses. The Hardin and Cooley systems have come 
quite generally. into favor. Dr. Ezra Miehener, 
who in his early experiments found the cans great¬ 
ly inferior to the pans, has since concluded that he 
did not skim-his cans deep enough. In a . recent 
number of the ft Country Gentleman ”, he, publishes 
the result of a comparative test : between cans in a 
Hardin ice-box, and pans ina. cool cellar. He 
found 21.50 pounds of milk yielded a pound of but¬ 
ter in the cans, and 21.93 pounds made, the same 
amount in the pans, “ the butter made was all 
good, but that from the cans had a peculiar rich 
flavor, which I have never found by the shallow- 
pan system.’?—Indeed, his communication may be 
taken as strongly in favor of the: deep cans. 
The .Cooley system strikes me as being a very 
good one. The cans are filled nearly. full with 
milk, covered with an. inverted pan, and placed in 
a water-tight box, the covers being fastened down 
by weights or 3lats bearing upon them. The box 
or vat is then filled with water, so as to immerse 
the whole concern, covers and all, the inverted 
pans keeping out the water on the principle of 
the diving-bell. If desired, ice may be put into 
the water, and. the whole concern is covered, to 
prevent the atmospheric warming, and the conse¬ 
quent waste of ice. »There is no exposure to the, 
air, to dust, and to flies. Ice enough is used to 
keep the temperature below 50°, until all the cream 
has risen—which takes place in less than 12 hours, 
so that one set of cans is all that is needed, when 
the cows are milked twice a day. The cans being 
nearly always submerged in cold water, and kept 
away from tFe' air, they need washing only once a 
week. Mr. Albert Chapman, of Vermont, reports 
experiments with this system (Cooley’s), where he 
took a can, at random, in which the milk stood 17s- 
inches deep, fully 4 inches being cream. 
' Two cans of skimmed milk, set for 48 hours, 
failed to throw up .any appreciable cream. His trial 
was made in June, when the cows (about half-blood 
Jerseys) were giving their best flow. He made one 
pound of butter to 22.50 pounds of milk—certainly 
a very good result. 
I have not determined to adopt the Cooley sys¬ 
tem, and, indeed, I find the simple deep cans, float¬ 
ing in cool water, so satisfactory, that I may not 
change. At the same time, were I about to start a 
new dairy, I should certainly arrange for the Cover¬ 
ing and total immersion of the cans under the' 
Cooley patent, feeling sure the result would be as’ 
good as that now obtained, and that the freedom 1 
from exposure to the air is a decided advantage. 
We have as yet no complete result to report 
concerning Prickly Comfrey. The sets planted last 
autumn were probably covered too deeply, and 
were very late in coming up—some of them are on¬ 
ly beginning to show now, and others are probably 
rotten. Sprouted sets, planted this spring, are 
much more forward, and those which came the 
earliest, show a vigorous growth, which promises 
excellent results later in' the season. The leaves 
are greedily eaten by horses, cattle, and swine, and 
there is thus far every indication that the state¬ 
ments of those, who have recommended the new 
plant, are sufficiently reliable, to warrant all who 
need green forage during the dry weather of sum¬ 
mer—and who'does not?—in setting out an experi¬ 
mental patch in September or October, so as. to 
procure a good start before winter sets in, 
Science Applied to Farming— XXXII 
More Aborat Seeds.—German Methods of Test¬ 
ing their Parity and Vitality.—Field Ex¬ 
periments with Fertilizers. 
In the last article reference was made to the im¬ 
portance of investigations of seeds, as illustrated 
by examinations of those sold, in England and on 
the Continent of Europe. As there stated, most 
remarkable results have come from the investiga¬ 
tions of Dr. Nobbe, of the Experiment and Seed- 
Control Station at Tharand, in Saxony, whose ex¬ 
ample ,i's being followed ina iarge number of'Sta¬ 
tions in Germany and other European countries. 
The importance of the subject will, I feel sure, war¬ 
rant a brief outline of the methods recommended 
by Dr. Nobbe, and pursued at the laboratory here, 
especially as no description of them has, so far as 
I know, ever been, given in English, except in the 
last report of the Connecticut Experiment Station, 
from which the following is condensed. 
The sample of the seed to be examined is taken 
from the barrel or bag, with instruments made for 
the purpose or in such other way as to secure a 
perfect average sample. This, when brought to 
the laboratory, is thoroughly mixed and a small 
part of it withdrawn with very special precautions 
to ensure its representing the average quality of the 
whole. This portion, from 2 to 15 grammes, (’/is to 
l 3 /i ounces,) according to the kind of seed, is next 
carefully weighed, and then picked over by the ex¬ 
aminer, seed by seed, with the: aid of magnifying 
glasses and other instruments designed for the pur¬ 
pose. Each seed passes under the eye, the genuine 
seeds,• those corresponding with the label under 
which they were sold, are put by themselves iu one 
place, and the foreign matters, whether seeds, chaff, 
dust or sand, in another. The pure seeds are 
weighed by themselves, and the impurities also. 
In this way we learn the percentage of pure seed. 
For instance, suppose we take four grammes ;qf. 
seed, and find after picking it over, one gramme of 
impurities, and three grammes of pure seed. We 
make then the proportions,- 4 : 3:: 100 : 75, i. e., our 
sample contains 75 per cent of pure seed, and 25 
per cent of impurities. The foreign seeds are ex¬ 
amined botanieally, to see if there are among them 
any which would produce parasitic plants or weeds 
poisonous to cattle. If there are, such an article 
should he at once rejected by the farmer. The 
germinating power of the pure seeds is next ascer¬ 
tained, as follows : Two lots of two hundred seeds 
each are carefully counted out, and, after being 
weighed, are allowed to soak in distilled water 
twenty-four hours. They are then transferred, the 
one lot to an apparatus of porous earthen ware, the 
other to a wrapper of bibulous paper. 
The figure herewith represents Dr. Nobbe’s ap¬ 
paratus for testing the sprouting power of seeds. 
It-is made of burnt clay or earthenware, and con¬ 
sists of two parts, the base and'eover. The base is 
about 8 inches square, and has m the middle a cir¬ 
cular depression, about 4 inches wide and 3 / 4 inch 
deep, which serves as a receptacle for the seeds. 
Around this “ germinating bed,” as it is called, 
runs a canal, a little over an inch deep, for water, 
which soaks through the porous material, and 
beeps the seeds moist. The base is glazed on the 
bottom, and part way up the sides, to prevent the 
water running through and wetting the support 
on which the apparatus rests. The cover is of the 
same material as the base, and fits over it like an 
ordinary paper-box cover. In order to allow cir¬ 
culation of air through the apparatus, the cover is 
gomewhat wider than the base, and each interior 
comer is provided with a projection. It is thus 
prevented from closing down tight upon the base, 
and room is left on all sides for free movement of 
the air. A small aperture is left in the top of the 
Fig. 2.— COVER EOK SPROUTING APPARATUS. 
cover, in which a thermometer may be inserted, if 
desired, for determining the temperature. 
Suppose now that the seeds have been counted 
out, as above mentioned, in- two lots of two hun¬ 
dred each, soaked, and one lot put into the moist¬ 
ened paper. The other lot are laid in the germi¬ 
nating bed of the apparatus, which is kept moist 
by the water in the surrounding canal, the cover is 
put on, and the whole set in a convenient place, 
where the temperature is fit for the germination Of 
the seeds. From time to time the cover is taken 
off, the seeds are examined, and those which have 
germinated are removed. The date of each count¬ 
ing, and the number which had germinated, are 
entered in a book kept for the purpose. At the ex¬ 
piration of ten days or two weeks, in most cases, 
the trial is concluded. The number which have 
sprouted, all told, is found, and to it is added one- 
third of the number which have remained sound 
during the experiment, and yet show no disposition 
to sprout. The number is divided by two, and the 
quotient taken as the number of seeds in one hun¬ 
dred, i. e. the per cent which will sprout. The ob¬ 
ject in making two sprouting trials, one with the 
apparatus, and one with the paper, is to provide a 
check on any possible mistake, which might pass 
unnoticed in a single experiment. 
As was said, these four hundred seeds were 
weighed previous to the sprouting trial. From this 
we calculate the weight of one thousand kernels. 
This is not au unimportant item in judging of the 
good quality of the seed. Heavier seed, other 
things being equal, is to be preferred to light seed. 
From the percentage of pure seed in the sample, 
and the percentage of pure seed capable of germi¬ 
nation, we calculate the “ agricultural value,” 
which expresses the percentage, or proportion by 
weight of the sample, which may be expected to 
furnish plants of the kind indicated by the label. 
The report returned to the persons sending in the 
sample, will run as is illustrated by the following 
example : 
The following is the result of examination of 
Trifolium pratense — Red Clover, received March 
21, 1877, from John Smith, Middletown, Conn. 
Pure seed...... .94.3 per cent. 
Impurities*. ... 5.7 per cent. 
Pure seed capable of sprouting.89 per cent. 
Agricultural value.. ....... 83.9 per cent. 
One thousand seeds weigh_... 1.59 grammes. 
The seed is accordingly of good quality. 
As was said last month, the tests made at our 
laboratory, indicate a remarkably favorable condi¬ 
tion of the seeds -sold in our markets, as to purity 
and vitality. But our examinations have not been 
extensive enough to enable us to judge accurately of 
the general state of the seed market, and where 
there is so much of opportunity for both innocent 
and willful wrong doing, a check must always be 
valuable. The interest is of too vast importance to 
the agriculture of the country, to be neglected. 
I wish to add a word about the germinating ap¬ 
paratus above described, and particularly to invite 
the careful attention of sellers and users of seeds 
to its merits. All of the methods commonly em¬ 
ployed for testing the sprouting power of seeds, are 
open to more or less objection in one way or an¬ 
other. When sand or earth is used, aside from the 
danger of presence of foreign seeds, and of im¬ 
proper covering, it is difficult to maintain a uniform 
* Consisting of chaff, broken seeds, and a little Swedish 
Clover— T. hybridum, 
