THE CULTIVATOR. 
59 
south impairing the elaborating organs—the leaves— 
and consequently checking the growth, before the bulb 
has time to acquire the full size. We remember see¬ 
ing, in the garden of Col. McAllister, near Harrisburgh, 
Pa. a bed of full grown onions, which the owner seem¬ 
ed proud in assuring us, had grown from the seed that 
year, and which he stated as a remarkable circum¬ 
stance. We made no inquiry when they were sown, 
but conjecture that the seed was sown the previous au¬ 
tumn, a practice which, according to Loudon, is com¬ 
mon in'Portugal, and is often practised in Britain. The 
onion in this case attains its full size by the first of Au¬ 
gust, before the intense heats of summer. Although 
the onion is said to be a native of Spain, it probably 
is indigenous to the mountainous regions, for it seems 
adapted to the temperature of this latitude. It with¬ 
stands our winters, especially if protected by straw or 
litter. The onion planted for seed is often put out in 
autumn, or left in the ground for a second, after the first 
crop of seed has been gathered; it is often sown in Sep¬ 
tember, and particularly the tree or bulb bearing vari¬ 
ety. We recommend to Mr. King to sow in autumn, 
say in September or October, and at mid-winter, if the 
state of the ground will permit. 
Onions are sown in this neighborhood from the 1st to 
the 25th April, on rich, well prepared ground, in drills 
12 inches apart, and are afterwards thinned to a proper 
distance. The earlier they are sown, the sooner they 
come to maturity ; and, well managed, are a sure and 
profitable crop. 
The tree onion is said to come from a high latitude, 
where the climate being too cold for them to flower and 
seed, the flower becomes viviparous, and bears bulbs 
instead of flowers. 
CORN AND COB CRUSHER AND GRINDER. 
M. M .McFeer, writes us from Marysville, Ten. that 
an excellent machine for crushing corn and cob has 
been invented and put in operation by Mr. William 
Gault, of that place. Our correspondent assures us he 
has seen it in operation, and that it will crush and grind 
from 20 to 30 bushels of corn and cob in an hour, pro¬ 
pelled by water or horse power. Such a machine is 
much wanted, and will meet with a ready sale, at a fair 
price, in every part of the country. 
MACHINE FOR SOWING LIME. 
William Wells, of Plainfield, N. J. notifies us, that he 
has patented a machine for sowing lime, which will 
spread any required quantity, from two to five hundred 
bushels on an acre, of lime, ashes or marl. A boy large 
enough to shovel, will, he says, with a horse, spread 
700 bushels in a day, perfectly even. The machine will 
hold 20 bushels for one horse, or 40 bushels for two 
horses. 
N. B. We must inform Mr. Wells, as well as others 
who like him are disposed to transgress our rules, that 
letters for their exclusive benefit, addressed to us, will 
not hereafter be noticed in the Cultivator —unless the 
postage is paid. 
Italian vs. Siberian Wheat .—We must be excused from 
prolonging the controversy as to the relative merits of 
Italian and Siberian wheat, which we apprehend would 
neither profit the parties, nor enlighten the public. We 
have given our opinion, judging from an analysis of the 
grain, that the two species of wheat are identically the 
same. When they are ascertained to be different, it 
will be time enough to say which is the best. 
Button Corn. —H. II. Eastman, of Marshall, Oneida, 
complains, that corn which he obtained as Dutton corn, 
at Albany, proved an entire failure; that the stalks 
grew strong, and six or eight feet high; but that the 
corn did not ripen, while other kinds came to maturity. 
Mr. E. we venture to say, did not plant the Dutton corn; 
as this is of rather dwarfish growth, and with us has 
never been injured with frosts. Mr. Thorburn has in¬ 
formed us, that in the spring of 1837, he sold a quantity 
of seed corn as Dutton, which he believes was not such, 
as in every instance that he has heard of it has proved 
a large growing late corn. 
Hessian Fly .—Timothy S. Olmsted, of Croton, West¬ 
chester, sends us the following directions for preventing 
injury by the Hessian fly. Mr. O. is informed, that this 
fly and the grain-worm are not the same. 
“ As soon as wheat shows two blades after sowing in 
the fall, sow two bushels of good wood ashes per acre. 
Repeat.the same the first and last weeks in April, and 
as late in the month of May as the sower can pass over 
it without injury. As the first and second times are 
past, (that is, fall and first week in April,) I would re¬ 
commend the sowing of three bushels per acre anytime 
in April, and three in May.” 
An extraordinary calf has been raised by Austin Har¬ 
mon, jun. of Bennington, Vt. which, on the 29 th March, 
the day he was one your old, weighed one thousand and 
three pounds! He is of the Short Horned Durham breed. 
This calf, Mr. Harmon writes us, sucked the dam ten 
days, was then fed with new milk twenty days, and af¬ 
ter that with skimmed milk and a little oat-meal, till he 
was six months old; since which he has had neither 
grain nor milk, but has been kept upon hay and raw 
potatoes. 
Value of Gypsum .—Barnabas Miller, of Catharine, 
Chemung, has sent us the result of some experiments 
with plaster. A row of potatoes not plastered yielded 
49| pounds of tubers, while a row along side, which he 
plastered, gave 90 pounds—a difference of nearly one- 
half in favor of the plastered row. Mr. Miller says the 
difference upon his corn was nearly the same, a table- 
spoonful being applied to each hill, after the first hoe¬ 
ing. The soil a gravelly loam. Mr. M. recommends 
the sowing a bushel an acre on grass grounds, about the 
first of May, and he thinks its benefits are manifest the 
second season. We join Mr. M. in begging farmers who 
do not use plaster to try it —on their meadows and pas¬ 
tures, on their corn, potatoes, &c. 
Hog manure, D. Gillet is informed, in answer to his 
queries, cannot be applied amiss. Hot manures, as hog 
and horse dung, are best applied to cold moist land, cow 
and fermented manures to dry or warm land. Much, 
however, depends upon the degree of fermentation they 
have undergone, and reference should be had to crops, 
rather than soils. If unfermented, they should be applied 
to an autumn-ripening crop. Mr. G. thinks the best mode 
of applying manures for his corn is to spread it, and then 
gather his land in one bout ridges. This brings the ma¬ 
nure spread upon three furro ws into the space of one fur¬ 
row. There is no doubt of the superior benefit of this 
mode of dressing to the first crop, yet it may be doubt¬ 
ed if it is ultimately most beneficial to the crops which 
follow, or to the soil. 
Threshing Machines. —J. G. M. Ramsay, of Macltlen- 
burgh, Ten. asks our opinion of the relative merits of 
threshing machines. We have no better data to judge 
from, than is afforded by our columns. We repeat, the 
threshing machine and horse-power are distinct; and 
that generally more depends upon the latter, as to the 
points of inquiry,—if portable, cheap, simple, and re¬ 
quiring but one horse—than on the thresher. Most of 
the threshers we have seen and described, do their work 
thoroughly; but in relation to the horse-power, we feel 
wholly incompetent to decide as to the relative merits 
of the different ones in use. 
Acknowledgments .—Among many acknowledgments 
that are due to correspondents, we record the receipt of 
twenty-four kinds of prairie flowers from Mrs. Hamil¬ 
ton, gathered by her on the prairies of Wisconsin, geo¬ 
logical and agricultural reports from Gov. Everett, Rev. 
Mr. Coleman, Prof. Mather, Dr. Perine, and several 
members of congress; red blaze corn from H. Luce, & c. 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
Importance of the Ruta Baga Crop. 
Whalen’s Store, 29 Ih March, 1838. 
Dear Sir,— So much has been said and written on 
root culture of late, that I feel a diffidence in attempt¬ 
ing any thing new or profitable on the subject; should 
you, however, find a crumb in the following worth no¬ 
tice, you may use it as you think proper. 
I commenced raising the ruta baga five years since, 
and can truly say, the more I know of them, the bet¬ 
ter I like them. Last season I raised 700 bushels on 
ground that would measure not to exceed three-fourths 
of an acre, after making a deduction for fifty pine 
stumps on the same. I sowed the 20th June, at the 
rate of two pounds of seed per acre, on ground which 
had ruta baga the season previous, ploughed once, har¬ 
rowed down, laid off into furrows two and a half feet 
apart, two-thirds filled with long manure ; a two bout 
ridge thrown back on the same, and the seed sown on 
top ; hoed twice, passing the cultivator each time, and 
thinned down to one foot apartin the rows. A frequent 
mistake is crowding the plants too much ; they must 
have room, air and light; all they are crowded nearer 
than rows two and a half feet apart, and a foot in the 
row, will surely diminish the amount of crop. 
Two pounds of seed to the acre will give generally 
four times the number of plants necessary; but I find 
the extra expense of seed and trouble in thinning out 
amply repaid by the sav ing of time in transplanting 
and filling up vacant places ; besides the transplanted 
ones never do as well as those left undisturbed. 
As an experiment, I commenced the 1st September 
last, depriving every second row of all except the 
crown leaves, feeding them morning and evening to 
my milch cows. The result was, the milk increased 
nearly fifty per cent; the crop, when gathered, show¬ 
ed no difference in the rows. I pulled, topped, bot¬ 
tomed and put into the cellar with ease, at the rate 
of 100 bushels per day to each hand. I calculate the 
cost in the cellar at four cent per bushel. My store 
pigs have been wintered on them raw, with no addi¬ 
tion, save tim wash from the house and a little buck¬ 
wheat and rye bran; they look well, and when I un¬ 
dertook a few days since to substitute raw potatoes, 
they would hardly deign to touch them. 
I have tried mangold wurtzel each year of ruta ba¬ 
ga, and were I to give any instruction as to its culture, 
would say, like Cobbett in his Cottage Economy, 
“ wherever you see ruta baga, read mangold wurtzel,” 
only sow early in May, and soak your seed at least 
twenty-fours hours in tepid water. I consider ruta 
baga much the most certain crop, and the difficulty in 
preserving through winter much less. 
My drill-barrow sows most kinds of seeds ; is pret¬ 
ty much of my own inventing two years since; cost 
in making about $2.50. Can all be made by a com¬ 
mon carpenter, except the tin barrel; sows as much 
and as well as those costing $10 or $12. It is a 
great labor saving machine, every person engaged in 
root culture should have one. 1 am sanguine in the 
belief that the root culture will continue to increase 
here in the same ratio it has done in Great Britain, 
and that eventually the revolution in our agriculture 
from that source will be equally great with theirs; 
and whilst we see two blades of grass growing where 
but one grew before, we shall soon find ten bushels of 
roots growing where a short time since not one was 
thought of. Respectfully yours, 
J. Buel, Esq. SETH WHALEN. 
Improvement of Grass grounds. 
Cedar Brook, Plainfield, N. J. 22 d Mar. 1838. 
Jesse Buel, Esq.—Dear Sir,—I am a general con¬ 
vert to the new system of husbandry, but not without 
some important exceptions. Nothing is more com¬ 
mon, than while we are endeavoring to avoid one 
error, to run into another in a contrary direction. I 
remember a remark of an elderly man many years 
since, who observed, that he had been endeavoring 
for a long time to understand and follow the true line, 
but he had come to the conclusion, that he was never 
on the line, except when he was crossing it. 
1 believe in the propriety of a rotation of crops on 
a large proportion of our lands; but I am acquainted 
with many pieces of meadow and pasture lands in 
New-England, the former of which are more valuable 
than any lands in that part of the country, which have 
never been ploughed within the memory of the pre¬ 
sent generation, which, in favorable seasons, produce 
two good crops of hay, and yield much after feed, 
with only a top-dressing of manure once in two or 
three years ; and if not fed too close in the fall, do not 
deteriorate ; while the pasture lands, without top¬ 
dressing, are a perennial green. Some of these lands, 
within the last twenty years, have been ploughed to 
make them belter by a rotation of crops. They gene¬ 
rally produced abundantly for two or three years, and 
after seeding with grass, yielded heavy crops of hay 
for about two years, and would then, notwithstanding 
top-dressing, begin to run out, as it is termed in New- 
England, so as to make it necessary in a few years to 
plough again, and when ploughed again, did not pro¬ 
duce half the amount that followed the first plough¬ 
ing. I am aware that the lands might have been pre¬ 
served in good heart by expensive manuring; still I 
am of an opinion, that they were essentially injured 
by destroying the native rich sward. 
I had charge and was a proprietor of a large ma¬ 
nufacturing establishment in Connecticut, erected dur¬ 
ing the late war, connected with a firm of about nine¬ 
ty acres. A piece of ground of about four acres, near 
the river, above high water, but where the bed of the 
stream, probably at some former period, had run, had 
never been ploughed to the knowledge of any of the 
neighbors, but had been for years pastured and mow¬ 
ed. Indeed, it was so full of large stones as to dis¬ 
courage the use of the plough, besides it was consi¬ 
dered leachy land, that was almost useless to manure. 
I examined the soil, and found it from two to four feet, 
sand, coarse gravel, stones of all sizes, to four feet di¬ 
ameter, interspersed with alluvial deposite. As it was 
convenient to irrigate it from the pond, I determined 
to make an experiment upon it. The native grass 
was principally white clover and spear grass, but was 
intermingled with brakes, small bushes, vines and 
weeds, and did not usually yield more than half to 
three-quarters of a ton of second quality of hay to the 
acre. By blasting and digging, all the stones from 
the surface were removed and placed in heavy walls, 
the holes were filled with decayed chips and wash 
from the roads; the ground cleared on the surface, 
without breaking the old sward more than was neces- 
sary. I was then advised to plough, as the only way 
to subdue it and get it into good grass. I determined 
not to disturb any more of the native sward, though 
quite thin and broken. We had prepared about 200 
loads of good compost, which was carted and spread 
upon it; then sowed white and red clover and timo¬ 
thy seed freely, had it raked over, and all the little 
stones and sticks removed. The water was turned on 
the next spring when needed ; a very large crop of 
grass, intermingled with some weeds, was ready to 
cut by the last of June. By the 1st September a 
great crop of rowen was produced. The following 
year it produced principally spear grass, mingled with 
clover and timothy, ol superior quality and a great 
burden, estimated at more than three tons per acre, 
and the second crop full one and a half. By the mid¬ 
dle of October, the grass was six inches in height and 
very thick ; no creature was allowed to graze in the 
field. The next season it was top-dressed with about 
twenty loads of compost to the acre : the crops were 
equal, or superior, to the previous year; the ground 
was covered with a firm sward, and had a rich ap¬ 
pearance. We reclaimed about four acres more in 
the same manner, on a moist and richer soil, and with 
equal success, without the advantage of irrigation, 
part of which had been considered so worthless, that 
it was not fenced, but left in commons. From about 
eight acres we calculated annually to obtain more 
than thirty tons of first quality of hay at two crops, 
and one year the estimation was as high as thirty-four 
tons. These meadows did not depreciate with a top- 
