THE CULTIVATOR. 
19 
the whole expense, including interest of land, was less 
than 3 cts. per bushel, a price which I have frequent¬ 
ly paid for digging potatoes, and the same land would 
not have produced 200 bushels. I fed 2 yoke of cat¬ 
tle on them for 2 months, viz : November and Decem¬ 
ber, feed 5 bushel per day, a yoke. Average gain 
115 lbs. a yoke per month. The same cattle were 
fed through the month of January, on potatoes and 
meal, corn and oats, ground together in equal quanti¬ 
ties, feed 2 bush, potatoes, 1 bush. meal. Gain 60 lbs. 
Estimate the value of the ruta baga, by the present 
price of corn, oats and potatoes, and the respective 
gains, and it makes the ruta baga worth but a fraction 
less than 48 cts. per bushel; that is, if corn is worth 
8s., oats 4s., potatoes 2s., for making beef, we must 
put the ruta baga at 48 cts. I will only add that the 
experiment was fairly tried, the cattle were weighed 
correctly, and eat their allowance every day. 
Yours, respectfullv, 
JOHN C. MATHER. 
Cure for the Scours in Calves, &c. 
Scantick, E. Windsor, Cl. Jan. 17,1838. 
Judge Duel, —Dear Sir,—About ten years ago I 
happened to observe a young man busy about a sick 
calf, endeavoring to force it to taken some medicine, 
and on inquiry I found the disease to be what the far¬ 
mers here call the white scour, or a drain horn of a 
light ash color. He was a large well formed bull calf, 
of the Durham breed, but was apparently near death, 
being excessively weak, having refused all food for 
several days. Relieving the disease to be caused by 
acidity, and to depend upon a suppression of the se¬ 
cretions from the liver, I directed five grains of calo¬ 
mel to be given once in four hours, until the evacua¬ 
tions assumed a darker color. This was done. The 
white purging was checked by the first dose, and in 
some twelve or fifteen hours after was followed by 
evacuations much resembling tar in consistence and 
color. This change was followed by complete relief; 
the appetite and strength returned, and the calf prov¬ 
ed to be a very valuable animal. 
Since that time I have almost every year given ca¬ 
lomel in this way to calves thus affected by the white 
scour. I have not known a single instance in which 
it has failed of effecting a speedy and complete cure. 
I have commonly advised scalded milk to be given, to 
prevent a relapse. 
Some time last May, being at the residence of my 
father-in-law, I noticed one of his swine, a fine huge 
barrow, apparently very much exhausted, and was 
told that it had had the lockjaw for nearly a week pre¬ 
vious, and that during that time, it had not swallowed 
a particle of food, or a drop of liquid, and that it was 
impossible by any means to force his jaws open, even 
in the slightest degree. Suspecting another disease, 
I directed an examination of the glands back of the 
angle of the jaw; these proved to be excessively 
swollen and very hard on each side. A deep inci¬ 
sion was immediately made with a sharp knife into 
the substance of each gland, through a wound in the 
skin, about three inches long. Half a tea-spoonful of 
a mixture of calomel and lard was crammed to the 
bottom of the wound, and the skin being closed by a 
single stitch, the operation was completed. In less 
then two hours the hog ate freely, and in a fortnight 
was apparently perfectly well. 
If these facts can be made useful to you in any way, 
you are at liberty to make what disposition you please 
of them. 
I am, sir, very respectfully, yours, &c. 
H. WATSON. 
Mode of Planting Cedar Hedges. 
Judge Buel, —In looking over number 11 of the 
present volume of the Cultivator, I notice the method 
of planting a cedar hedge, as recommended by John 
Taylor, of Caroline county, Ya. and as I should infer, 
also advised by the Cultivator. 
I have at least as handsome a cedar hedge as I 
have ever seen, and raised with, perhaps, one-twen¬ 
tieth part of the trouble that is required to dig up and 
tansport each plant, with some fifteen or twenty 
pounds of earth attached to the roots, as recommend¬ 
ed by him. 
My plan was this : on the last of the third month, 
(March,) 1823, a trench was first partially opened to 
the width of a spade ; the remaining earth to the 
depth of nine inches, was worked to a fine mellow 
state, and not removed. With the aid of a small boy, 
in about one day, I obtained the plants from the fields, 
and nearly finished the planting; a single stroke with 
a grubbing hoe, near the plant, would loosen the soil, 
and then removed carefully, but without any earth at¬ 
tached to the roots. The plants were from six to eigh¬ 
teen inches high, and the roots of each dipped in wa¬ 
ter, as planted. They were placed in a single row, 
from four to six inches apart, requiring from 300 to 
350 plarits ; and out of this number not one dozen 
failed to grow. The hedge is about forty yards in 
length, (separating my yard and vineyard,) and so 
close as entirely to obstruct the view from the oppo¬ 
site side; is about eight feet high, and from four to 
five feet through at bottom; the average, size for eight 
or nine years past. The annual pruning will soon 
reduce it to six feet high, and about two and a half feet 
thick. 
A common farm hand will prune it in a few hours, 
and it then presents a beautiful appearance ; the top 
is dipt with pruning shears, and the sides with a com¬ 
mon mowing scythe^very evenly and expeditiously, 
mowing perpendicularly. 
No hedge that I have met with, is more ornamen¬ 
tal ; and few are made with less labor ; if care is ta¬ 
ken to keep them well pruned, there is no danger of 
their not being thick enough at bottom. 
If the above hasty remarks are considered worth a 
place in the Cultivator, please make use of them. 
I am respect’y, E. S. 
Harewood Montg’y co. Md. 1 si mo. 8 th, 1838. 
Remark. —We thank our anonymous correspondent 
for the above valuable communication. The red cedar 
grows upon most of the Atlantic border, and we are 
now satisfied, that with moderate care, red cedar hedges 
may be made to grow and do well. We did not intend 
to recommend Mr. Taylor's mode of planting; in fact we 
did not give the matter a thought—considering Mr. Tay¬ 
lor’s authority as sufficient. But we do recommend the 
above mode with two slight variations; first, that the 
roots of the plants be dipped in a thin grout, that is loam 
and water made of the consistence of porridge, and that 
the transplanting be delayed till the spring growth has 
commenced— it satisfactorily appearing, from experience 
as well as philosophy, that all evergreens are most sue- 
cessfully transplanted while in the progress of growth. 
It may be well, after the planting is done, to cover the 
ground about the roots with straw or litter, to prevent 
evaporation.— Cond. Cult. 
Book Farming Considered. 
Whalen’s Store, 2 0th Jan. 1838. 
Dear Sir,—I have been a constant and much grati¬ 
fied reader of the Cultivator, since its first commence¬ 
ment, and have taken much pleasure in introducing it 
to the notice of my neighbor farmers. In a few cases 
I have been successful, would that I could say so in 
all. I consider the money paid for it an investment 
that will be repaid to the intelligent farmer, with ten¬ 
fold interest, and that too in most cases before the 
subscription year expires. The common objection I 
find, is its being “Book Farming;” to do away this 
absurd notion, I conceive to be of great importance; 
remove this film from the eyes of the agricultural 
community, and you have at once a large and rapidly 
increasing circulation. The lawyer, physician, divine, 
and mechanic read ; and for what l to get the opi¬ 
nions and experience of those that have travelled the 
road before them; to get arguments and ideas that a 
life time of experience might not give. True, practi¬ 
cal knowledge is good in all cases, as far as it goes; 
but how many rocks and quicksands in our journey 
through life should we not shun, did we but take 
warning from the many monitors continually issuing 
from the press, guiding us like beacons of light to the 
lone mariner in the way to the wished for haven. 
Agricultural periodicals bring us into an acquaintance 
with those far distant from us, and of whom we could 
know nothing, except from their communications. 
One sits down and gives a long list of failures before 
a profitable result has been attained ; now in half an 
hour’s reading we gain, perhaps, what our informant 
has spent years of toil and anxiety to obtain. Ano¬ 
ther gives a description of a building, farm implement, 
plan of draining, or making, perhaps, a fence or gate, 
bringing the subject to our mind’s eye, in so plain a 
manner, that we may be said almost to have ocular 
demonstration of the same. Now, in9tead of travel¬ 
ling for this information, it is brought to our fire-side, 
where, during the long winter evenings, we can con it 
over at our leisure, and judge of the propriety of 
adopting or rejecting it. I am far from recommend¬ 
ing the adoption of every new theory in agriculture ; 
but when a long series of experiments have termi¬ 
nated in continued favorable results, then why not 
adopt them, particularly if reason and judgment speak 
to us in their favor. Let us then away with the ill- 
founded prejudice against “book farming,” and let each 
farmer take an agricultural paper for one year, and 
my word for it, that ninety-nine in a hundred express 
themselves more than amply remunerated for the ex¬ 
pense. A thought struck me, that the circulation of 
the Cultivator might, in many cases, be extended by an 
offer to refund the subscription at the year’s end, 
should the paper fail of giving entire satisfaction ; the 
subscriber returning the papers in order to the office, 
or its agents; believe me, the drawback would be 
small. Again, let each subscriber introduce the Cul¬ 
tivator to his neighbor that is without it, and see if he 
cannot add at least one to the subscription list; would 
they do so, its circulation could easily be doubled. 
I can lay no great claim to either book or practi¬ 
cal farming; but were I to be deprived entirely of 
reading on the subject, I should consider my progress 
much retarded, and the prospect in the future a cheer¬ 
less one in the extreme. 
With unfeigned wishes for the success of the Cul¬ 
tivator, and all its kindred prints, permit me to sub¬ 
scribe, your ob’t serv’t. 
J. Buel, Esq. 
SETH WHALEN. 
Siberian Wheat. 
Stamford, Del. co. Jan’y 19 th, 1838. 
Mr. Buel, —Dear Sir,— I have read with pleasure 
and profit, the various communications in the Culti¬ 
vator on the subject of improvements in agriculture, 
and amongst these, my mind has been led to the in¬ 
troduction and selection of the best kinds of seed, as 
one which ranks high in value to the farmer. 
My object in this communication, is to give to the 
public, through the medium of your very valuable pa¬ 
per, my experience in the growth of the Siberian 
spring wheat. About the 6th or 7th of May, I^owed 
three bushels and 1 ?ur quarts of Siberian seed on 
three and a half acres of ground, planted the previous 
season with corn; the soil middling for the ridge land 
in this county, though never manured. The tillage, 
owing to unavoidable circumstances, poor, it being 
ploughed but once, and that poorly and lightly ; har¬ 
rowed one way. About one and one-fourth acres of 
this was thickly infested with brier roots, which 
sprouted and grew so luxuriantly as to destroy at 
least one-fourth of the crop on that part of the field 
I harvested 1,485 sheaves ; have threshed 638, which" 
produce 431 bushels of first rate wheat. The sheaves 
threshed being an average of the whole crop, I havo 
no doubt but I shall have 100 bushels. 
The above is the result of my first crop under very 
disadvantageous circumstances. Were I to venture 
an opinion of a future crop with good tillage and fa¬ 
vorable season, it would be much larger; but I find 
“ guess work ” meets with a rebuke. 
I will, however, venture one comparison, since I have 
reduced it to matter of fact. In the same field with 
the Siberian I sowed my common spring wheat, on 
land equally as good and tillage the same, with the 
advantage in favor of the common, that it was sowed 
at the rate of one and one-fourth bushels of seed to 
the acre, and in consequence of the grain being smal¬ 
ler, I judged that there was twice as many plants on 
a given quantity of ground of the common, as there 
was of the Siberian. Both sowed the same time. 
The common came in about one week before the Si¬ 
berian. Both kinds full and plump kernel. The 
straw of the common somewhat rusty, and some smut; 
the other straw bright and lustrous, and no smut. 
The common produces eighteen bushels per acre ; the 
Siberian, as you will see, making a fair allowance for 
damage done by briers, about thirty-three. I saw al¬ 
so, on examination, considerable of the works of the 
Hessian fly in the common; only two plants in the 
other. 
Thus I have endeavored to give the public a fair 
and candid statement of my experience in growing 
the Siberian spring wheat. Whether it will be con¬ 
sidered very like a “bed-bug,” or another “harbinger 
of summer,” I cannot tell. 
Yours respectfully, GEO. STURGESS. 
Ruta Baga—Italian Wheat—Crops generally. 
Oxford, Jan’y 14th, 1838. 
Dear Sir, —I made a good crop of ruta baga last 
year. Not as large crop as others have mentioned, 
but it was a fair crop, 360 bushels from half an acre, 
from seed I bought of you, and they were good. I 
find them excellent food for all kinds of stock. Fat 
cattle, cows, horses, sheep and hogs, improve well on 
them. I think them excellent for sheep. They ap¬ 
pear to be well calculated for villages, where land is 
high, and the occupants wish to obtain the most pos¬ 
sible feed from a little land. I consider the root cul¬ 
ture as of great importance, and increasing rapidly. 
The Italian wheat did well, better than any other 
kind. I sowed two bushels, and some of it lodged, 
and did not fill so well, as the ground was too rich. 
However, I got forty-five bushels of excellent clean 
wheat, weighing upwards of sixty-one pounds to the 
bushel. It sells freely for three dollars per bushel. 
I have ground a few bushels, and it makes better flour 
than I can buy. My son-in-law carried six bushels 
last spring to Pine Creek, Tioga county, Pennsylvania, 
and calculates on 150 bushels; and he informs me he 
could take five dollars per bushel it he would sell it. 
He means to sow fifty bushels this spring. It has 
done so well hitherto. 
Potatoes, oats, barley, grass, &c. have done well 
last year. Apples were mostly spoiled before gather¬ 
ed the two last seasons. The winter has been soft so 
far. Some people have ploughed in January. 
Cattle sell well. I sold a pair of four year old 
steers for 140 dollars, in September, afrer using them 
all the spring, and till that time. They were the 
short horned Durham in part. I think that half bloods 
of that breed answer our purposes for cows, oxen and 
for beef as well as any. Those cattle I sold had ne- 
