VrURE 
i WHOLE NO. G10 
ROCHESTER. N. T.,—FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 18G1 
the fertility may he kept up, though after two crops 
it is better to sow grain, and clover to he turned 
under. The importance and the uncertainty of the 
crop cause extensive growers to look with concern 
for the nppearancc of the rot, which may sweep 
away their anticipated profits. In this section we 
have seen no cause for alarm, though many fields 
have not a very promising appearance. Front Gen¬ 
esee county we have received several gloomy letters, 
that speak of fields entirely destroyed, not worth the 
digging, Ac. Not having an opportunity to observe 
for ourselves, we cannot say how Just are these com¬ 
plaints, nor how general the evil, and therefore hope 
for the best. There may he exceptional cases—the 
result of improper treatment- such as planting in a 
heavy, damp soil, the free use of fresh manures—or of 
some other cause that will all'eet but few. We have 
known an outcry raised in a neighborhood by failure 
in one or two cases, where no other result should 
have been anticipated. We cannot say that this is so 
in the present instance, but we will hope for the best 
until WO bear further. 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
AN ORIGINAL WKEKI.Y 
AGRICULTURAL, LITERARY AND FAMILY JOURNAL 
In our issue of the 21th ult. 
Will be found an inquiry from a 
subscriber in Crawford connty, 
Pa., for information in relation 
to the Fat ■ Tailed Sheep, their jy 
peculiarities, value, Ac., and 
also n request for an engraving . - 
illustrating their form. After 5 
answering other inquiries, we £ 
promised to, “at some future jf 
period, turn our attention to J| 
the bearer of the ‘oleaginous fi* 
narrative.’" This promise wo 
now purpose to redeem. 
From the earliest days of ,,® 
which we have any reliable ¥ 
history, u race of sheep have • 
existed in Asia, having a pecu- ^ 
liar development of fat in the 
hinder part of the body. In 
tins North and South of Asia 
in Palestine, and even in the 
Northern parts of Russia, a 
breed called Fat ■ Rnmped is 
the most, common and most ancient, 
and over prairie, and I come upon a man raking 
Club aud Fife wheat, mixed. It is in the “Open¬ 
ings,” and he is at, work in an orchard. He com¬ 
plains of all the bugs the world is heir to — at least 
of most of those which infest wheat. The orchard 
has hut little fruit, anti if one crop of small grain is 
equal to a fire, as some of my orchard friends assert, 
he is burning his trees up fast,, and they certainly 
are goiug! 
— On this low, level timber land, near the Des 
Plaines river, I find a fruit orchard, and have heard 
from the neighbors that the o-vner “takes great 
pains to grow fruit." I find him in the field, tell 
him that 1 want to talk fruit witu him. He insists 
that “ fruit is an up-hill business " , that the climate 
does not appear to be adapted to it - the wind blows 
it off or blasts it, or the winter Oils the trees—in 
short, it, is a doleful story ho tells. He calls the 
White Doyenne and the Bartlett the best pears to 
plant for market, and had he a thousand trees to 
plant, he would select no other varieties. The Beokcl 
he calls hardy and good here. IP's neighbors have 
Brown Beurre, and with them it proves hardy and 
productive. The Flemish Beauty a!ways bears. The 
Louise Bonne do Jersey is hardy on Quince stock and 
very productive had to build frames under his trees 
last year to support the fruit, but, they bore to death. 
He neglected to thin them out. This year the most 
of his trees have the lcat blight. 
“Apricots on plum stocks ore hardy, and but for 
the ourculio could be grown in any quantity." Then 
fence, the pigs under the apricots and keep the fowls 
there too, and the “little Turk" will leave. But that 
coats labor and trouble, you know, and we find some 
of these Badger State men will n"'*— ke the trouble 
to grow fruit. His plains are trout,Ted in the same 
way — can grow any quantity of them but for the 
curonllo. “The rabbits killed fifty pear trees last 
winter and winter before last for me." Yes, but 
cannot that be prevented? “ Yes, take it in time, it 
could tie done I ’.vpo.vc," Aye, could be done take it 
in time! That is the way to do things generally! It 
will be seen that this man who decrys this as a fruit 
country, acknowledges that some kinds of fruit do 
well here, lie looked the writer straight in the eye 
and asserted with remarkable boldness and emphasis 
that the Roxbury Hussctt and Rhode Island Greening 
would not do at all here! This was a startling 
announcement, to bo sure, to a man who had heard 
and read the assertion from long before he ever saw 
a prairie to this hoar! Such orchardlsts would be 
wiser if they were to get away from home occasion¬ 
ally and talk with western orchardlsts more. 
— To a Massachusetts woman. - Do you like living 
in the West bettor than in New Rutland? The ques¬ 
tion seemed a painful one for the moment; and 
the mental balances seemed to require adjustment,. 
Finally: “Yes, 1 do nut know but 1 should have 
liked living here better, had we been as successful as 
we expected; but you know crops have been poor; 
and when they were good, price.- were low, and we 
had got too much involved — purchased too much 
land and ran in debt for it. Although I like the 
West, yet if 1 could choose such a place as I would 
like, would rather spend my days in Massachusetts,’’ 
But the good woman knows she :»nnot chooBO, and 
she is content where she is. Bui let me say to the 
eastern reader, who may some dqv desire to immi¬ 
grate hither, t: 1 at the great houiub of discontent is 
disappointment. Too many coije here with too 
large expectations, and entirely too large ideas of 
their own importance and capacity to operate here; 
and before they know it they have spread themselves 
over so great a surface, that they, ire altogether too 
thin to resist misfortune. It is a great deal better to 
grow large by degrees—to limit or curb ambition 
for a time, until something is knof n of the road one 
is to travel; for no matter what ifluy be said of the 
ease with which fortunes are ma<!d in the West, they 
rarely cling to men who have o>t made them by 
“ hard knocks " — by industry am economy, 
— Two miles and a half nortt of the State line, 
close to the Des Plaines river, I ft d Mr. H.— a well 
to do farmer with 320 acres of go id land. lie came 
here in 1835 and made his claim. 1 5 is from Connecti¬ 
cut— a lover of red cattle wit! white, handsome 
horns; for ho remembers, when ut a boy, that he 
Attended a Fair at which he saw i large number of 
yokes of oxen — all red, trim anc handsome—“not 
a white hair on them!" lie has always liked red 
cattle since, hence prefers Devon or their grades, 
lie breeds accordingly. Witnen how profoundly 
early impressions mold our lives! 
We go to see the sheep, he a sorting that he is 
gradually going out of cattle and grain raising, aud 
into sheep. II is flock is composed 4fSpanish Merinoes 
and their grades — a healthy, pod-looking flock, 
with some line lambs among them. His pasture con¬ 
sists of filly acres, on a portion f which are small 
groves of second growth oak s rid hickory, from 
which the under-brush has been chared and the grass 
grows nicely. It ought to he divlled into two parts, 
so as to afl'ord a change of pasture! sheep do better — 
enough better to pay the trouble] Our friend Baid 
he knew it, hut “hadn’t time." Ij may be permitted 
to assert that taking lime to do theie things or hiring 
them done, pays quite as well ak growing ten to 
fifteen bushels of wheat per acre 1 and selling it at 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
With an Able Corps of Assistants and Oontx-ibutors, 
CHAS. D. BRAG DON, Western Corresponding Editor. 
Thk Rural Xhw-Yorkkk is designed to be unsurpassed in 
Value, Purity. Usefulness aud Variety of Contents, and unique 
and beautiful in Appearance Its Conductor devotes his per¬ 
sonal attention to the supervision of its various departments, 
and earnestly labors to render the Rural an eminently 
Reliable Guide on all the important Practical, Scientific and 
other Subjects Intimately connected with the business of those 
whose interests it realonrly advocates. As a Rmil.v JOURNAL 
it is eminently Instructive and Entertaining—being so con¬ 
ducted that it can be safely taken 10 the Hearts and Homes of 
people of intelligence, taste and discrimination. It embraces 
more Agricultural, Horticultural. Scientific, Educational, 
Literary and News Matter, interspersed with appropriate and 
beautiful Engravings, than any other jdhrual, —rendering 
it the most complete Agricultural, I.itkrary and Family 
NrwhpaI'BR in America. 
WESTERN EDITORIAL NOTES, 
WAYSIDE JOTTINGS. 
An now three miles west of Kenosha, or there¬ 
abouts. lb-re are good board fences along the road, 
and snbdiv ling the farms. Hero is a barley field - 
forty or fiity acres. Yonder a man cradling, and 
still further away a Manny’s reaper in motion and 
throe or four hands at work. Barley over-ripe — 
badly crinkled. Yonng man says it is better to grow 
some barley than all wheat. 1 believe him. He does 
not know what It is worth. Last, year we sold at ti8 
cents — it yielded about 33 bushels per tterc. Not 
quite as good as wheat, hut this year the grain is 
heavier aud straw lighter. The six-rowed barley is 
mostly grown — a little two-rowed is mixed with it. 
Boys are binding it. Bmells like “before the ma¬ 
chine " in a down east barley barn. I would never 
grow it because of any pleasure 1 took in working 
in it. 
— 1 travel but a short distance south on the old 
stage road from Chicago to Milwaukee, and again 
turn west, leaving the ridge which divides the waters 
which flow into Lake Michigan and those which 
flow into the Mississippi. And here before me lies 
Pleasant Prairie!—stretching away to the North, 
West and Bonth— a basin, dotted with groves clus¬ 
tering about homesteads, and checkered with the 
ripening harvests — a magnificent sight! Away, as 
far as the eye can see, is a fringe of green — a timber 
hill, which bounds it. We descend toward the bot¬ 
tom of the basin. The grain grows heavier and the 
farms larger. 
—A Hock of grasshoppers! I wrote the above twenty 
minutes back, and now I am in the midst of a flock 
of grasshoppers that fill the air, fly in ray face, thump 
against my hat and — there! look at those green oats 
over the fence! — hardly an oat to he seen! The 
straw stands hare of its burthen! Even the May¬ 
weed by the roadside is being pruned by these indus¬ 
trious feeders. 
— Bare pastures, innocent of tree or shade, and 
this August sun beating upon the unprotected cattle 
—not a Hlmdow in which they may stand to stamp oil’ 
the flics. When groves are so easily grown, this is 
inexcusable. It is unprofitable too! It pays as well 
to regard the comfort of the animal as to provide 
food. 
— “ Botheration,” Baid a farmer we called upon. 
“Our crop is only half what it ought to be —the 
chinch bug, grasshoppers, and army worm will eat 
us out of house and home. The grasshoppers are 
eating up the oats aud gnawing into the corn silks 
like the mischief.” 
— The farmers here, many of them, believe that 
they cannot grow fruit on the prairie; but tbat the 
soil of the timber belts is better adapted to fruit 
growing. TheyJ recognize the necessity of protec¬ 
tion. 
— “ How much more a man can do now with such 
implements as this — standing beside a Buckeye 
mower —than he could ten years ago. I used to 
have three or four hands in the hay harvest, but this 
year my boy, twelve years old, and I have harvested 
thirty tons of hay alone, in ten days, and done it 
easier than we could have done it without this imple¬ 
ment and more help.” And then, we thought, as we 
looked upon the complacent, smooth faced wife who, 
the husband Raid, was “a great band to read,” how 
much the women have cause to rejoice ut any 
improvement that diminishes the number of hired 
hands and saves the labor of cooking, in the West 
this cooking for harvest help is an onerous tax upon 
the strength and endurance of women; ami any 
method that can be adopted by which this burthen 
may he diminished, is worthy the attention of west¬ 
ern farmers. The employment of tenants as hired 
men. providing men of families with homes aud pay¬ 
ing them a certain sum per year, they boarding them¬ 
selves, is recommended. Men are more contented, 
and, having families to support, are more reliable 
than the adventurer with no incumbrances other than 
an extra hickory shirt and a pair of boots, 
— Talking about the Buckeye Reaper and Mower, 
since writing the foregoing, I have seen it work. It 
is highly spoken of as a mower. 1 have only seen it 
at work as a reaper. Its cuts wide — wider than 
Manny’s, I believe, and is too heavy work for a 
medium sized single team. Compared with the 
care weigh 150 lbs., the tail alone composing one- 
third of the whole weight. I bis broad, llattish tail is 
mostly covered with long wool, and, becoming very 
small at the extremity, turns up. It. is entirely com¬ 
posed of a substance between marrow end tut, serving 
very often in the kitchen instead of butter, and cut 
into small pieces, makes an ingredient in various 
dishes.” 
Dr. Russell further remarks:—‘ Animals of this 
extraordinary size (150 lbs.) arc, however, very rare, 
and kept up in yards, so as to be in little danger of 
hurting their tails from the hushes. The shepherds 
They have slen¬ 
der logs in proportion to their bodies, a high chest, 
aud tolerably fine wool mixed with hair, 'l’lie body of 
the ram, and sometimes of the ewe, swells gradually 
with fat toward the posterior, where a solid mass of 
fat is formed on tlvc rump, divided into two hemi¬ 
spheres, which take tin- form of the hips, with a little 
button of a tail in the middle. This breed often 
weighs 200 pounds, of which weight the suit oily fat 
alone constitutes from t wenty to forty pound-. 
The Fat • Taii.ro sheep is even more extensively 
diffused than the preceding; and it is by some sup¬ 
posed that the broad or fat tailed sheep is merely a 
variety or the fai-rumped, the strange collection of adi¬ 
pose matter having only shifted its situation from 
the posterior part of the haunch to the tail, which may 
have been at first accidental, ami perpetuated by 
accident or design. 
Dr. Rosbki.l, in his history of Aleppo, gives the 
following account of it, as it appears in Syria:—“The 
dead weight of one of these sheep will amount to 50 
or 00 lbs., of which the tail makes up 15 or 10 lbs.; 
but some of the largest that have been fattened with 
INQUIRIES AND NOTES 
Fnll Plowing Clay Land. 
Eds. Rural Nrw-Yorkbr:— J have a piece of clay land, 
strong and rich, producing a heavy crop, if the plants once 
get a start, but it is so eti tT that if the weather is unfavorable, 
and the ground dry and baked, it is Home times impossible for 
tender plants to break the crust, aud they therefore perish. 
It i* also very unpleasant to work, and sometimes I think the 
more it is handled the worse it becomes. Would fall plow¬ 
ing be any advantage? It has beeu recommended, aud I 
would like advice—CLAY, Niagara CO., N. V , 1801 
A clay soil is much ameliorated by fall plowing, if 
it is done when the ground is in the prop r condition. 
Plow when pretty dry, and leave It rough during the 
winter. The frosts will break and completely pul¬ 
verize the toughest clods, and make the whole quite 
mellow. In the spring it should not be touched 
until dry, when it may be plowed again and harrowed 
before planting. Before doing this it would he well 
to give a good coating of long, unfermented manure, 
A dressing of ashes after harrowing would, in a 
measure, prevent baking of the surface. If a course 
similar to this is pursued for a few years, the charac¬ 
ter of the soil will be materially changed for the bet¬ 
ter. It is assumed, of course, that the soil is 
thoroughly drained; for unless this is the case, all 
attempts at improvement will be useless. An un- 
drained clay soil will always be cold, late, aud hard 
to work, no matter what may he done for its benefit 
in other respects. 
Well, madam? 
“ Do ye want work?” 
Nothing harder than traveling afoot such a day as 
to-day. Why, did you want help in the house? 
“ Nay, nay; but. me moo lias a new reaper and has 
na enough help to bind hia crap. 1 did’n know but 
ye wanted work? Beg ye pardon; 1 see ye’re a gin- 
tlenion!” — and away she went without allowing me 
to thank her for the’compliment. But the woman 
had unconsciously given expression to a sentiment 
which seems to underlie the current of farm life, 
which is too plainly Indicative of the respect too 
many farmers have for their business. She was pro¬ 
voked apparently that she had been so presumptious 
as to ask a gentleman if he wanted work! The more I 
thiuk of it, the more 1 don’t relish the compliment! 
There may have been ft 'good deal of stinging sarcasm 
Intended. Am half inclined to apply it in that way. 
— Four or live miles from the line dividing Wis¬ 
consin and Illinois, in the latter State, I sit down in 
the shade of a red oak to advertise this locality ; 
and this is done, because there is a class of immi¬ 
grants that will be suited with no other, as I have 
had opportunity to learn in my travels. Here are 
big, red, sandstone “hard-heads" in any quantity, 
and of sizes to suit the rnoBt incorrigible lover of 
such ware. And here, too, are stumps and roots, 
and logs and “grubs,” with a stiff'clay soil and 
bard cuough "hard-pan" beneath it—so that many 
an eastern man need not “ break any associations” 
with friends of this character, in removing hither; 
Indeed, the “custom of tho country” l« very like 
some parts of “down east." Ah! down the road 
yonder is a half wall of these stone with posts and 
two boards! And, as l live, yonder are two old- 
fashioned frame gates suspended from a 10 by 12 
beam, one end of which Is loaded with stone to 
make it balance! And yonder, out of doors, stands 
a lever cheese press, with a substantial hewed oak 
log for a baRe, and a long heavy lever hearing upon 
blocks which rest on the “follower” of the hoop, 
one end of said lever being fast, and the other end 
supporting a "iive-puil kettle” full of htono!—a 
constant pressure being kept tip. Again, there 
stands a grindstone, ont of doors, hut over it is a 
neatly-fitting board cover, to prevent it “hardening”’ 
in the sun. Things are picked up. There is literally 
nothing lying around loose. I believe the man is a 
Yankee, aud am going in to see. As F pass the door 
to go to the barn where I see him at work, I took 
into the house, which has the air of a down east 
kitchen. Yes, sir, he is from Vermont!—has been 
litre twenty-four years, but has not lost his early 
thrifty habits, although he says he has been here 
“long enough to become a pretty good Hoosm-r.” 
“Train up a child iu tho way he should go,” Ac.; 
or, better still as a quotation here, "As the twig is 
bent the tree is inclined.’? But before I close the 
paragraph, let me cal! the attention of the Rural 
reader, East or West, who lets his grindstone stand 
out of doors, to the Vermonter’s contrivance for 
protecting his — a roof or frame-work of boards, 
But I did thank Mr, H. for 
sixty or seventy cents, 
taking time to fix up and clean out that grove. It I 
was “ a big thing” done. 
— Did you ever see a man who was not proud of, 
and prompt to show a good cellar, if he had one? T 
never did; and I never yet visited a farm where, if 
there was such a thing as a cistern, I was not in¬ 
formed of the number of barrels it would hold. It 
does men good to tell of such achievements, in de¬ 
tail; but it is a greater gratification to womankind 
to “ have such things about tho house.” 
— There arc bark lice on the apple trees. The 
owner complains that he is ahont discouraged, yet 
he acknowledges he has not paid any attention to the 
orchard the past two years, ft, Is seeded, and the 
grass grows in most cases " plntnb up" to the bodies 
of the trees. They have received no culture, the old 
bark has not been scraped from them, and they have 
not made growth enough to shed it. ft is a question 
with the writer whether in this case the lice are not 
the result rather than the cause of unhealthy trees. 
M. H. calls our attention to a few trees about the 
base of which bo has placed a quantity of teaehcu 
ashes and spent lime. Bays they seem to be grow¬ 
ing and making new wood rapidly. 80 they do, and 
the lice arc still there. Wonder if they will not 
leave soon. 
— Going south on the east side of the Des Plaines, 
I find some one has been hauling coarse manure on 
the meadow and spreading it. It is a good practice 
to do this on dry soils at this season of tho year. It 
protects the roots of timothy and clover during the 
next two months. There are hundreds of stacks of 
straw in the country that could tie employed In no 
better way than this. Yes, there is one other thing it 
is profitable to do with them protect the young grass 
of the new .seeding, by a light tualch of this straw us 
soon as the grain i-^offtbe ground or in shock. And 
if the drouth early in the season has destroyed the 
young plants, it is good practice, if the ground is 
in condition to seed, to re-sow with timothy or 
clover on the stubble, before potting on this mulch. 
This is the practice among some of the best, farmers 
in some localities — among farmers noted for having 
good meadows and pastures. Now is the time to 
look after these items — as soon as the harvest is 
secured. 
— T cross to the west side of the Des Plaines, and 
find a broken country timbered with burr oak. The 
soil is excellent, and crops generally good. The few 
fruit trees planted are bearing well, particularly 
where they are cultivated at all. Grain, grain, wheat 
and oats, cover the surface. There are few fields of 
corn, but little grass except on the marshy bottom 
lands, and the buzz and hum and click, click, of a 
score of reapers come to me on the heated August 
air. And it is hot! 
— “Hi! Hello, Meester!" and we tqrn to see a tub 
of a Welsh woman waving her apron and beckoning 
to our agreeable self. When woman calls, we obey! 
and forthwith turn towards the front gate, which is 
nothing but a pair of bars. 
Weeds — What are They ? 
Eos. Bubal Nbw-Yorkkr:—A ccompanying this you 
will Cud a plant, the name of which I would like to ascer¬ 
tain It grows iu pastures, andbeing creeping in some places, 
is quite troublesome. I would also like to know what are 
properly called weeds Must a plant be hard to eradicate, or 
injurious to crops, to give it a claim to this reproachful name? 
—W. T., Norft tt, A r . K , 1801. 
Any plant that is not valuable either for use as 
food, clothing, or medicine, or for its beauty, is 
called a weed, as the term is popularly understood. 
But to the farmer and gardener everything is tt weed 
that is out of place, or growing where it is not 
wanted, and where it is liable to do more hurt than 
good. Rye is a weed when growing among wheat, 
and often we see fields whitened with the flowers of 
buckwheat, growing from scattered seeds of the last 
crop; and these are nothing less than weeds in 
appearance and effect—invaders of the soil, and rob¬ 
bers of the legitimate crop. 
One of the plants sent is Lycopodium clavatum, or 
Common Club Moss. It grows in open woods and 
rather shady pastures, and ^ 
is quite common on the I/./'/: 
borders of Lake Ontario, 1, /;' if | U • 
and particularly so on the f.)LA 
islands in the Ft, Law- ' V,,-. $r& : $// 
rence River. It will not Wy / - 
endure the bright sun- jlK - . 
light, we judge from its ; -i/- t%T 
habits, and therefore its j: Lg 
eradication must be easy. W - • 
JV; 1 V.v Yfislv* 
The other is a different ['(, vr. 
variety of Lycopodium — 
dendroideum, or Tree Club 
Moss, and sometimes 
called Ground Pine. It 
is an elegant little plant, 
found growing some eight 
or ten inches in height, 
and found mostly in the lycopodium dsndkoi daum 
woods. Our engraving shows its appearance and 
habit, and also a single spike. 
The Potato Kor. 
The potato in this section of the country is an 
important crop; indeed, many farmers rely on it 
almost exclusively, perhaps too much so for the good 
of the soil and their own ultimate benefit. It is very 
easy to impoverish a soil by growing potatoes too 
frequently, and this is particularly the case with sandy 
ground, which of late, aad since the prevalence of 
the rot, has been found to be the only Boil to be relied 
upon for a crop of sound tubers. With a little stable 
manure every spring, and a dressing of leached ashes, 
