KM 
CXCELSICR 
5 HeeUiimn 81., New York 
82 Ituflnlo 8t., Roclirsler. 
NEW YORK CITY AND ROCHESTER, N. Y 
S3.00 PER YEAR. 
Singlr (\o., Ki^lit ('em*, 
FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER IB, (871 
[Kntere.1 nccnnUntr to Art of Comrress. In the yonr 1871. by D. D. T. Moore. in tire office of the librarian ot Congrtiaa, M Washington.] 
mates of its yield vary from sixty to seventy 
live bushels. The yield lias been seriously 
diminished bv the drouth.” 
Alliill'n III ('ii)itui'iiin, 
“ W® are informed by intelligent gcntlc- 
mon ( &©., jte. 1 find the above in an ar¬ 
ticle f>n Alfalfa, in your !*»<-,.. n f 5th inst. I 
beg leave to differ with the opinion exp. 
therein. I have raised alfulla in Los Ange¬ 
los, out. it seven times in a year, and at, the 
rate of three tons per acre each time; it, is 
worth twice as much as wild grass, and fully 
equal to timothy or clover. It is fust-rate 
for horses, cattle, hogs, turkeys and chickens. 
If stock can get alfalfa they won’t eat any¬ 
thing else. 1 have six acres on my ranch, 
will sow ten or twelve acres more in a few 
days. I intend to cut it live times a year 
here, and have at. least two and u-half tons 
per acre at each cutting; and it is worth $25 
per ton. Why should I eradicate it? “ intel¬ 
ligent gentlemen ” to the contrary notwith¬ 
standing.— Ciias. Whipple, Lone Pine, Cal., 
Any. 17,1871. 
Figure 1. 
gen oils material. Until gave an abundant 
harvest. In another pot ho planted them 
with au abundance of mineral without nitro¬ 
genous material. The result in this case 
was, that the wheat grew very poorly, while 
the beans developed to perfection. In a 
third pot he placed an abundance of nitro¬ 
genous material without, the mineral in¬ 
gredients, and the result was nearly the rc- 
mo'-Mt.' beans were poor, but the wlient 
much better, without, however, giving what 
could he called a good harvest. 
Now, as beans as well as wheat contain 
considerable nitrogen, the beans must, when 
nitrogenous matter tvas wanting in the soil, 
have taken nitrogen from the air, while all 
they needed from the soil were the mineral 
ingredients. The wheat, on the contrary, 
placed under the same conditions, unable to 
take nitrogen from the air, and not finding 
it iu the soil, grew very poorly. Reversing 
the experiment, both plants suffered from 
want of mineral matter in the soil • how¬ 
ever, the wheat did better than the beans, as 
it found, ar least, the so much needed nitro¬ 
genous matter in the soil. It appears that 
this nitrogen was useless to the beans, since 
they were able to take it from the air; but 
they suffered greatly for want of mineral 
substances, the absence of which made the 
earth, as it were, an iuert substance for their 
nourishment. 
This contrast in growth of the cereal and 
leguminous plants may even be used as a 
test of the soil in regard to Us richness in 
mineral or nitrogenous constituents. Pro¬ 
fessor Vit.le says:—“Plant in close prox¬ 
imity peas and wheat. If both give an 
abundant harvest, be sure that the soil is 
rich in both mineral and nitrogenous mat¬ 
ter. If the crop of wheat is middling and 
that of the pens large, it indicates that the 
soil lacks nitrogen, hut contains the neces¬ 
sary mineral elements. If the peas are poor 
hill the wheat, middling, the soil contains 
nitrogenous matter, and lacks the mineral 
ingredients. In this way, the plants them¬ 
selves are made to give an analysis of the 
soil, more reliable and more practical in its 
results tliftn the most elaborate analysis of 
the chemist, which is often without practi¬ 
cal value, notwithstanding the learned array 
of chemical names, and figures to fractions 
of a grain. 
The gramineous plants or cereals take 
their nitrogen from the soil alone, whereas 
the leguminous are capable of absorbing 
what nitrogen they need from the air. In 
the first cuse, the nitrogen is combined with 
oilier elements, in the form of ammonia or 
some salt containing nitric acid ; and in the 
second case, the problem to be solved is, 
whether the leguminous plants take the ni¬ 
trogen, as such, directly from the tincom- 
bined nitrogen in the air, or whether they 
take it only from the nitrate or nitrite of am¬ 
monia, which the air often contains in small 
qusmiUies, as it contains permanently a 
larger quantity of carbon in the state of car- 
TIh* iSciiii Wheat. 
The Farmers’ Advocate (Ontario) says: 
“ Air. John Brock BunwKt.t. of C'aradoc 
was the only gentleman in Ibis county who 
purchased the Scott wheat last year, and it 
was very late when wo heard of it. He 
sowed it by the side of bis Delhi wheat, and 
it yielded seven bushels more per acre than 
the Deihl and weighs sixty-eight pounds to 
the bushel. The best judges pronounce it, 
superior in quality to any other red wheat. 
The straw is of better quality and it is a 
harder wheat, than the Diehl. Air. Burwki.l 
is highly pleased with the wheat and so is 
every one that we have heard from who lias 
raised it. It is a bald, red wheat, and wo 
must give Mr. Bint well the credit of clean¬ 
ing it. It is, we think, the purest and cleau- 
cst wheat that we have ever been able to 
procure in ibis county for many years." 
Figure 5. 
AUike Clover in (lie Sonlli. 
Have any of your Southern readers—in 
North Carolina, Georgia, Virginia or Ten¬ 
nessee—tried the AlsikeClover? If so, will 
they please to state results. With me it has 
proved, this season, inferior to the common 
red clover.—W. P A., near Lj/neMniry, Vo. 
AVe should hardly think it adapted to the 
South. It thrives best in the North, in a 
cool and moist climate. But we shall be 
glad to hear from those who have tested it 
in hot and dry latitudes. 
I'rnirie (Mover, 
Enclosed you will find a flower head and 
a part of the stem of a plant growing on our 
Western prairies of which I very much de¬ 
sire to know the name. 1 Have consulted, 
flower in hand, no less than four school 
botanies, for the purpose of finding its name, 
but for some reason, the want of a suitable 
glass, or of the requisite sagacity, or ade¬ 
quate description in the botanies, have never 
yet, been able to trace it to its genus. It 
seems to be an herbaceous perennial amt 
has, as you will find, a very strong odor.— 
Fourteen, Mon^roe, PL 
Look in your school botany for Pelaloste- 
mon wolaeevs, and see how it compares with 
the plant. It is sometimes called Prairie 
Clover, although the leaves have very little 
resemblance 10 the true clovers (Tiifirtwns. j 
Dent Corn in (Icorscla. 
The Plantation says:—“Air. George II. 
Waring near Kingston has planted an 
acre of the Dent Corn. The ground was 
very heavily manured, being, naturally, ex¬ 
cellent, valley land. The corn was planted 
four feet by two, on the 20th of April. By 
the 15th of August, a large portion of it was 
ready 1o send to the mill. This is a very 
rapid maturity, and determines it to be a 
valuable corn for us. Alost of the stalks 
have two good ear.s upon them—the ears 
are large and heavy. This acre was exam¬ 
ined by Air. Barnett, Judge ScnLET, Colo¬ 
nel T. C. Howard and others. The esti- 
FIELD NOTES AND QUERIES, 
The Bent Winter Wheat in Sow. 
I should, and I have no doubt others 
would, be glad to sec votes in the Rural 
New- Yorker as to the best, kinds of winter 
wheat to sow. It is rather late 1o make the 
request, but Hie voles will be interesting. 
Let us have them. — Sam. Jones, Genesee 
Go., N. Y. 
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