814 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
made an average of 600 pounds of butter a year, gave, 
at the most, but twenty quarts per day; and the Oaks 
cow, which made 480 pounds of butter in a year, gave 
but sixteen to eighteen quarts per day. John Hot* 
Bert, of Chemung, N. Y., states that he has found, by 
churning the milk separately, that one of his best cows 
will make as much butter as three of his poorest —all 
giving an equal quantity of milk. He states, also, that 
100 pounds of milk drawn from his cows which give 
the richest milk, will make one pound more butter than 
100 pounds drawn from the whole herd; and he adds, 
that there is more difference in the quality than in the 
quantity. His advice in conclusion is, that all dairy¬ 
men look well to the quality of milk their cows give. 
South Down and Leicester Sheep.— The two 
most popular breeds of sheep in England are South 
Downs and Leicesters. C. Hilliard, an experienced 
farmer and breeder, suggests to the Council of the Royal 
Agricultural Society, the propriety of offering a prize 
for sheep produced by a cross of these breeds. He uses 
the following arguments in favor of the proposition: 
u The South Downs do not come to sufficient weight 
of carcass in proportion to the quantity and value of 
the food consumed, and the Leicesters do not produce 
a sufficient quantity of lean meat to the fat. By an 
admixture of the two breeds—by putting a pure-bred 
South-Down ram to pure-bred Leicester ewes, I have, 
in the space of six years, established agreed that I 
find yield a better profit in feeding than either the 
South-Downs or Leicesters. The mutton is as fine as 
can be eaten, and the fleeces are of greater value than 
either South-Downs or Leicesters.” 
Stage for cutting Grass. —A writer on the scien¬ 
tific principles involved in the process of haymaking, 
lays down the following rules: 1. Grass must be fully 
developed before it is mown; if not, it will be found in 
its early stages to contain so much water as to be 
reduced, on drying, into so small a compass, that it 
will in quantity much disappoint the haymaker. 2. It 
must not be permitted to stand until its seeds are 
formed, much less ripe. All plants in arriving at ma¬ 
turity have their starch and sugar and gum in large 
quantities converted into woody fibre—a wise provision 
of Providence for enabling the stem to bear the matured 
seeds—and as sugar, gum and starch, are nutritive 
elements, it is desirable that these should be preserved, 
and hence the point for successful grass-cutting is that 
between the full development of the plant and before 
the formation of their seeds, in other words when they 
are in flower. 
The proper drying and storing of hay should be 
strictly attended to. If it is put up with two much 
moisture in it, the fermentation is so violent that the 
hay is greatly injured in quality, and may be more or 
less consumed. But hay may be made too dry; for 
though a violent fermentation is to be avoided, a slight 
one is considered necessary to the full development of 
the best qualities of the grass; as there is little doubt 
that it is the vinous fermentation of the saccharine mat¬ 
ter of the hay which renders it palatable to animals. 
Cheese Factories. —In the Western Reserve. Ohio, 
where the making of cheese has been largely carried on 
for several years, a change of system has lately taken 
place to some extent. Certain men who are well ac¬ 
quainted with the manufacture of cheese, purchase the 
curd , unsalted, of their neighbors; and make it into 
that kind of cheese for which they find the readiest sale 
and best price. A single manufacturer sometimes uses 
the curd produced from the milk of several hundred 
cows. It is gathered every morning, by men who call 
at the different farms for that, purpose. These large 
establishments are called “ factories.” The Coneaut 
Reporter notices some factories which it is stated use 
Nor. 
3000 pounds of curd daily, making from twenty to 
thirty cheeses Of from fifteen to thirty pounds Weight 
each. Some of the cheese is sent to the English 
markets, some to the West Indies, and some to Cali¬ 
fornia. 
Live Stock at Auction. —Attention is invited 
to the advertisement of Mr. Blakeslee, in this 
number. 
Transmutation. —We have on hand several 
communications in reference to wheat changing to 
chess. While we desire to treat all our correspon¬ 
dents with civility, we do not think the publication 
of these articles would be generally interesting to 
our readers. We do not reject them because they 
express opinions contrary to our own, but because 
they throw no new light on the subject. All as¬ 
sume that because wheat failed to mature, more or 
less, where it was sown, and chess grew in its 
place, the w'heat was transformed into chess! Now 
all we ask is the proof of this change. One cor¬ 
respondent says —“ When I see wheat converted 
into chess, I must believe it.” Aye, but does he 
see it? Does he absolutely know that the chess did 
not grow from chess? or did he “ see” the miracu¬ 
lous conversion? We do not doubt the honesty of 
these statements—we admit that chess was found 
where wheat was sown—but we think the chess 
was produced, like every other plant, from seed of 
its own kind. 
Shrunk Wheat. —The millers of Zanesville, Ohio, 
have published the following scale of prices, in view of 
the depreciated quality of wheat from rust, the present 
year:— 
“ Assuming that cleaned wheat, weighing 58, 59, 
and 60 pounds to the bushel, is worth 75 cents per 
bushel, wheat weighing 
57 
lbs. 
would be worth 72 
cents, 
56 
u 
u 
it 
69 
u 
55 
u 
a 
it 
66 
ll 
54 
it 
u 
it 
62 
ll 
53 
u 
it 
it 
58 
it 
52 
a 
it 
(l 
53 
a 
51 
u 
(C 
l( 
48 
n 
50 
ll 
et 
tc 
42 
it 
For white wheat , 10 per cent additional on the above 
prices.” Below 54 lbs. per bushel, superfine flour can¬ 
not be made, whence the rapidly diminished prices. 
The Army Worm. —The Michigan Farmer states 
that twelve miles from Port Huron, on Black River, 
whole fields have lost their entire crops by the enormous 
numbers of these worms in their march from place to 
place, and that one tenant was actually driv'en from his 
house by the swarms which obtained possession. 
Cheap Crop of Sweet Potatoes. —The South¬ 
ern Cultivator contains a statement of Aaron Ad¬ 
kins, who raised 307 bushels of sweet potatoes—ex¬ 
cellent food for cows at the South—on an acre of 
land, at a cost of about ten dollars, or about three 
cents per bushel. The potatoes, cut three inches 
long, were dropped into deep furrows three and a 
half feet apart, and a foot and a half apart in the 
furrow. They were covered with a plow; not hill¬ 
ed, nor hoed, but repeatedly cultivated with a 
shovel-plow, throwing the vines, when they became 
lorg, on one side, for one furrow, and on the other 
side for the next furrow. A small plow was used 
near the rows, and a larger one in the middle. They 
were plowed up out of the ground when harvested. 
Plenty of Room. —According to the estimates 
of the General Land Office, the whole United States 
empire measures about two thousand million acres. 
If one half should be waste lands and forests, there 
would still be a thousand million acres. Intelli- 
