1847, 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
143 
very limited, would make me hesitate in speaking so 
emphatically. Their general reputation is strongly in 
their favor,” He states that he visited a dairy farmer 
in Ayrshire, who kept thirty-five very beautiful cows of 
this breed, “ His best cows, in the best of the season, 
gave fifty-four pounds of milk per day. If, as is.usually 
reckoned, a pint is a pound, this would be twenty-seven 
quarts per day. The average yield was forty pounds 
per day, or twenty quarts,” 
But the most productive cow for butter which Mr. 
Colman met in England, was a North Devon, She 
averaged for several weeks, in succession, twenty-one 
pounds of butter per week. And the North Devon cows 
of Mr. Bloomfield, a tenant of Lord Leicester, are 
stated to have averaged upwards of two hundred pounds 
of butter each, per year, for several years. This is the 
herd from which Mr. Patterson, of Baltimore, and the 
Massachusetts Ag. Society obtained their Devon stock. 
The Kerry cows, of Ireland, are said to be greatly 
valued for their milking properties, Mr. Colman found, 
at a milk establishment near Cork, three of these cows 
which yielded an average of twenty-eight quarts each, 
per day, and it was stated to him on '“fespectable au¬ 
thority,” that a clergyman in the county of Kerry, sent 
to Liverpool in one year, twenty-five firkins of butter, 
of sixty-four pounds each, the produce of five Kerry 
cows—-equal to three hundred and twenty pounds per cow. 
Some observations on u Improvements in relation to 
the United States ,” are deserving special notice. u That 
the stock of the United States is of a very mixed 
and miscellaneous character, every one must admit. 
Comparatively few attempts have been made in a sys¬ 
tematic manner and upon an extended scale, for its im¬ 
provement. Where they have, been made, they have fre¬ 
quently failed for want of perseverance, very often for 
want of encouragement,—and have been sometimes met 
with the sneers of ignorance, or the derision of envy. The 
immense improvements which have been made here, 
strike the observer with grateful astonishment. Few 
subjects, in my opinion, more concern the interest of 
American husbandmen than the improvement of our 
live stock. Much, undoubtedly, may be done by the 
selection of the best from our own breeds, and by breed¬ 
ing only from the best ; but our stock is so crossed and 
mixed up, and amalgamated, that it would be a difficult 
process to unravel the web, and go back to any original 
breed. We may certainly, with great advantage, avail 
ourselves of the breeds existing here in the highest state 
of improvement. 
“ In making a selection of breeds, it is plain that re¬ 
gard should be had to the locality where they are to 
be placed. The Improved Short-Horns, the Yorkshire, 
and the Hereford, are the best adapted to the rich and 
deep pastures of the Middle and Western States; the 
Ayrshire and the North Devon, seem to me especially 
suited to New England; while the West Highland cat¬ 
tle would evidently be fitted to the cold and least produc¬ 
tive parts of the country,” 
“ With us, as well as here, the success of farming 
must mainly depend on such a conduct of the farm as shall 
not exhaust its productive powers; or rather, that it 
shall, from its own resources, furnish the means, not 
only of recruiting its strength, but of actually increasing 
its capabilities of production. There is no more obvious 
way of doing this, than by consuming the produce of 
the farm, mainly, in feeding animals, through whom the 
riches of its vegetation may be returned in a form to fur¬ 
nish other and better crops.” 
We have not room ihj the present number for a notice 
of Mr. Colman’s remarks on sheep and swine. 
WEEDS INJURIOUS TO AGRICULTURE. 
BURDOCK. 
Lappa major,,of Gaertner. 
Arctium lappa , of Linneus. 
Description.— Involucre globose, each of its subu¬ 
late scales with an incurved hook at the extremity, 
leaves very large, petiolate. It belongs to the natural 
order Composite, and in the artificial system is placed 
in the class Syngenesia. Lappa is derived from Hap , a 
hand, in Celtic, because it lays hold of everything 
near it. 
Geography, history, &c. —It is a native of Eu¬ 
rope, of the East Indies, and of Japan, growing in waste 
grounds, by road sides, and on ditch hanks. According 
to Loudon, “ few quadrupeds except the ass, will eat 
the plant, but birds feed on the seeds, and snails and 
caterpillars on the leaves. The stems, stripped of their 
leaves before the flowers appear, may be eaten either 
boiled or raw, with oil and vinegar. Withering says, 
a decoction of the roots is esteemed by some equal to 
that of sarsaparilla. Burnt green, between the time 
of flowering and seeding, three pounds of the ashes 
produced sixteen ounces of very white alkaline salt, as 
good as the best potash,” In the United States, it, is 
found throughout the northern states, as far south as 
Maryland and Virginia, extending west to Kentucky 
and Illinois, growing in cultivated fields and waste 
grounds, especially around old buildings and fence sides. 
The leaves, when in a young state, are eaten with ap¬ 
parently a good relish by either cattle or sheep; hence, 
there is little danger of the plant becoming ripe in pas¬ 
tures. We have seen the green leaves given as a food 
to horses, at intervals of eight or ten days, the leaves 
being considered useful for purifying the blood, and pre¬ 
serving the general tone of health. This plant is a 
great pest among wool-growers, on account of the lia¬ 
bility of the burs to become attached to the wool. 
The best method of exterminating it is to grub up the 
roots soon after the leaves appear, or any time during 
the months of April and May, but the earlier it is done 
the easier it will be effected, because the ground is then 
softest. Many farmers intend to destroy it by cutting 
off the stems just before flowering in July or August, 
but then the business is liable to be neglected during the 
hurry of haying and harvest, or if done, the roots put 
forth new shoots, which bear flowers and burs. The 
roots are biennial. There are three other species of 
this genus described in Decandolle’s Prodomus, all of 
which are natives of Europe or western Asia. 
COCKLEBUR, CLO TWEED, OR BURWEED. 
Xanthium strumarium , of Linneus. 
Description. —Leaves cordate at the base, 3 to 5 
lobed, largely dentate or incised. Fruit oblong, elip- 
tical, terete, rather acute, covered with strait, sharp, 
rigid, hooked prickles; stem smooth, much branched. 3 
to 4 feet high. 
This plant belongs to the same natural order and ar¬ 
tificial class as the preceding. The root is annual. 
Geography,- History, Sc c. —It grows throughout 
nearly the whole of Europe, and is also found in Sibe¬ 
ria and Northern Africa, abounding by road sides and 
in cultivated fields. It is also frequent throughout both 
the northern and southern portions of the United States, 
having been apparently' introduced from Europe; how- 
