1868.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
363 
know from actual experiment that an active ar¬ 
tificial manure, like sulphate of ammonia, will 
do more good on winter wheat when sown in 
the fall, than when sown just before the plants 
begin to grow in the spring. One would think 
that during the cold weather of the fall and 
winter, when there is little growth, the manure 
was not needed, but doubtless there is a greater 
accumulation of matter in the roots and leaves 
of the plants, and when the warm weather 
comes, the crop “ shoots right ahead.” I will 
not say that a liberal top-dressing of good ma¬ 
nure this fall will prevent a pasture from drying 
up next summer, but if other conditions are fa¬ 
vorable, I have no doubt that such would be 
the case. And stock will do better in such a 
pasture if we have a dry, hot summer, than if 
we have a cool and moist one. There will not 
be so rank a growth, but the grass will be rich¬ 
er. It will be more highly organized, and con¬ 
sequently far more nutritious. 
Except in the neighborhood of large cities, 
“ High Farming ” may not pay, owing to the 
fact that we have so much land. But whether 
this is so or not, there can be no doubt that the 
only profitable system of farming is to raise 
large crops on such land as we cultivate. High 
farming gives us large crops and many of them. 
At present, while we have so much land in pro¬ 
portion to population, we must, perhaps, be 
content with large crops of grain, and few of 
them. We must adopt the slower but less ex¬ 
pensive means of enriching our land from natur¬ 
al sources, rather than the quicker, more arti¬ 
ficial and costly means adopted by many farm¬ 
ers in England, and by market gardeners, seed- 
growers, and nurserymen in this country. La¬ 
bor is so high that we cannot afford to raise a 
small crop. If we sow but half the number of 
acres and double the yield, we should quadruple 
our profits. I have made up my mind to let 
the land lie in clover three years instead of two. 
This will lessen the number of acres under cul¬ 
tivation, and enable us to bestow more care in 
plowing and cleaning it. And tlie land will be 
richer and produce better crops. The atmos¬ 
phere is capable of supplying a certain quan¬ 
tity of ammonia to the soil in rains and dews 
every year, and by giving the wheat crop a three 
years supply instead of two years, we gain so 
much. Plaster the clover, top-dress it in the fall, 
if you have the manure, and stimulate its growth 
in every way possible, and consume all the 
clover on the land or in the barn-yard. Do not 
sell a single ton ; let not a weed grow, and the 
land will certainly improve. 
The first object should be to destroy weeds. 
I do not know how it is in other sections, but 
with us the majority of farms are completely 
overrun with weeds. They are eating out the 
life of the land, and if something is not done to 
destroy them, even the present high prices can¬ 
not make farming profitable. A farmer yester¬ 
day was contending that it did not pay to sum¬ 
mer fallow. He lias taken a run down farm, 
and a year ago last spring lie plowed up ten 
acres of a field, and sowed it to barley and oats, 
The remainder of the field he summer-fallowed, 
plowing it four times, and rolling and harrow¬ 
ing thoroughly after each plowing. After the 
barley and oats were off, he plowed the laud 
once, harrowed it and. sowed Mediterranean 
wheat. On the summer-fallow he drilled in 
Diehl wheat. He has just thrashed and got 22 
bushels per acre of Mediterranean wheat after 
the spring crop, at one plowing, and 26 bushels 
per acre of Diehl wheat on the summer-fallow. 
This, he said, would not pay, as it cost him $20 
per acre to summer-fallow, and lie lost the use 
of the land for one season. Now this may be 
all true, and yet it is no argument against sum¬ 
mer-fallowing. Wait a few years. Farming is 
slow work. Geddes remarked to me, when I 
told him I was trying to renovate a run down 
farm, “ you will find it the work of your life.” 
We ought not to expect a big crop on pooiy run 
down land, simply by plowing it three or four 
times in as many months. Time is required for 
the chemical changes to take place in the soil. 
But watch the effect on the clover for the next 
two years, and when the land is plowed again, 
see if it is not in far better condition than the 
part not summer-fallowed. I should expect the 
clover on the summer-fallow to be fully one- 
third better in quantity, and of better quality 
than on the other part, and this extra quantity 
of clover will make an extra quantity of good 
manure, (and there will be more clover roots in 
the land), and thus we have the means of going 
on in improving the farm. 
Barley is a paying crop on good land. I am 
offered $1.50 a bushel, and I see Canadian bar¬ 
ley is quoted in Buffalo at $1.75. I had 525 
bushels, “ thrasher’s measure,” from a little over 
10 acres, and have some rakings yet to thrash. 
This field was heavily manured for corn, and 
was sown the last of March and first of April. 
On another field of about 14 acres, not manured, 
but thoroughly cultivated for two years in beans 
and corn, I had 420 bushels, or only 80 bushels 
per acre. Now the extra yield of 20 bushels 
per acre, say $30, will go far towards paying 
for the manure, and I am satisfied that there is 
considerable strength yet left in the land, which 
will manifest itself on the wheat. I am encour¬ 
aged to go ahead and try to make more and 
richer manure. I have got in over a hundred 
good loads of clover hay, and I propose to feed 
it all out this winter. I have a big stock of 
timothy, rather unripe, from the “old stump 
lot,” and if the drouth in England puts up the 
price of hay here to $25 per ton, as is quite 
probable, I will sell it, and buy oil cake with the 
money to feed out with the clover hay. So with 
the clover seed,—if we have any. And if the 
paper men will pay as much for straw as they 
did last year, they shall have half the stock, and 
I will buy oil cake with the money to feed out 
with the other half and with the clover. I shall 
not get more than half the bulk of the manure, 
but one load will be worth two, and we save 
half the labor of drawing out and spreading. 
But do not sell nice, bright, wheat straw, as 
one of my neighbors did a few days since, to 
the paper men for $2.00 a load, and they put 
on from 20 to 25 cwt. on each wagon. There 
is an unusual quantity of straw in the country, 
but if we are to have an export demand for hay 
at high prices, we shall need all our straw be¬ 
fore the middle of May. The Deacon says he 
has observed that seasons which give us a large 
quantity of hay and straw, are followed by long- 
foddering or severe winters, and there is none 
to spare. The hay, too, is perhaps not as nutri¬ 
tious, and does not spend as well. At all events 
it is unwise to waste or sell the fodder thus early, 
In harvesting clover for seed, why is it neces¬ 
sary to let the crop lie in windrows or small 
bunches until the fodder is spoiled ? Will not 
a good machine thrash it clean unless the heads 
are steeped as they do flax, and rotted ? An 
old farmer who lets his clover lie out some¬ 
times until snow comes, told me that frost would 
not hurt the seed after it was cut (which is true), 
and that it was necessary to rot the heads in 
order to get the seed out. I take as much pains 
in curing clover for seed, as for hay, and when 
the weather is favorable and the clover heavy, it 
makes hay that smells as sweet and looks nearly 
as fresh as the first crop. And I do not believe 
there is any trouble in thrashing it—though it 
is true I have never yet had more than two and 
a half bushels of seed per acre. If there is a 
good growth of clover, it will yield at least a 
ton to the acre. And a ton of clover and seed, 
when well cured, contains about 50 lbs. of ni¬ 
trogen. A bushel of clover seed contains prob¬ 
ably about as much nitrogen as peas, say2'| 2 
lbs. Now if in such a crop we get 4 bushels of 
seed per acre, there is 10 lbs. of nitrogen in the 
seed and 40 lbs. in the fodder. And it seems a 
great pity to waste the latter. John Johnston 
says a crop of clover seed will impoverish the 
land more than a crop of wheat. And it is a 
fact that a ton of clover hay contains more ni¬ 
trogen than 30 bushels of wheat and straw. 
But in the case of the wheat, about 40 lbs. of the 
nitrogen is in the grain, and 10 lbs. in the straw, 
while in the case of clover only 10 lbs. is in 
the seed, and 40 lbs. in the straw. So that if 
the clover straw is retained on the farm, the ex¬ 
haustion is more apparent than real. The land 
from which the crop of clover seed was taken, 
might exhibit symtoms of exhaustion, as com¬ 
pared with a field that was pastured. But still, 
four-fifths of what is taken from the field is re¬ 
turned in the shape of manure, and the farm 
only loses one-fifth, while in the case of wheat 
it loses four-fifths. 
-«— li na g e— i » - 
Osage Orange and Silk-worms. —Andre 
Leroy, of Angiers, France, writes to the Revue 
Horticole, that the Osage Orange has not receiv¬ 
ed the attention as an ornamental tree that it 
merits. Mr. L. states that the leaves answer'as a 
substitute for those of the Mulberry, as food for 
the silk-worm. He says: “ Of 4,000 that I have 
raised with the leaves of this tree I have not 
lost one. Now they have commenced to spin 
and give me superb cocoons.” 
Curing and Use of Corn Fodder. 
Well cured corn stalks of the smaller kinds 
are worth as much as good hay as food for cat¬ 
tle, if cut up while green, and one or two days 
before the first frost. The very early kinds usu¬ 
ally will ripen and turn brown before frost, and 
by this process of ripening, just as it is with 
grass that stands too long, the sapid and nutri¬ 
tious substances are, to a great extent, convert¬ 
ed into or enclosed in woody fiber, so that they 
are neither palatable nor useful to the stock. 
Frost produces an immediate change of a simi¬ 
lar character, chiefly in the leaves and tender 
parts of the stalks, which are the most valuable 
for feeding ; but if they arc exposed for a few 
hours to the hot sun after cutting up, though 
quite green, so much of the water evaporates that 
frosts produce little or no effect. It requires, 
however, a good deal of drying to extract suffi¬ 
cient water from the thick huts to prevent them 
moulding when housed. After the corn is cut up 
and placed in stooks, well braced and bound to 
prevent rain from entering and wind from over¬ 
throwing them, this may go on gradually for 
several weeks. The grain if not quite ripe gains 
rapidly, at the expense of part of the juices 
of the stalks. When the ears are hard and their 
buts dry, they may be husked. The stalks will 
still need more drying in all probability, and 
bound in bundles of convenient size, should be 
again slooked up as before. If care be taken 
