138 DEAD ANIMALS.-A LESSON ON PLOWING. is a general rule to sow the seed in beds and then and use of this most powerful of fertilizers, when transplant. A recent and much superior practice common sense and decency fail to do it. is, to sow from three to five seeds in the places Whenever it is desirable to hasten decay, and where you wish one plant to grow. In this case rapidly turn animal matter into manure, sulphuric the largest and most thrifty plant only is left stand-acid may be used. This would be too expensive ing. After it gets three to four weeks old, the (although the acid is cheap) for farm purposes, but other plants are pinched off or broken down. may be employed for the garden, where expense is Grown in this way the heads are said to be much not so important. It is frequently desirable to have larger and finer than when the young cabbages are a rich manure in the garden, and it is not at hand. transplanted, as it is contended that however care- Animal matter put into sulphuric acid will in a fully the process may be performed, the plant re- few hours furnish it. Every house will supply To this rats, mice, ceives a check in its incipient state which it never much refuse animal matter. entirely recovers. There is reason and philosophy moles, feathers, hair, bones, horns, &c., may be in this, and we should be glad if those engaged in added. If the garbage of a slaughter-house can be All these will soon be reduced the culture of cabbages would make experiments got, it should be. the present season between different rows, side by side, sowing the seed as above, and in the usual method, and then transplant. DEAD ANIMALS. to an available state, be inoffensive, and will add great fertility to the soil where used. The requisite quantity of acid may be ascertained by experiment-about 10 or 15 lbs. is usually allowed for 100 lbs of animal matter. Ar all seasons of the year dead animals are to be A LESSON ON PLOWING. seen hung up on fences and on trees; and especially is this the case in spring. On every farm VISITING the farm of Edward J. Woolsey, Esq., where sheep are kept, dead lambs are suspended in at Hellegat Neck, one day the past month, we were the beautiful, blooming, and fruit-bearing orchards conducted over it by his manager, Mr. Samuel -how shocking!-to annoy the sight and smell, Pate. He has just begun his operations there, and and waste the farmer's means. Dogs and cats will one of these days make it one of the most protoo are frequently hoisted into view in the same ductive places that adorn this neighborhood. He annoying and disgusting manner. If horses, cattle, showed us a field of about twelve acres, the most sheep, or hogs die, they are drawn out of sight, thoroughly sub-drained of anything we have yet but not out of smell, and are stil! sources of dis-seen in the United States. It was originally a deep gust. Why is all this? If the farmer be so un- morass; now it is a firm, dry, meadow. But as we fortunate or so negligent as to lose an animal, hope to be favored with an account of the operation should he be so wasteful as to permit the carcase from Mr. Woolsey himself one of these days, we to decay uselessly in the open air, to the great an- forbear further observation upon it. noyance of his family and every passer by? Does Mr. Pate is a Scotchman, and having several he not know that animal matter is the best and Scotch plowmen, with Scotch plows at work, to richest of manure? Animal matter contains every gratify our curiosity he invited us to see them opeelement that is necessary to grow every plant rate. The work was not done for show, but was known. In it are phosphate and carbonate of such as characterizes the every day operations of lime, ammonia, carbon, in short, in the best form, good plowmen in Scotland; and if all were not as all the essentials of vegetable growth. Its putritive well done at home, they would be dismissed by their power is great, and if added to the compost heap employer for awkward workmanship. The field hastens fermentation, and adds greatly to its rich-in which we found the men at work was about 40 ness. Whenever a fowl, cat, dog, sheep, pig, horse, or cow dies, let the carcase be cut up, and the bones broken, and the whole added to the manure heap. The carcase of a single horse will turn loads of useless muck or peat into manure, richer than any ordinary barn-yard dung. Why then suffer it to decay uselessly and annoyingly? It is true it is not lost, for the gases that taint the air are appropriated by plants; but the farmer who owned the animal gets but a small portion of what should be all his own. Why, then, will he waste the dead energies of the horse, when he has lost the living ones? If our readers will heed what we say, they will not suffer dead animals to annoy the eye and disgust the nose hereafter. Bury them in the manure heap; add some lime to quicken decay, and charcoal dust or plaster to absorb the gases, and much will be gained to the good appearance of the farm, the quality of the manure, and the quantity of the crops grown; and much to the purse of the farmer. If your neighbor be so improvident as to waste a dead animal, beg it of him, that it may not be detrimental to health and useless to vegetation. Laws should be passed to compel the saving rods long, of a rich loamy soil, and coated with a tough old sward. Here the men set in and run their furrows from end to end, as straight as one could draw a line, turning them 6 inches deep, and 11 inches wide, slightly lapped, and packing them up one after the other all day long, with a single pair of horses, each plowman driving his own team, and not varying throughout their work, as we could discover, a single inch in the thickness or width of their furrow slices. We have seen as good plowing in Great Britain, but never anything like it before, as a whole, in the United States, though we have often been present at the most celebrated plowing matches. There were no snake trails, or ram's horns here, or half-turned sods, or untouched ground, or skipped places; but the whole was as thoroughly and evenly done as it would be possible to accomplish with the most careful spading, and when harrowed with the fine double harrow, the surface of the field had the appearance of a well-dug and fine-raked garden. People may say what they please, yet we con tend that good plowing is not only the first, but the most important part of the operations on the THE BUSH PULLER.-DUTTON CORN.-NURSERIES OF MESSRS. HOVEY & CO. 139 We are in want of a first quality of Dutton Corn for seed. Who has it for sale? DUTTON CORN.-Mr. Frederick Plumb, of Salsbury, Conn., says that he received an ear of corn from a friend, who said it was from the Rocky Mountains. The grains of this ear were covered They have originated another seedling strawwith a husk. He has improved it by cultivation, berry, which they call the Boston pine. It is of fine and thinks it will soon be entirely free from husk, flavor, though not so large as the Hovey seedling. and will be in perfect resemblance of the Dutton The green-house department here is very extencorn, which Mr. Plumb esteems as the best kind for sive. The large conservatory, or show house, is of the Northern and Eastern States. He planted, a a chaste, neat architecture, 84 feet long, 22 feet few years since, ten acres of Dutton corn, ten wide, with a span roof, and well constructed acres of the yellow eight-rowed, ten acres of the throughout, being one of the most expensive in the twelve and fourteen-rowed white, and ten acres of country. Another large house is 84 by 25, with a eight-rowed white. The Dutton proved a much span roof. Besides these there are some smaller better crop than either of the other varieties. Next houses, making a rich and varied display of plants. to the Dutton, Mr. P. prefers the eight-rowed yellow. I The camellias were worthy of all admiration. 140 PARING PLOW.-AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL ASSOCIATION. upwards of 2,500 varieties of the best foreign and the land. Paring and burning is a very amelioratnative, some of the largest of which we noted were ing process for stiff clay soils; it changes their 8 to 10 feet high. Nor was less attention given to mechanical texture almost entirely, and renders roses. Here we found 1,200 varieties, the most them friable and suitable for cultivation. The superb of which we thought was La Reine-worthy paring plow is also an excellent implement for indeed of being the queen of her species. Messrs. cutting off meadow-bogs and grass bunches, and Hovey & Co. have taken the first premiums of the turf for covering a grass plot. Massachusetts Horticultural Society for three years past, for the best show of rare roses, and if we may be permitted to judge by what we saw here, they well deserved them. AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL ASSOCIATION. SINCE our last the Society has had two meetings per month, instead of one. At that on the 18th of Mr. C. M. Hovey politely conducted us over the March, Mr. Pell moved that a Horticultural depremises, and pointed out many other things worthy partment be connected with the Society to make of notice; but we regret to say, that the weather exhibitions, and stated that they would be well was excessively hot, and we had been so greatly supplied and patronized, if premiums be offered to fatigued by several other excursions during the day, the amount of $400 or $500, and fruits, flowers, before reaching these nurseries, that we felt little and vegetables be included in the exhibitions. inclination to take notes, and have doubtless forgot-The money necessary might be expected to be adten many things which we ought to mention. Yet vanced by members, as the constitution does not this we remember, he has recently built a beautiful allow the Society to appropriate money not in the pointed Gothic cottage, and is now tastefully adorn-treasury. ing the grounds around with choice flowers and shrubbery, and within this we were hospitably entertained, and shown one of the best horticultural libraries we have seen in this country. Many of the works are rare, and others exceedingly rich and gorgeous in exquisite colored engravings, of superior fruits and flowers. Mr. Hovey is the editor of the Horticultural Magazine, published in Boston; a work too well known and highly regarded by the public to need any further notice of ours. A similar Society was commenced in Boston a few years ago, from humble beginnings, and the income of the exhibition the past year is said to have been $18,000. The resolution was adopted, and the following Committee appointed to carry it into effect:-R. R. Delafield, S. T. Jones, Alex. H. Stevens, T. A. Emmet, Wm. S. McCoun, Hugh Maxwell, J. F. Sheafe, Shepherd Knapp, E. K. Collins, James Boorman, Jas. Lenox, Ambrose Stephens, R. B. Parsons, and R. L. Pell. These gentlemen have an agricultural implement and seed store in Boston, where they do an extensive business in their line. With all these varied occupations they doubtless have a pretty active life of it, and we can only hope it may prove as profit-crease his plantation to 100 acres. able to them as busy. PARING PLOW. FIG. 41. Mr. Van Epps made some further explanations in regard to the silk business, showing that the multicaulis had done well in Washington, D. C., where he had 20 acres set out, and intended to inDr. Underhill said that however well this variety of mulberry might succeed elsewhere, it could not be depended upon to stand the rigor of the New York winters. Mr. Seeley addressed the Society on the influ ence of electricity on vegetation, and thought that the causes of failure were owing to the erroneous manner of applying it to growing plants. At the meeting on the 1st of April, various grafts, seeds, and vegetables were offered for distribution among the members. Of the latter there were some fine large stalks of the pie-plant from Mr. Pell, who said that by selecting roots in the fall and placing them in the loam under the shelves of the green-house, you can have a supply of this plant from the latter part of February to Junewhereas it is now to be had only during the latter month. THIS plow is used for paring turf lands pre- Dr. Gardner presented from the publishers, the paratory to burning. The share is thin and flat, Messrs. Harper, a copy of his Farmers' Dicmade of wrought iron, steel-edged. It has a lock-tionary. coulter in the centre, and short coulters on the out- Chancellor McCoun, having been called to the ward edge of each wing of the share, cutting the chair, read the report of the committee to whom turf as it moves along into two strips about one was referred the offer of Gardner Howland, Esq., foot wide, and as deep as required, there being a of his farm on Long Island, for the use of the Soci sliding apparatus put on the end of the beam in- ety. The report takes the ground that the Society stead of a wheel to regulate the depth of cutting. is not sufficiently advanced at present in its means This is much preferable to a wheel for this particu- and resources to safely assume the responsibility lar purpose. After the turf is pared off into strips, of managing a farm; and that it will be advisable, men follow with sharp spades and cut it into suita- in the present stage of its career, to confine its ble lengths, say of two or three feet. These pieces labors to the investigation of new truths, and the they then throw into heaps after drying of which elaboration of important principles-leaving their they are burned, and the ashes spread broad-cast on practical application to individual enterprise. The L MANURE. report expressed the hope that hereafter, when the 141 At the meeting on the 15th of April, the Corresponding Secretary, Mr. Green, read a letter from Baron Von Spech, of Upper Bavaria, accompanied by a treatise on sheep and another on hops, written by that nobleman. Mr. Howland presented a basket of large, delicious strawberries, perfectly ripe, and of the most exquisite flavor and fragrance-together with a plant containing the berry in all stages, from flower to ripe fruit. They are the monthly strawberry. Mr. Howland received the plant from Mobile about eighteen months since. The plant is very healthy and vigorous, and bears luxuriantly. Mr. Bradish presented for distribution and experimental planting a small parcel of potatoes from Ocaña, a table land in the highest part of New Grenada, S. A., and in about 30 lat. N. They were dark in color, and of small size. Mr. Griffin detailed some experiments he had made last summer with various kinds of manure upon corn. He planted corn with guano, poudrette, stable-manure, and ashes. That with guano was far the best, poudrette next, and ashes last. Some of the corn which he had soaked thirty-six hours before planting, in guano-water, grew the greenest and thriftiest; but he did not know that it yielded any more than that guanoed in the hill The ground was clayey, and not particularly adapted to the potato. Mr. Howland had tried an experiment with corn last year. He divided a ten-acre lot into three sections. The first he gave a top-dressing with stable manure planting; the second lime before plowing; the third he first plowed and then dressed with lime. This he found to be decidedly the best. Dr. Stevens made some observations respecting the use of whale oil soap, and stated that much injury had resulted from its application to trees, by the too great acceleration of their growth. As to the worms, no liquid was efficient against them, for they deposit their larvæ under the inequalities of the bark. A solid coating was, in his opinion, the only efficient protection. Dr. Underhill had found security in scraping his trees in the winter with a dull hoe [a scraper for this purpose, such as is found at the agricultural stores, would be better], and then paint them with soft soap, and afterward he had found a solution of potash—a pound to six or eight quarts of water-answer every purpose. Gov. Edwards, of Connecticut, then was called up, and gave a very interesting account of his raising an entensive variety of early and late pear trees from the seed. He recommended that fruit trees should be raised in this way, and stated the probability that the race of a tree became, in a certain number of years, enfeebled and finally extinct, and it was therefore necessary to renew the trees from the seed. [We consider this false doctrine entirely. If fruit trees are properly taken care of they will never run out, any more than animals or man himself.] He had also planted the seeds of the two native species of grape-fox and frostfrom which he had raised a great variety of fine fruit. Altogether, cultivating the native fruits of this country had been too much neglected, and he earnestly recommended it as being among the subjects most worthy of attention. Dr. Underhill agreed with Gov. Edwards on the necessity of cultivating American fruit, especially in regard to grapes. Foreign grapes, except under glass, cannot be cultivated in our climate. The winter freezes them and the summer scorches them to death. All the hundreds of thousands of dollars expended in the experiments with foreign grapes had been literally thrown away; and yet there were nurserymen, who knew better, every spring advertising and selling foreign grape-vines which they promised would flourish in our soil. They ought to be and should be exposed. In regard to American grapes, they had already been much improved, and would doubtless improve for a hundred years to come. He had himself produced Isabella and Catawba grapes, which had been pronounced good by Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Italians; and they were now beginning to lay out vineyards for these varieties in Spain, France, and Germany. When MANURE.-Cart out all the manure on your prewe began to import them, Americans would doubt-mises as fast as possible, and spread it broadcast less find them of exquisite flavor! Some further remarks were made on the subject of grapes, pears, &c., by Gov. Edwards, Dr. Mason, and Col. Clark. Dr. Gardner eloquently defended the European grape, and stated that it was a superior fruit when found wild, which was not the case with the American grape. His opinion was that the Isabella and Catawba were hybrids. Mr. Lawrence exhibited a model of his newlyinvented park-gate, which can be opened without dismounting. It is very ingenious and simple, and must work well. Dr. Gardner mentioned that some noise had been made in this country regarding a new kind of provender used in Germany, and which was said to be far more nutritious than any other kind of green fodder, not excepting clover. This was known under the name of spurry, and in several instances persons had sent to Europe for the seed. This was quite unnecessary. The plant is indigenous here, and well known to farmers as infecting corn and wheat fields. It is known as corn spurry; and if even half the wonders told of its nutritiousness by our friends in Germany be correct, it is worthy of attention by our farmers. At the Doctor's suggestion, a committee was appointed to make some experiments on this subject. After some little farther business, the Society adjourned, to meet on the first Wednesday evening in May. upon your grass lands or plow it under for hoed crops. It is fast losing its most fertilizing portions in the sun and rain, and the sooner you get it on to your lands and covered up, the better. If left to rot in the barn yard it fertilizes the air, and passes into your neighbors' crops at the expense of your own. No good farmer will neglect his manure heap-it is his mine of wealth DISEASES OF POULTRY. BEING a subscriber to the Agriculturist, and seeing a great many articles on the breeding, rearing, and diseases of poultry, I thought I would relate an experiment I made on a fowl of the Poland breed, if you saw fit to publish it for the benefit of those who may have fowls afflicted in the same way. I noticed one of my hens drooping for two or three days, and when I went to feed the fowls, she would not eat. I therefore concluded something must be wrong. I took her up and found her crop perfectly full. I then came to the conclusion that she was crop-bound, and she might get over it in a day or two; but she continued to get worse, and was now in the last stage of existence. I now made an incision through the breast, into the crop, of an inch long, when I found the passage from the crop to the gizzard completely stopped up. I removed that, took two stitches in the crop, kept the hen in a warm place for a week, fed her on warm, light food, and she is now as well as any fowl I have. This happened about three weeks ago. H. T. LLOYD. New York, No. 3 Prince st., Feb. 4, 1846. It is stated in an English publication, that "a farmer in the county of Sussex, some years since, had and that the grass produced upon it was of so sour a field, one part of which was very wet and rushy, and unpleasant a kind, that the cattle would not graze upon it; he tried several methods to improve fits of salt as a manure, he determined to try that; it but to little purpose; at last hearing of the benefor which purpose he procured a quantity of rock salt, which, in a random way, without any regard ground, fencing it off from the other part of the to the precise quantity, he threw upon the rushy field, the effect of which was a total disappearance of every kind of vegetation. In a short time, however, it produced the largest quantity of mushrooms ever seen upon an equal space of ground in the ceeded by the most plentiful and luxuriant crops of country. These, in the spring following, were suc grass, far exceeding the other part of the field in cattle were remarkably fond of it, and though the richness of verdure and quickness of growth; the salt was laid on it twenty years before, this part is still superior to the rest of the field." From the information which I have been able to collect, I am inclined to believe that salt, when sparingly applied, is valuable as a fertilizer, and which We knew an instance of a valuable hen being in useful in killing the grub and wire worm, the same predicament as the above, from swallow-often injure, and sometimes even destroy, whole ing a large piece of India rubber. She was cured crops; and it has been found by experiments the by making an incision in her crop, and taking it past season, that the scab or disease which has out. There is no danger whatever in performing proved so disastrous to the potato crop in all secthis operation, provided the incision is immedi- tions of the country, has not been found upon that had a proper dressing of salt. ately sowed up, and the fowl properly cared for till well. Fowls, both young and old, are very apt to overstuff their crops, especially when they get their food irregularly, and we have no doubt that many more deaths arise from this cause than is generally supposed. land that he had found great advantage from using salt Judge Hamilton, of Scoharie, informed the writer, on his potato ground last spring. After plowing, he caused four bushels of salt to be sown on the furrow, upon one acre of the field, and harrowed in. Potatoes were then planted. Part of the field was not salted. Although the season was remarkably dry, the salted acre was observed to maintain a green vigorous appearance, while the other part of the field looked sickly and stunted. On lifting them in the fall, those potatoes, where salt was applied, were of good size, smooth skin, sound, and of good quality, and yielded a fair crop, while of those on the unsalted part of the field, although the soil was fully equal to that of the salted portion, the yield was considerably less, potatoes small, and much eaten by worms. His neighbor had a field of potatoes on the opposite side of the road, soil similar to his own, who planted them in the usual way; the consequence was, his crop was small in size, inferior in quality, and most of them rotted soon after digging they were diseased. The value of salt for agricultural purposes has long been known both in Europe and in this country, and why it has not been more generally used is beyond my comprehension. More than one hundred and fifty years ago, Sir Hugh Platt, an eminent writer of the day, speaks very decidedly of the benefits which might be derived from the practice of sprinkling salt upon land, and calls it "the sweetest, and cheapest, and the most philosophical material of all others." He relates the case of a man, who in passing over a creek on the sea-shore, suffered his sack of seed-corn to fall into the water, and that it lay there until it was low tide, when, Doctor Bogart, who has charge of the Sailors' being unable to purchase more seed, he sowed that Snug Harbor, on Staten Island, informed me that which had lain in the salt water, and when the har- he applied four bushels of salt to one acre of his vest time arrived, he reaped a crop far superior to potato ground, last spring, and thinks he derived any in the neighborhood. The writer adds, how-great benefit from it. Though the crop was not a ever, that it was supposed the corn (grain) would not fructify in that manner, unless it actually fell into the sea by chance; and, therefore, neither this man, nor any of his neighbors, ever ventured to make any further use of salt water! [So much for superstition! ED.] large one, the potatoes on the salted portion were soggy, and That salt is an excellent manure, experience, the most satisfactory of all evidences, clearly proves. C. W. Johnson, a distinguished agricultural |