DEVOTED TO AGRICULTURE AND ITS KINDRED ARTS AND SCIENCES. CALENDAR FOR APRIL. PRIL, showery, flowery, cold, and the most delightfully fragrant of all flowers, the Violet, discovers itself by the perfume it imparts to the surrounding air, before the eye has perceived it in its lowly bed. Shakspeare compares an exquisitely sweet strain of music to the delicious scent of this flower: it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, That breathes upon a bank of Violets, Stealing and giving odor.' April, inspiring as it is, leaves a great deal of hope and pleasant anticipation for MAY-especialare prepared for him-for ly for lovers-because May brings the fruition of of what use are bright suns hope; seals the plighted vow, brings the birds, and warm showers to the the flowers and blossoms of every delightful hue farmer, if his land remains and fragrance. But we must not venture too far undrained, unplowed, and on that enchanting ground-other duties press, nearly as compact as the beaten belonging to April, and they must be attended to road? We trust that the soils of now. our readers are ready to appropriFENCES.-In the country, where snows are ate all the sunshine and showers deep, and in places where the frost penetrates, and vernal airs to themselves which fences become more or less broken or displaced, fall upon them, and will feel their and need repairing. If cattle are turned to pastures to browse the bushes, as is often the case, grateful effects until their harvests are before fences are repaired, they rove at will over perfected. wel- other people's domains and thus acquire a habit which no fence but one of the best character will Old prevent. Replace fences early and thoroughly, or you will probably be electrified some hot afternoon in haying time by the announcement that your herd is destroying your neighbor's corn April, inconstant as it is, is comed by all. It kindles new sentiments of gratitude and love in every breast. and young express new joys, and look for the fulfilment of long cherished hopes. Birds begin to appear, lambs skip and frolic, the hum of insects is heard, and all animated existence awakens to new life. field. Timber cut in the winter will not last so long for posts as that cut in September; and good And so it is with inanimate objects. The gar- chestnut cut in September, peeled, seasoned under dens are "now rendered gay by the yellow, blue, cover and charred the next April, will last 25 to and the white striped crocuses, which adorn the 50 years. Mr. REYNOLDS, agent of the Copperas borders with a rich mixture of the brightest col- Works at Stafford, Vt., states that "timber which ors. The fields look green with the springing has been saturated with copperas and exposed to grass, and a few wild flowers appear to decorate all weather for forty years, is perfectly sound and the ground. Daisies begin to be sprinkled over hard, and has become something of the nature of the dry pastures; and farther south the moist stone. Timber that has been soaked in copperas banks of ditches are enlivened with the glassy water, one pound of copperas to two gallons of starlike yellow flowers of Pearlwort. And in this water, will last more than twice as long as that month Primroses peep out beneath the hedges; which has not been thus prepared." FARM IMPLEMENTS.-To use that old plow longer than to keep plowing, and then find the seeds reis bad economy; repairs have already come to fuse to come up. We never fail of a good crop of more than the original cost, and still, it is an old, carrots when they are sowed the last of April or ricketty plow. It always did "run to land" too early in May, as the season may be, and then much, and always will, perplexing the plowman taken good care of afterwards. For the New England Farmer. USE OF GUANO. and fretting the team. It has a radical defect, POACHING. The stock should not traverse the past al' cure of inventor or mechanic. Do not mowing fields in April, when the ground is soft work with heavy, uncouth implements-they drag and spongy. Many a man feels cross-if he don't down the body like a perpetual sorrow upon the swear-in haying time, owing to this slovenly mind. Boys often acquire a disgust for farming, practice. merely from the use of the miserable implements placed in their hands. The lighter the tool, the better, if strong enough for the work for which it was intended. The workman who uses his I will give my experience in the use of this arshovel to pry up a stone, and breaks it, should be ticle as briefly as possible. Last spring. I took required to pay for it, and the next time, if not equal parts of guano and plaster, and mixed them with five parts of soil Furrowed for corn, incorrigibly lazy, he will probably use the bar. Use light rakes, made of good material, and so of fevelled it, and dropped in a handful of the mixput a shovelful of compost manure in each hill, hoes, spades, scufflers, and all other implements. ture, covered it with one inch of earth and plantWe have beaten the English in the construction ed it with corn. It came up badly, except where of our agricultural implements, in their adapta- the land was quite moist, where it came up well, tion to the work required of them. Use the grew well, and ripened well. Think the guano was beneficial. Pumpkins grew enormously. Wheel Hoe, by all means-it costs less than two dollars. Broke up a piece of ground for potatoes, and put the same mixture in the hill, without other CROPS.-Have you assigned the particular crops manure, as its application for two years previous had caused the potatoes to rot. It proved a to your fields? failure. On a portion of the same piece, I plantPLOWING.-"I am determined to go one inch ed the pea-bean, furrowed the ground and strewed deeper this spring than I did last." Well, that into the furrows a small quantity of compost, and is a capital resolution-carry it out. Do not be also the guano mixture. The crop was the greatest I ever saw. Where the mixture was prepared in haste about plowing the wet, heavy land, beon a spot of winter-killed grass, the weeds came cause the sun, wind, and evaporation will bring up and grew exceedingly rank. I placed the it into suitable condition for planting, or sowing, mixture around some plants in the garden after quicker than you can. they were up, without any visible effects. KITCHEN GARDEN.-If you have brought forInferences. That such plants as contain a large amount of the phosphates in their composition, ward plants in hot-beds, you may transplant will be benefited by guano. That it should be to the open ground this month early cucum- buried more than two inches in this hot and dry bers, melons, cabbages, cauliflowers, lettuce, climate. That the farmer who has a small maradishes, &c.; but they must be watched and nure heap, may use it in limited quantities with protected if the nights are too cold. Clean out advantage. That it will not pay to use alone. That it is better for starting than for ripning a the strawberry beds, the currants, raspberries, crop. That I should again use three or four times and gooseberries. Stick down cuttings plentiful- as much plaster as guano in the mixture, especially ly of such fruits as you wish to propagate. The on lands remote from the sea-board. That it is a cherry cutting will grow if put down in a moist poor article, if it will not make the nose tingle and shady spot. and the eyes moist on smelling it, when a lump is broken open. That I should not in any case, FLOWERS.-Encourage the women and children mix it with ashes. Finally, that the farmer must to cultivate a few flowers, by preparing a suitable make his own manure. I can neither add to, place and procuring the seeds or roots. Depend nor subtract from this article, tili I know more upon it, they will bring smiles upon your lips and radiate your own heart before the summer closes. FRUIT TREES.-All kinds of fruit trees and forest trees should be transplanted before the leaf buds shall have come out. The reader is referred to former volumes for the mode of proceeding. about it. Bethel, Me., Feb. 17, 1855. N. T. T. EFFECTS OF THE WINTER.-A note from Mr. J. F. C. HYDE, the well-known Newton Nurseryman, says, "There is no prospect of any peaches with us; every bud that I examined was killed. It has been a very hard winter for grain and PLANT EARLY.-Prepare to plant early, while grass that was sown late. Nursery trees have the soil is moist and light. Do not believe the been thrown out by the frost more than they gendoctrine that it is better to sow carrots late, in erally are. I find roses and many other things order to save weeding, for it is better to pull weeds winter-killed." TURNIPS AS FEED. man. three or four more, put them in a glass tumbler, While in attendance upon the late National and poured on them aqua fortis (nitric acid) Poultry Show at Barnum's Museum, we spent a enough to cover them. They lived in it about half few minutes in the "Lecture-Room." Our friend, an hour. The acid effected them only in the Mr. Solon Robinson, was making remarks upon If any of your readers can give anything that mouth, their oily shell protecting them elsewhere. the use of turnips as feed, as reported in some of will be effectual in destroying them, it will be the journals of the day. He took the position that they were good for nothing as nutriment, gladly received in this vicinity. W. E. VROOMAN. and sustained himself by giving its analysis. This Oswego, N. Y., Jan. 4, 1855.—Country Gentleis all very well, but, unfortunately, it is not in accordance with well-known facts. We used to For the New England Farmer. talk in the same way, but were obliged to yield not simply to a few doubtful experiments, but to MR. EDITOR-It will be recollected that some years of experience. This the speaker seemed to time since you published in the Farmer a number feel, for he admitted that "in England it might of articles upon the habits of the birds of New not be so.' But we suppose a turnip in England England, written by one who is anxious for their is very much the same thing as a turnip in New preservation, and who, for many years, has obYork. He also added that they should be fed by served their habits, when, in their migratory visits turning the cattle in upon them, as they are from the South, they have taken up their tempogrowing in the field. We cannot see the force or rary abode in his grounds. In these articles, I propriety of this distinction. Is it not the same endeavored to show, by their mode of living, worthless thing before it is pulled, as afterwards their great benefit to the farmer and horticulturist Must the cattle or sheep pull it, or bite it off, to in the destruction of vast numbers of noxious render it nutritious? But even here there is no insects, the folly and cruelty of destroying escape, for the English practice is, after the ani- them. I endeavored, also, strongly to impress mal has bit off as much as is practicable, the root upon all cultivators of the soil the importance of remaining in the ground is then lifted by a fork putting an immediate stop to the shooting of and left on the top of the ground, for the cattle birds on their premises, by motives drawn from to eat at pleasure. self-interest and humanity. My remarks, howWe are compelled to admit that there is some- ever, were confined principally to those birds thing in this fact of nutrition, that no doctrine found in New England, that migrate from the of chemistry or physiology is able to explain. South in the spring, and passing the summer The fact is unquestionable, that turnips are ex-with us, return again in autumn. But there is cellent for fattening sheep and cattle, whether we another class of birds, arriving from the north in can explain why it is so or not. It is equally the fall and winter, that I consider very useful to true, as Mr. R. stated in the same speech, that the cultivators of the soil, they either remaining about 97 per cent. of the flat turnip, as shown by with us through the winter, or leisurely passing a chemical analysis, consists of water. These on to the South as the season advances, and returntwo facts, so apparently contradictory, are entirely ing, visit us again in the sping, on their way to above and beyond contradiction. We subjoin the their breeding-places at the north. It is to this following, on this subject, which appears in the class of our birds I wish to direct the attention of Northern Farmer: your readers, and claim for them protection. "The vegetable I wish to recommend as the How far I have made good this claim, can be debest, all things considered, for milch cows in termined after reading the articles that may be winter, is white flat turnips. Some, perhaps, written upon the subject. S. P. FOWLER. will object to the turnip, because it will affect Danvers Port, Jan. 26, 1855. the taste of the milk and butter. So it does if NEW ENGLAND---No. 1. BY S. P. FOWLER. These birds form a class whose habits and fed raw; this can be avoided by boiling. For THE WINTER MIGRATORY BIRDS OF each cow, boil a half a bushel of turnips soft; while hot, add five or six quarts of shorts, which will swell, and you will get the full worth of it. A mess like this fed to a cow once a day, will produce more milk of a good quality than any mode of life are somewhat different from many of other feed at the same cost. Turnips fed in this the other feathered tribes. Some of them reside way do not taint either milk or butter. One in gloomy forests, and are seldom seen by man, thing in favor of turnips as feed for cows, is, that and being provided by nature with warm cloththey can be sown in August, or as late as the ing, they are enabled to resist the severest cold, first of September. I sowed some as late as Sep- and apparently are content with the most scanty tember, last year, which were very fine. Turnips fare; their breeding-places are in the icy regions are also very profitable feed for pigs, when boiled of the North, and they are seen by us only in in the same way as for cows."-Plow, Loom and their migrations. In consequence of this limited time for observation, and their summer residence in high northern latitudes, we see nothing of WIRE-WORMS-THEIR TENACITY OF LIFE.-I have them at home, when arrayed in their nuptial been experimenting a little with wire-worms. I dresses. Some of the birds inhabiting these cold took some quick lime and made a paste with it regions, are very hardy and robust, and covered about as thick as cream, and placed six wire- with a splendid plumage, and possess great pow worms in it, stirring them in. I went to them in er of song; others are small, delicate and beautithree days, expecting to find them dead, but they ful birds, and excite our surprise that with such were as smart as ever, and crawled readily out of comparative feebleness of flight, they should take the lime. Not being satisfied with this, I procured such long journeys. They are strangers to beau Anvil. tiful gardens and highly-cultivated fields, never been in the habit of transplanting the suckers entering them except in autumn when the sear from old trees, and then from these to another and yellow leaf is upon the trees, or in spring, generation, until they had completely degenerated when they have fallen to the ground, and before and could not be made to bear to any extent. the swollen buds have expanded. We should He doubted whether the habit of grafting on suppose that these feeble birds, after having such stocks would be successful. Dr. TRUE enpassed the winter at the South, might some of dorsed the statement of Mr. THOMPSON. He rethem be induced by the natural beauties of our an- membered trees that bore the greatest quantity cient commonwealth, as seen in her forests, lakes, of fruit thirty-five years ago. Seedlings were rivers, orchards and gardens, to stop and pass the obtained from these which bore also; but, during summer with us, and forego their journey to the a severe winter, the tops died, and an attempt was North. But this they seldom do, impelled, as they made to renew the stock by transplanting the probably are, by an instinct implanted in them suckers, but they never bore freely. This pracby an all-wise Providence, difficult for them to tice has been carried to a great extent, especially overcome. And did not this principle exist in among farmers in Maine, and had done much all animated nature, viz., a desire to inhabit par- to discourage them from cultivating the plum. ticular districts, we should see the strange specta- It had long been known that the apple would not cle of one portion of a country crowded with ani- succeed from such shoots, but it had escaped mals, while another portion, less attractive, notice in regard to the plum. If these facts were would be entirely destitute of them. But by the true, they should be more generally known. The wise arrangement of Nature as we now see it, habit of Western fruit-growers of root-grafting, animals, birds and plants, by their peculiar con- making two or more trees out of one original formation, are made capable and desirous of in- root, was of doubtful utility, although we need habiting particular districts, and are thus distrib- more information on that point. The people uted over the entire globe, so that no part of it, should know what they are about. Probably however cold, dreary and uninviting, is destitute fifty thousand apple trees were set out last spring of its inhabitants. in Oxford county alone, and the most of these With these preliminary remarks, we will close are western trees, though justice requires the this communication. statement that they generally appeared well in this vicinity in the fall. Danvers Port, Jan. 26, 1855. [TO BE CONTINUED.] For the New England Farmer. In regard to the pear, it was suggested by Dr. TWITCHELL and others, that an agent be sent to some nursery to select trees instead of sending orders. No man would send an order for a sheep or an ox, but would be most desirous of seeing MESSRS. EDITORS-Thinking that some notice it before he purchased. The general impression of the plan of operations in this society might of the society was that the price of dwarf pears stimulate others to form similar associations, I is too high; that a cheaper rate could be afforded send you such information as may be of service. for all the more common kinds. Attempts have I think our plan will commend itself for its sim- been made to propagate the pear on the mounplicity and efficiency. tain ash and thorn, but with doubtful success. One year ago a few individuals agreed to pur- One standard pear still lives in this village, which chase books, to the amount of at least one dollar is probably sixty years old, and there is no diffia share, on agriculture, horticulture and similar culty of their winter killing at the root, as in subjects, and loan them to the club, with the some places, for the ground rarely ever freezes privilege of withdrawing the same, together with before it is covered with snow for the winter. their connection with the society, should any Care should be taken to tie the tops together one choose to do so at any subsequent time. while young, as the heavy snows will certainly By this means we soon obtained a library on all split them down. The Bartlett pear, which is the subjects necessary for such an association. very tender, can easily be matted after tying These are put in charge of a responsible librarian, round and drawing together the top with a stout and exchanges made at the weekly meetings of cord. A very slight protection is all that may the society. We have as few regulations as pos- be necessary. sible-no two-thirds vote to tie our hands, but Remarks were made on the ripening of the rely mainly on the individual interest of mem-grape. The practice of covering the ground bers. We meet at the houses of the members, with cinders from the blacksmith's shop, or with take our wives with us, such as have any, and charcoal, was well calculated to absorb the rays combine social intercourse with the discussion of of the sun and force them to ripen, as well as whatever subject has been previously announced, add to the health and growth of the vines. It with only one proviso-that our host shall pro- was suggested that glass frames used for the hotvide us with the best fruit in his possession. bed, might be set in a frame near to the vines This latter, however, was only an appendage to which run on a wall during the period of ripenour last meeting, as we were furnished with an ing, and thus prevent the frosts. oyster supper, to our especial gratification. Remarks were also made on transplanting Perhaps some account of our last meeting forest trees. People had run into opposite exmight be of general interest. It was on the sub-tremes on the subject of pruning. Some had left ject of Fruit and Ornamental Trees. Among the only a stump. This would not do here, especially points under consideration was the fact that the with the elm. New shoots would grow, but they common plum trees did not produce now as for- would be almost sure to be killed during the next merly. The Rev. Z. THOMPSON stated that the winter. Others had not pruned at all. This principal reason was, that people in Maine had would do if the tree were an evergreen, or if all |