American Pocket Library of Useful Knowledge

Agriculture

AMERICAN POCKET LIBRARY.

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Authorities.–Judge Buel, Sir Humphry Davy, Professor Colman, Pedder, Biddle, J. Quincy, J. S. Skinner, and others; Papers of the Philadelphia Agricultural Society, and the principal Agricultural papers and magazines of the day.

IMPORTANCE OF AGRICULTURE.

“The task of working improvement on the earth is much more delightful than all the vainglory which can be acquired by ravaging it with the most uninterrupted career of conquests.”–Washington.

The great business of our country is agriculture. Because it feeds us, and furnishes the materials for our clothing; it gives employment to five-sixths of our population; it is the primary source of individual and national wealth; it is the nursing mother of manufactures and commerce; it is essential to national independence. Agriculture is worthy the most liberal patronage of our governments, state and national; it ought to be enlightened by a better (and thorough) education of the agricultural class. Agriculture, manufactures, commerce, stand together; but they stand together like pillars in a cluster, the largest in the centre, and that largest is agriculture. We live in a country of small farms; a country, in which men cultivate with their own hands, their own fee-simple acres; drawing not only their subsistence, but also their spirit of independence, and manly freedom from the ground they plough. They are at once its owners, its cultivators, and its defenders. And whatever else may be undervalued, or overlooked, let us never forget, that the cultivation of the earth is the most important labour of man. Man, without the cultivation of the earth, is, in all countries, a savage. When tillage begins, other arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of human civilization. If there lives the man who may eat his bread with a conscience at peace, it is the man who has brought that bread out of the earth by his own honest industry. The profession of agriculture brings with it none of those agitating passions which are fatal to peace, or to the enjoyment even of the common blessings of life: it presents few temptations to vicious indulgence; it is favourable to health and to long life; to habits of industry and frugality; to temperance and self-government; to the cultivation of the domestic virtues; and to the calm and delicious enjoyments of domestic pleasures in all their purity and fulness!

Measures (a Substitute).–A box 24 inches by 16 in. square and 28 in. deep, will contain a barrel. A box 16 inches by 16 8-10 in. square, and 8 inches deep, will contain a bushel. A box 8 inches by 8 4-10 in. square, and 8 inches deep, will contain one peck. A box 4 inches by 4 in. square, and 4 2-10 inches deep, contain one quart.

IMPORTANCE OF AGRICULTURAL PAPERS.

A good agricultural paper, contributed to by practical and scientific farmers, will be of service in many points of view. It is a storehouse of agricultural knowledge, from which farmers may always draw something new and serviceable. For its contents are made up of the best opinions and best practices, and accurate experiments of the best farmers of the world combined.

The leading object, indeed, in the publication of an agricultural paper, is to afford to farmers a common medium through which to impart and receive instruction. Amongst the most intelligent farmers in the land are always found the best patrons of agricultural newspapers; where the land is in the highest state of cultivation, and where the domestic economy is all regulated in perfect order, you will invariably find agricultural newspapers, and intelligence to appreciate them: but they are seldom met with, where neglect and ignorance prevail! Some farmers may fail for want of sufficient capital, but more for want of sufficient knowledge. There is no class who place more entire reliance on their skill than farmers, yet no one who is acquainted with the general agriculture of the country, will assert that it has yet reached the perfection of which it is susceptible. The intent of cultivation is to obtain the greatest possible amount of produce from the soil; the farmer’s object being to raise it by such means as will afford him the largest profit with the least labour; and there can be no doubt, that the more scientifically he proceeds, the more effectually will both objects be gained.

There is not a subject which absolutely admits of a greater improvement than the cultivation of the soil: vast improvements are in progress, and will yet be made to an almost infinite extent; the slumbering energies of the farmer are awakening up, and agriculture, the broad foundation of a nation’s prosperity, is unmantling some of the brightest features of her hidden glory!

Encourage your Agricultural Papers.

Musty Grain is made sweet by putting it in boiling water, (double the quantify of grain), letting it cool in the water, and then dry it well. Skim the water.

A single Weed may draw out the nourishment that would have given fulness to half-a-dozen ears. To be free from taxes, is far less important than to be free from weeds.

From the Address of Nicholas Biddle, Esq., before the Philadelphia Agricultural Society. Oct. 1840.

Besides lime and other enriching substances, the cost of the mere animal manures applied to the soil of England, amounts to three hundred millions of dollars; being more than the value of the whole of its foreign commerce. Yet the grateful soil yields back with interest all that is thus lavished upon it. And so it would do here, if we would only trust the earth with any portion of our capital. But this we rarely do. A farmer who has made any money spends it not in his business, but in some other occupation. He buys more land when he ought to buy more manure; or he puts out his money in some joint stock company, to convert sunshine into moonshine–or he buys shares in some gold mine or lead mine. Rely upon it, our richest mine is the barn-yard, and that whatever temptations stocks or shares may offer, the best investment for a farmer is live stock and plough-shares.

No soil can withstand a succession of grain crops; and instead of letting it lie fallow in order to recruit from its exhaustion, as was the old plan, the better practice now is to plant in the same field a crop of roots. These draw their nourishment from a lower region than the grain crops do; they derive a great part of their food from the atmosphere, by their large leaves, which at the same time shelter the soil from the extreme heats; they provide a fresh and juicy food for cattle during the winter, thus enabling us to keep a large stock, which, in addition to the profit on them, furnish abundant manure with which to return to the grain crops. Now this should be our effort–more roots–more cattle–more manure–then more grain.

All these improvements which may adorn or benefit our farms, are recommended to us not only by our own individual interests, but by the higher sentiment of our duty to the country. This is essentially a nation of farmers. No where else is so large a portion of the community engaged in farming; no where else are the cultivators of the earth more independent or so powerful. One would think that in Europe the great business of life was to put each other to death; for so large a proportion of men are drawn from the walks of productive industry and trained to no other occupation except to shoot foreigners always, and their own countrymen occasionally; while here, the whole energy of all the nation is directed with intense force upon peaceful labour. A strange spectacle this, of one, and one only, unarmed nation on the face of the earth! There is abroad a wild struggle between existing authorities and popular pretensions, and our own example is the common theme of applause or denunciation. It is the more important then for the farmers of this country to be true to their own principles. The soil is theirs–the government is theirs–and on them depends mainly the continuance of their system. That system is, that enlightened opinion, and the domestic ties are more stable guarantees of social tranquillity than mere force, and that the government of the plough is safer, and, when there is need, stronger than the government of the sword.

IMPORTANT FACTS.

“A spot of land which, when pastured upon, will yield sufficient food for only one head, will abundantly maintain four head of cattle in the stable, if the crop be mown at a proper time and given to the cattle in proper order. The soiling yields at least three times the quantity of manure from the same number of cattle; and the best and most efficacious summer manure is made in the stable, and carried to the fields at the most proper period of its fermentation. The cattle, when used to soiling, will yield a much greater quantity of milk, and increase faster in weight while fattening than when they roam the fields, and they are less liable to accidents–do not suffer by the heat, flies or insects, and are not affected by the weather, escaping also many disorders to which cattle always abroad are liable. Each head of cattle fed in the statble, if plentifully littered, yields annually sixteen large double cart-loads of dung.”

A visiter to the farm of Josiah Quincy, quoted in the Farmers’ Cabinet, says:–

His farm is extensive, and surrounded by a flourishing hawthorn hedge, but there is not an interior fence on the premises; the whole presents a single field, devoted to all the various purposes of agriculture; no part of it is allotted to pasture, properly speaking, as his cattle are fed in their stalls, and are never suffered to roam over the fields; and the advantages of this system are thus given–formerly, there were seven miles of interior fences to be kept in repair, but by keeping the cattle up, the whole of this expense is saved: formerly, sixty acres of this farm were devoted to pasturage, but now, a greater number of cattle by one-third, are kept on the products of twenty acres, and I never saw cattle in better condition. The saving by these means is enormous, and the immense advantages arising from it too apparent to be dwelt upon. During the summer, the cattle are fed upon grass, green oats or barley, cut the day before, and suffered to wilt in the sun, and the manure which is thus saved will more than pay for the extra expense and trouble. The farm is most highly cultivated, and every kind of grain and vegetables have a place.

Near London, it is the custom to sow large quantities of oats, to be cut green for stall-feeding the milk-cows; these are always sown on land most highly manured for the purpose, with four, and sometimes five bushels of seed per acre; the yield is prodigious, and is found to be one of the most valuable crops that can be grown, coming off the land in time for a full crop of turnips for the winter, or of late potatoes.

Fences. Around each post hill the earth, to carry off the water, and charr the end a few inches above the surface. Cedar fences last about 15 years, which should lead owners to inquire where the fences are to come from hereafter.

Manure.–Every farmer can double the quantity of his domestic or yard manure, with scarcely any additional expense. At least fifty per cent. of the nutritive properties of yard manure are lost by drenching of rains, excessive fermentations, and injurious application to soil.

MANURES.

Under the improved system of a rotation of crops, root culture, and alternation of grass and grain, combined with yard and stall-feeding of sheep and cattle, the quantity of manure produced on the farms has in many instances been quadrupled, and the amelioration of the soil has been in the same proportion.

Ship loads of bones have been carried from this country to Europe to be crushed and used as bone-dust in fertilizing their soils; and we have been compelled to purchase, at exorbitant prices, of those nations, the wheat and other grain, that this same manure would have produced at home, and at the same time have lost to our farms the fertility it would have imparted.

Scrapings of streets, leached ashes, lime, refuse from skin, leather and soap boilers’ shops, slaughter houses, bones, weeds, salt, and any kind of animal or vegetable substances, by the addition of earth, may be largely increased in quantity and made to enrich and fertilize the soil.

But whatever improvements or discoveries may be made, it seems clear that the farmer for manure must rely mainly on his stables and yards, and his study should be to render these most efficient and available. One main object should be to prevent the escape of the liquid and volatile parts of the manure, as experience proves that these are the most active in exciting or supplying plants with food and thus accelerating their growth. The yards and the stables should be provided with litter, such as straw, hay, leaves, weeds, &c., with vegetable mould or muck, with the wash of roads or the overflowing of streams, in sufficient quantities to absorb and retain the urine and other liquid parts of the manure, and where these cannot be obtained, common earth or dry sand will be found of great utility in preventing the loss which must ensue where these parts of the manure are allowed to escape from the yard. If when the farmer cleans out his yards, he were to cover them with a hundred loads of vegetable or absorbent earth, he would find in the following year a greater number of loads of the most valuable manure, the greater part of which, without such precaution, would have been wholly lost.

Rotted manure may afford at limes more benefit to a particular crop, or may be more conveniently applied to some crops; but as a general rule, manure should be rotted in the ground where it is wanted. Some crops are rarely injured by any quantity that can be given them, as corn, potatoes, and roots generally; of course such should have the advantage of the first process of decomposition in the manure, while its after effect is reserved for the grains and grasses.

The great object in the application of manure should be, to make it afford as much soluble matter as possible to the roots of the plant; and that in a slow and gradual manner, so that it may be entirely consumed in forming its sap and organized parts.

All green succulent plants contain saccharine mucilaginous matter, with woody fibre, and readily ferment. They cannot, therefore, if intended for manure, be used too soon after their death.

By covering dead animals with five or six times their bulk of soil, mixed with one part of lime, and suffering them to remain for a few months, their decomposition would impregnate the soil with soluble matters, so as to render it an excellent manure, and by mixing a little fresh quick-lime with it at the time of its removal, the disagreeable effluvia would be in a great measure destroyed; and it might be applied in the same way as any other manure to crops.

Green vegetables, when put under the soil and submitted to the process of decomposition, are efficacious in restoring exhausted soils. Buckwheat and clover are striking instances of this power in green crops to fertilize soils, and both have been extensively used for this purpose.

PLOUGHING.

Much time and labour is saved in ploughing long instead of short ridges. For instance, suppose the ridges are 78 yards long, four hours and thirty-nine minutes are spent in turnings in a day’s work of eight hours! whereas, if the ridges are 274 yards long, one hour and nineteen minutes are sufficient in the same length of time.

Plough deep. Let a farmer examine the extent and depth to which the roots of grain, in a loose and favourable soil, will spread, and he will cease to wonder at the failure of a crop where the subsoil has never been stirred by the plough.

Small fibrous roots of vegetation extend to a depth, where the soil is loose and deep; and where vegetables thus take root they are much less affected by drought. The soil being turned up to the action of the sun and air, becomes enlivened, and better fitted for producing vegetation. An acre of land yielding a ton of hay, at the usual season of ploughing greensward contains more than twelve tons of vegetable matter, consisting of the roots and tops of grass, and other vegetable remains upon the surface. Such a method of ploughing, then, as will be best calculated to secure for the benefit of the crop, this mass of enriching substance, the farmer should not hesitate to adopt. By completely inverting the sward, and laying it as flat and smooth as the nature of the ground will admit, and then cultivating without disturbing the sod, with the application of a dressing of compost, land may not only be kept in heart, but wonderfully improved.

The Plough.–By so placing the coulter as to form acute angle with the plane of the share, on the land side, the beam is brought more directly over the centre of the plough, as is the case with Prouty & Mears’ improved plough, and thereby the power necessary to move it, is applied more directly to the centre of resistance, and the force required to move it, and overcome this resistance, is of course less than when applied, as in other ploughs, on one side.

The difference in the force required for ploughs now in use, has been ascertained to be 100 per cent.; showing the great importance of its structure. The work which one team of horses or one yoke of oxen can perform at one plough, will require two yoke at another!

GRAINS.

General Remarks.

The compounds in vegetables really nutritive, are very few; farina, or the pure matter of starch, gluten, sugar, vegetable jelly, oil and extract. Of these the most nutritive is gluten, which approaches nearest in its nature to animal matter, and which is the substance that gives to wheat its superiority over every other grain.

There is a particular period at which each species of seed ought to be sown, in order to bring the plants to a perfect state of ripeness.

The condition of the land is, in fact, the best guide; for, if it be in a mellow state, between drought and moisture, the seed may be put in with confidence. Some kinds, however, prefer a dry and warm soil; others, that which is more humid and tenacious. Thus, barley, rye, and buckwheat, succeed best on the former; and wheat and oats on the latter.

The depth at which seed should be sown is a matter of nicety, as well as of importance. If too deeply buried, germination is impeded, and may be altogether prevented; while, if sown too shallow, sufficient moisture is not left in the surface to afford nourishment to the roots of the plants.

The depth at which seed ought to be placed must, therefore, be regulated by the nature of the soil. If stiff, more moderate covering should be used than if light and porous; wheat, barley, and oats also require more than rye or buckwheat; but, except in a few instances, from one and a half to three inches, is in every case, the lowest to which it should be carried.

Seed should be selected from the earliest and most perfect growth of the preceding year. Too much attention cannot be bestowed on this part of the operation, as every kind of seed will produce its like. Late sowing requires one-third more grain to the acre, than if put in early. Land, naturally very rich and too highly manured, is apt to cause during the hot season of summer a too rapid growth of the straw, at the expense of the seed.

Wheat.

The white are superior in the quality of their produce; the red are the more hardy; and in general, the thin and smooth-chaffed are preferred to the woolly and thick chaffed.

The produce of wheat sown in spring acquires the habit of coming much sooner to maturity, than the produce of that sown in autumn. Hence the farmer, when he sows wheat in spring, should sow the produce of that which had been already sown in spring, and not the produce of that which had been sown in autumn.

This change in the habit of ripening, though it may at first view appear somewhat singular, takes place in all the cereal grasses, and also in many other cultivated plants. The minor varieties of any species of wheat, under given conditions, will remain unchanged for an indefinite period; under other circumstances, however, they degenerate–and hence, particular kinds that were once valued, have now ceased to be so.

The soils of the lighter class are the best suited to wheat; and it is an error in practice to force the production of wheat on soils, and under circumstances which are better suited to the production of the other grains.

No wheat, however clean or beautiful, should be sown without being soaked 12 hours in a pickle of strong ley, brine strong enough to float an egg, or lime water, and after being drained, should be rolled in powdered lime.

As the wheat crop generally receives no after-culture, the soil should be brought into as fine condition as possible. Manuring and thorough culture are indispensable.

If it be desirable to sow wheal after a fallow crop of rye, oats, &c., the land should be immediately ploughed or thoroughly harrowed after it is cleared–then one good ploughing with sufficient harrowing is a good preparation for the seed.

As a large crop cannot be sowed in a few days, it is better to begin a fortnight too early than a week too late.

Two bushels of seed to the acre of winter wheat, is not too much: less than six or seven pecks should never be sown.

By sowing too thin, the growth of weeds is encouraged to the great detriment of the growing crop and the loss of the owner.

Ploughing in wheat is best, especially on worn land. The depth at which the seed is buried is more regular, and gives the young plants a stronger bold on the soil.

Corn.

As a general rule it may be laid down that any crop which matures so large a quantity of seed, must exhaust the fertility of a soil much more than a crop which does not produce seed, such as the root crops.

There is probably no other crop that produces so much nourishment for man and beast as this does. It was the opinion of “Arator,” that it was “meal, meadow, and manure.” And the manure which might be made from the fodder that is produced, if returned again to the soil from which it was taken, would keep it in a constant state of fertility, and in fact increase it from year to year.

To plant, plough well in the fall and early in the spring. Manure and harrow well. Select from the host stalks large sound ears–throw out the small, ill-shaped grains from each end. Soak in strong liquid of rich manure 12 hours. Put four grains in hills four feet apart each way. Cover one and a half inches deep, and press down with foot or hoe. Apply leached ashes or plaster, after the corn is up. Use the cultivator instead of the plough, which cuts the roots and makes them bleed–besides, all that is now needed is to keep the ground loose, well pulverized and free from weeds.

The ravages of the wire-worm may be stopped by slacked stone lime.

Of all the grains, corn is the most valuable, taking into view quantity and price. Soaking the seed in a solution of saltpetre keeps off the worm and largely increases the crop.

Topping the stalks diminishes the grain from 6 to 8 bushels the acre, without a corresponding increase of fodder.

Grind corn in the ear for feeding. Pure corn meal does not appear sufficiently to distend the stomach to bring into exercise its digestive faculties fully, without taking so much as to clog and impair its functions eventually. For this reason, a mixture of leas nutritive materials is desirable; and one of our most successful feeders of pork has assured us, that he always mixed oats with his corn, in the proportion of one-fourth, previous to grinding, and thinks he should find a profit in exchanging corn for oats, bushel for bushel, rather than feed the former to his pigs clear. The cob, possessing nutriment in itself, makes about the requisite mixture with the grain, and hence is of great value for the purpose of feeding.

In any district where Indian com is extensively grown, a miller would find it for his interest to attach a cob-cracker to his machinery, as the farmers would find themselves well repaid by the great saving and superiority of the meal so made, for feeding.

SEEDING.

Of all the practices constituting good husbandry, none are more replete with beneficial effects, and which better repay the outlay, than that of seeding. It has become an established practice with good farmers to seed frequently with clover and timothy.

The natural grasses yield less of quantity and nutriment than either clover or timothy, and some others of more recent introduction.

Independent of this, its fertilizing properties to the soil must be considered. Whereas, grounds not seeded, by being loo much exposed, soon become of so compact a nature as to render them in a degree impervious to either heat or moisture, without which they cannot be capable of the least productiveness.

Autumn is deemed the best time for sowing timothy, and the spring for clover.

ALTERNATE CROPS.

The summer and winter food must have a due proportion to each other, and the fields of grain are not to exceed the fields of meliorating crops,–these preserve the soil, as well as produce crops; but grain reduces the soil in producing the crops. Aim at income from live stock, which improves, rather than from grain, which impoverishes your land.

SAVING CLOVER SEED.

The difficulties of saving the seed are imaginary; the process is simple and easy. After the clover field has been cut or grazed, let the second crop come on.

The second crop produces more seed than the first, and hence the economy of first cutting or grazing the field; though from that cut for hay, a careful husbandman might easily save sufficient seed for his own use. Mow when about two-thirds of the heads have turned brown, because, if cut sooner, too many seeds are unripe, and if later, too many shatter out of the beads in cradling and handling.

POTATOES.

Potatoes in general afford from one-fifth to one-seventh of their weight of dry starch.

One-fourth part of the weight of the potatoe at least may be considered as nutritive matter.

The best potatoes are heavier than the inferior varieties.

The American Farmer says: For some seasons past, I have only planted the top eyes, and I have the best crop and the driest potatoes in the country. After the top is cut off, the remainder beeps better and longer fit for use. If housekeepers in towns were to preserve the cuttings of the tops of their potatoes, there would be sufficient to plant all the country, without the cost of a cent for seed!

Preserving Potatoes.–Potatoes should be dug during dry weather. They should be exposed as short a time as possible to the light, as it always injures their quality for whatever use they are intended. They should be kept in a state similar to that before they are dug,–that is, secure from air and light, with a slight degree of moisture to prevent withering, and a temperature so low as to keep them from vegetating. The difference in the quality caused by good and bad keeping is very rarely appreciated.

In planting, have a good supply of rich earth around; but elevate the hills as little as possible after planting, in order to leave the tubers to grow at the depth which they choose for themselves. Besides, a more even surface is better adapted to obtain a supply of moisture, by admitting the rain, &c. The distance of the hills should be governed by the spice occupied by the tops; for much of the nutriment of vegetables is taken from the air, and the tops should therefore be allowed to expand.

STOCK.

Treat Domestic Animals kindly and tenderly.

Domestic animals of all kinds, from a horse down to a chicken, should be treated with gentleness and mildness; men or boys who are rash and bad-tempered, ought not to be permitted to have charge of them or to interfere with their management. Animals that are kept in constant fear of suffering never thrive well, and they often become vicious and intractable by unkind and cruel treatment.

Keep Stock in good condition.

An animal may be kept short of food in the latter part of the fall or first of winter, at a small saving of food, but at a loss in the condition of the animal. It is like salting a hog with a pound of salt–a saving of salt but loss of bacon. One dollar saved by short keeping of animals, will be a loss of five dollars. It will cost more through the winter, and the profit from the animals, either in growth or milk, will be lost.