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the top. If in hills, one plant only should be placed in a hill; if in ridges, about the same proportion. The vine should not be allowed to take root. The plant, in this latitude, should be raised in a hot-bed; the sweet potato is a native of the South and loves a sunny exposure. Ashes are a good manure for this root; 200 or 300 bushels may be raised to the acre.

As you will receive a communication from a distinguished orchardist of this county, it is not necessary to answer your queries respecting fruit.

Manures.-Neither guano nor plaster of Paris is known here as a fertilizer. Agriculture is not studied as a science. The laws which govern vegetable reproduction are not as well known as they should be. In this county, as in all others where the soil is rich in the elements of vegetation, no attempt is made to improve the natural fertility. Barnyard manure is almost the only fertilizer known. Even lime and ashes are little used. Our soil is rich in the carbonate of lime; and it is questionable whether an additional portion would prove beneficial. Ashes are a manure on almost all soils; on cold clays they will often double the

crop.

Some attention has been paid to draining the land lying between our streams. After we leave the river bluffs, it is inclined to be wet. This land, believed at first to be of inferior quality, is found to be much improved by ditching. One man informed me that the increased products of two years more than compensated him for the expense of ditching. Deep ploughing is becoming much more common; the effect of which is abundantly evident in the increase of crop.

There is an agricultural society in this county. It was organized this year. It was entered into with zeal by our farmers. The benefits of it will soon be manifested.

Very truly yours,

The COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS.

ISAAC KINLEY.

WASHINGTON, WAYNE COUNTY, INDIANA,

December, 1850.

SIR: Being prevented from replying before to your request, I at this late hour design giving what information is in my reach respecting some of the subjects of your inquiry.

Corn is the principal grain produced in this county. As the soil is exhausted, other grains and clover are substituted. When the land is first cleared of timber, it will produce 60 or 70 bushels per acre; but by continued corn-growing from year to year, in the course of 12 or 15 crops, 30 to 35 bushels are all that can be produced. More white corn is raised than yellow; though the yellow will yield most per acre, and is considered most nutritious. In all lands cultivated in corn, 40 bushels are an average crop per acre; yet, by proper rotation with wheat and clover, 75. bushels might as easily be produced on the same ground.

Cost of production, 15 cents per bushel; price this season, 30 cents. Average price for last four years, 20 cents per bushel. But few experi

ments have been made on ground or solid corn; the price being too low, for both corn and pork, to induce many to economize their grain. It is common to turn hogs into a field of corn and give no further care to them than to salt and water them until the corn is consumed; then turn into another field. Fields thus managed will produce good corn from year to year, without change of crop.

Wheat is now a staple crop. Perhaps half as much wheat as corn is raised in this region. The greatest enemy to the wheat crop is rust; to prevent which, the earliest varieties are selected, and sown as early as the 1st of September. The best varieties for this purpose are the rock, which is a smooth head, and red-chaff, and the white-chaff bearded. Rust seems to strike all wheat about the same time in the same vicinity; after which, the berry, in whatever state of maturity it may be, begins to dry up; so that late wheat is often left in the field unharvested. Ordinary time of harvesting is from the 1st to the 10th of July.

More wheat is sown among corn than in all other modes of sowing; when it produces 12 bushels per acre. But if, when fallow or clover ground is ploughed in June or July, then ploughed again in September, you sow the wheat and harrow well, 20 bushels per acre are produced. Three and four crops of wheat have been raised in succession, and the last was better than the first. Five pecks are sown per acre. Some experiments this season in deep ploughing more than doubly repay the labor, both for corn and wheat. As attention is paid to better modes of preparing ground, the crop is increasing. Price, 60 cents per bushel.

Oats are not very extensively cultivated, and are not considered a profitable crop, as they are thought to exhaust the ground more than wheat. Seed sown per acre, 1 bushel; price per bushel this season, 25 cents.

Clover is begining to be much cultivated for the purpose of resting and enriching the soil. It is principally pastured by hogs and cattle; seldom being cut for hay.

When the early part of the season is wet, I have known three tons of clover hay to be mown per acre. As the time for cutting clover comes in the most busy season for working corn, and as that time is generally liable to frequent rains, which are much more injurious to clover hay than other grasses, it is not commonly mown for hay.

Timothy is commonly used for hay, and yields, on an average, 11⁄2 ton per acre. It is not a profitable crop to raise for market; the price gener. ally averaging $5 per ton. This season, however, owing to drought last summer, the price is $8. Too little attention has been paid to this branch of husbandry to know much about the effect of manure or flooding meadow lands.

Hogs.-Until recently, owing to the distance to market, hogs were the principal means of obtaining wealth, as they could better be driven 80 miles to market than to haul grain the same distance. Hogs are generally sold at the age of from 18 to 24 months. They are not generally fed, but eat what they can get until the last four months of their lives, when they are made fat by feeding them with what corn they will eat in the ear. They are generally pastured on clover in the summer, and fed on grain. In the winter they are fed enough corn to keep them in what is called "growing order." I am satisfied that more pork, with less expense, can be produced by keeping pigs fat from their birth, until they are slaught ered. A pig, kept fat until it is 12 months old, is larger and better for.

pork than one 20 months old kept three-fourths of the time in only "growing order." The average weight of hogs in market is 200 pounds net. Irish Potatoes are considerably cultivated. Owing to the potato rot during the last four years, comparatively few have been raised. The variety most cultivated, until recently, seems to be much more liable to the rot than other kinds-that is, the Mashanocks. To avoid the rot, we select the kinds of potatoes least liable, and then plant on a gravelly or sandy hill-side as early as the potatoes will vegetate-say the 1st of April. They flourish best on new soil, or that which has been highly manured with stable-manure. Price this season, 60 cents per bushel; average yield per acre, 150 bushels.

Sweet Potatoes grow well here of a dry season, planted in a sandy soil; best manure, ashes; price this season, 65 cents per bushel.

Apples. The only fruit profitably cultivated; they are abundantly grown for cider, and family use. No experiments have been made as to their adaptation to feeding stock. The best winter varieties in use are the Rambo, bellflower, greening, golden russet, white winter pippin, Newtown pippin, never-fail, and wine-sop.

Pears are a very uncertain crop, as the trees seldom live more than 10 or 12 years.

Peaches have been an entire failure the last 10 years, owing to the yellows and the severity of the winter. Perhaps, however, the winter would not injure them were not their vitality first affected by the yellows.

Hon. THOMAS EWBANK,

Commissioner of Patents.

W. W. BUNNELL.

RICHMOND, WAYNE COUNTY, INDIANA,
8th month, 25th, 1851.

SIR: Thy Circular reached me a few days since; in answer to which 1 may say, no lime, guano, or plaster has been used on our field-crops, excepting some few cases, which have not been so successful as to justify the expense; nor have I seen any benefit from their application to our vegetable gardens, unless it is to frighten the potato-bugs from the plants. I have been much diverted at seeing the haste with which they will leave the premises after having their heads well powdered with lime, &c. My Rotation of Crops differs from most of the farmers in this settlement. I put all the green manure 1 can get upon my sod-ground in early spring, and, as soon as spread, I turn it under from 8 to 10 inches deep; then harrow it well, and plant the corn from 3 to 4 feet apart each way, with 4 grains to a hill; cover it 2 to 3 inches deep with light soil. My reason for this deep planting is, that the cut-worm does not go so deep in the soil as to reach the heart of the corn, and then cutting it above the bud does very little injury. Let the farmer try it, and I think he will not go back to a half, or an inch deep. As soon as it is 2 or 3 inches high, we commence with the cultivator 2 or 3 times in a row both ways, and continue on until near wheat harvest-say 6 times each way-when we lay Reports of the Commissioner could reach the farmers and mechanics, as

it by; and as soon as the grain is glazed, I begin to cut the corn close to the ground, putting 32 hills to a shock. (Now, it is to be understood that there are no weeds or grass in the field.) We then go 2 or 3 times in each row both ways; then sow about 14 bushel wheat to the acre, and, with a large harrow, 12-inch iron tooth, we go over the whole field, levelling the ground. Immediately after this, I sow 1 bushel timothy seed to 8 acres; and, in the 3d month, (March,) I sow a half bushel clover seed on the same ground. I pasture it the next year, and the following two years mow for hay, then green manure, &c., as before. My reasons for this course of cropping are drawn from observation, and some little experience. I have noticed, when the juices of the barn-yard run through my corn-field, that the corn could hardly be better; and when they pass through any part of my wheat-field, it would be perfectly worthless; hence I concluded the green manure was just what the corn wanted, and that portion of the manure the corn did not take up was precisely what the wheat required; and by following these notions, I have seldom raised less than 50 to 70bushels of corn, 20 to 28 bushels of wheat, and, fair seasons, 2 tons of hay per acre. Now, I can give no chemical reasons for my whys or wherefores; but more of this by-and-by.

I try to get my wheat in the ground not later than the middle of the 9th month, (September;) and I am careful to try not to sow one seed of cheat, for I know it will grow; and I would as soon believe that Indian corn would turn to broomsedge, as to believe a clean grain of wheat would grow chess. Why not turn to fox-tail, blue grass, or any other kindred grasses? The thing is incompatible, and should be frowned at by every practical farmer. But to return: My reason for sowing wheat early is to avoid the rust; and I often found it so well ripened before the fogs and hot suns fell on it, that it sustained no injury. I also try to cut my wheat as soon as the milk will not press out of the grain; it shatters less, and the wheat is just as good. Our oats are sown on our poorest corn-ground in the 3d or 4th month, (March or April.) Perhaps it would not be apart from the subject to say, our corn, wheat, oats, and hay were never better, in quality or quantity, in this settlement. Butter and Cheese.-Very little attention is paid to butter and cheese over the wants of the settlement.

Horses and Mules are raised with us, though but few of the latter. Of the horse we have raised some very fine, at a cost not under $50 at 3 years old. Very little attention is paid to sheep, and less to improved varieties.

Hogs and Corn are our staples. We try to slop them twice a day, and give them an ear of corn each at slopping-time. By this course we get them to weigh 250 to 300 pounds at killing-time, which is generally about the close of the year. The Berkshire, when they will be from 18 to 20 months old, crossed with the Irish grazier, is preferred by most of Root crops are not raised for distant markets. The little surplus finds a low market in our city.

us.

I now take up the subject of my ignorance (referred to on the other page) as regards the proper application of things to things in farming. If I understood the drift Congress had in gathering all practical facts, it was that they might be embodied in a permanent form for the good of all; and if this had been done, perhaps I might have been much better qualified to give good reasons for my course of farming. I believe if the

they justly should, they would be considered a treasure to us; but what are the facts of the case? Do not the members of Congress, except a few hundreds put into the hands of the Commissioner-first tying his hands before he shall distribute them, sweep off the whole lot? These books, with other like things, are taken to their respective homes by cart-loads, and there distributed among just such men as themselves-lawyers, doctors, &c.; some of whom, I venture to think, if I were ploughing, and wanted my plough to run a little deeper, and were to ask their advice, would be as ignorant as a child to advise me. Many such men as these get the books, and these men may consider themselves the public; but the facts are, the public do not get them-the farmers and mechanics, who are the largest portion of the community, do not get them, though they need them most.

I have inquired of many for the late Report of the Commissioner, and none have so much as seen it. It is true, I had the privilege of looking into one about five minutes, and this was in the hands of a doctor; and I have my doubts whether he has seen the inside of it for three months past. Not a farmer or mechanic of my acquaintance has this book, that can find. My word for it, the thing is wrong as regards its distribution. I remember, not long ago, I asked the present Commissioner to continue to me the favors I received from his predecessor (Ellsworth) in sending me a copy of his Reports; and he was kind enough to send me the law governing him in the distribution, by which I found he had no right to do so unless contributions to the Agricultural Bureau were first made. Now, was it not known by the makers of this law that not one in fifty of those who would delight in reading the book could scrape up and put together his ideas, of the adaptation of thing to thing, of manures to soils, of effects and their causes, such as would make a paragraph in one of his Reports? and knowing this, to require of us to do that which we have no capacity to do, is verily too much like Pharaoh requiring of the Israelites the full tale of brick, without furnishing the means to make them. Give us the books; they are the property of the farmers and mechanics, in common with others, by a fair construction of the law; and justice should be done them. I do not blame the Commissioner. I think he stands excused by law; but the law does not make it right that his hands should be tied thus. I think he should have ten times the present number of copies placed in his hands; and such as would ask for them should have them; and then I have little doubt but in time that Bureau would become one of the richest treasuries of prac tical agricultural facts on the face of the earth; but keep them out of the hands of those who hunt more for the loaves and fishes than the good of the whole community. Could some of you only feel a little of that pleasure we would have, whilst our horses were feeding, to sit facing a pleasant breeze at our windows, and reach from the table and read some of the reports touching some of the branches of farming that we had just been engaged in, I think more liberality would be extended to us. I say, again, give us the books-the key-that we may, with industry on our part, unlock to our understanding some of the laws-the wondrous laws-of the God of Nature.

Very sincerely, I am thy friend,

JOSEPH P. PLUMMER.

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