the former practice. A liberal supply of ma- produce grass satisfactorily, was owing simply during the whole year. How many from one to two hundred acre farmers are there among us who have literally "nothing to do" except, perhaps, hoeing. Four or five acres of corn and a half acre of potatoes from the time they finish sowing their wheat and oats until har-borne in mind that the refusal of such land to vesting commences. Infinitely better would it be for them (and their farms) to sow less wheat, and turn their attention more to the growing of corn, roots, grass, beans, peas and fruit, and to the raising of sheep, horses, pork, neat cattle, &c. By taking this course we may reasonably expect better prices for what wheat we do raise; also profitable employment for ourselves and our men during the entire season without being particularly hurried in any part, and also have something to sell every year that will bring a remunerative price. DANVILLE, Wis., July 8th, 1862. G. H. ADAMS. Rejuvenation of Old Pastures. Land that fails to feed more than one animal, where it used to feed five or six, can be restored to fertility. The subject is important, in proportion to the extent of land to be restored, which is very large. The treatment should of course vary with the character of the land, situation, cause of failure, &c. I propose to define a few cases, and to suggest a treatment adapted to each. 1st. A pasture of naturally good soil, feasible, neither steep nor rocky; but long cultivated with exhausting crops, without manure; made to grow inferior kinds when it would no longer produce the more valuable; and then, when it would return nothing worth the labor, turned over to pasture. It starves the cattle. The owner complains. He should not, for it is but the inevitable result of his own doings.He exhausted the soil of all plant-food, then in a condition to be appropriated by plants. He has done nothing to promote changes in the soil, by which its inorganic elements may be converted into plant-food, it therefore lies dormant. Most of the elements of plant-food are there, in quantities sufficient for thousands of crops; but for the want of others, and for the want of action in the soil, they are about as useless as the gold now in circulation was, when embedded in the Maraposa gulches. Now, unless the owner be satisfied with an unproductive investment, let him plow that land again. He should plow it a little deeper the first year than it was ever plowed before, still deeper the second, and yet deeper the third, and so on till he at least doubles upon 2d. Land similar to the foregoing, with the exception of not being feasible; that is, soil good originally, but too steep, broken or rocky, and little productive; such land as abounds in to be plowed; long pastured, but turf bound New England, and in some portions of New York and New Jersey. Thousands of hill-sides are such, that to plow and cultivate them is impossible. They can be used only for pasturage. A heavy dressing of ashes will, in most cases, bring them up; but as wood ashes, to an extent commensurate with the breadth of such land, cannot be had, such a prescription would be valueless. Lime, sowed broadcast on the surface, would rot the old grass roots and bring in the clover and other forage plants more nutritious than the wire grasses now growing, and would at the same time act, by its alkaline properties, favorably upon the soil, and might pay in locations where lime can be had at a low rate. Plaster does well, if the soil be warm; but if it be cold, wet and sour, plaster is of little or no use. It would be well for all farmers, who have failing pastures, to make trial of ashes, wherever they can be had at not more than ten cents a bushel leached, or fifteen cents unleached. They would do well, also, to make trial, if they have not already done it to their satisfaction, of lime and of plaster, as that is the only way in which the value of either, for any particular soil, can be satisfactorily tested. Let it be remembered that those pastures which have never felt the plow, have not failed from exhaustion. Why should they be exhausted? Not a crop has ever been carried from them, except perhaps a single grain crop, when first cleared. The cattle that have grazed them, have returned to the surface ninetenths of all they have taken from it. It cannot therefore be that the failure is due to an abstraction of all the valuable ingredients, as is the case with badly misused plow-lands.— There must be some other cause. It is the condition into which the soil has fallen. Plowing and manuring are what is wanted. But that being out of question, on account of their roughness, what can be done, that will in some measure prove a substitute? Chafing the surface with a harrow, will have in part the effect of plowing. It will bring portions of the soil in contact with the air. It will loosen the surface and admit the air. Sub-soiling, if praeticable, will be ten times better. If you can run a sub-soil plow sixteen or eighteen inches deep, once in two or three feet, the whole surface will be lifted and made pervious to the air. If, on account of the rocky character of the pasture, it can be run but ten or twelve inches deep, and that even only on portions, better so than nothing. Do not fear that the grass will be killed out by harrowing and subsoiling. In the first place, you cannot kill it if you would; and in the second place, if you were to kill two-thirds of the grass plants on every square foot, the growth would be all the greater for it. On an old turf there are too many plants rather than too few. In addition to the top-dressing with ashes, lime, or plaster, we would suggest that the chafing of the surface with a sharp harrow, and the sub-soiling of such portions of a rough pasture as will admit, are operations which will be likely to pay well for the labor. On pastures that have been long used for dairy purposes, bone earth will not fail to pay. It may be applied at the rate of three or four cwt. to the acre, with absolute certainty of returning more than its cost in the enlarged quantity and improved quality of the food. Super-phosphate of lime, applied at the rate of from one to two hundred pounds an acre, is equally sure of giving a good return from old dairy pastures, and will give the return much more speedily. 3d. There is another kind of pasture, not wholly unknown in this country-hill tops and steep slopes-soil naturally poor-gave a fair crop of rye or wheat when first cleared, and some grass for a few years afterwards, but now nearly barren. The only best thing that can be done with such, is to grow a twenty-five year's crop of wood and timber on them. There are at least half a million acres in Massachusetts, and many in all the Eastern states, for which this would be the best possible use. Abundance of timber would thus be supplied. The local climate would be improved, winters milder, summers more equable, rains more abundant, and drouths less severe. Probably a region, one-fourth in forest, will give quite as great an amount of agricultural products, as if all were cleared. If it be asked how shall such rocky hill-tops and sides be brought into wood, the answer is, little more need be done than to shut off the cattle. But the process may be hastened somewhat, by planting a variety of seeds-as butternuts, chestnuts, horse chestnuts, beech-nuts, hickory nuts, acorns, &c., &c. A great variety would be more likely to answer the purpose. If the surface were broken up here and there in spots, and a variety of seeds applied, some of them would be likely to find a congenial location and soil. The best way of planting such seeds-nuts mostly-is, not to cover them with earth, as we do the seeds of cultivated crops, but merely to lay them on the surface, and throw over them a little leaf mold. With most of them, it is not necessary that even the ground should be mellowed. The chestnut, for instance, will grow vigorously the first few months, in a soil nearly as hard as rock; and whether it grow well afterwards, depends mainly upon the ingredients of the soil, and not upon its physical condition. It is so in degree with many kinds. Let the naked hill tops and their steep sides be made to grow fuel and timber. The cost of starting need not be great, and almost the only condition of success is, that here and there a tree be started, and that cattle be kept off for a few years. As the ground begins to be shaded, and its surface to be mulched with leaves, other trees will spring up, and there will be the older trees and the under-brush of a miniature forest within ten years; and in fifteen or twenty years it will begin to make its return in fuel and timber. The planting of nuts should be in the fall, and the nut should not have dried before planting. If kept till spring, they should be kept in a cold, damp place. There is no better place than on the ground, with a slight mulching over them, or in a hole dug for them but four or five inches deep, and covered simply with a board or a flat stone. Mulching with loam, from the time of planting onward, till they shed leaves enough to cover their own roots, is greatly beneficial to all trees, but to none more than to forest trees.-PROF. Nash, in Working Farmer and U. S. Journal. Will Farming Pay. Luther Buxton, in the Oshkosh Northwestern, in alluding to the remarks of some of our State Senators, made in debate, that "farming did not pay over one per cent., and hardly that"— rather has the Senator on the hip. He says: The remarks of the Senator are well calculated to convey the impression that farming in the State of Wisconsin, is a non-paying business. The truth is far different. There is no State in the Union where farming pays better than this. Many are improving their farms, and at the same time making them pay ten per cent. I would not doubt the Senator's word in regard to the per cent. they make from their farms. I think the truth is they have run their "Political Machine" at the expense of the farm. I never could understand before why we have so many poor and inconsistant laws, upon our Statute books, but until I have further light, I must come to the concluson, it is because we have too many one per cent. farmers in our Legislature. I can give Senators the names of farmers in drained dry. Another thing gained. By runthis county who will answer, ("without an ex-ning this single mole drain through the centre ception," with wheat at 60 cents per bushel,) of the slough, he secures living water for his that they make their farms pay 10 per cent. If stock the year round. he had interrogated the undersigned, I should have answered as follows: Total,................. $581 33 119 $1,543 Call my own labor at $170, and wheat at the present price at Neenah, 73 cents, one can easily find 20 per cent. on the investment. I do not present my own case because it is better than many others, but because I have the figures near at hand. I have neighbors who can figure a larger per cent. than I can. The large barns, elegant houses, and highly cultivated farms in Winnebago Co., gives the lie to "the one per cent. farming." L. B." Mole Draining. Few of our farmers have any conception of the benefits of Mole draining. Hear what Dr. Kennicot, Western Editor of Moore's Rural, says: "I stopped at Campaign and spent the Sabbath with Hon. M. L. Dunlap, Editor of the Illinois Farmer; agriculturist and horticulturist, theoretically and practically. Had good time, as I always do here. The soil is soft and oozy, but nevertheless, we traversed the domain-both farm and nursery. a Whereas he had less confidence in the utility of the mole drainer than some others, now he has more when the sub-soil is a stiff clay. Last fall I conversed with D. F. Kinney, of Rock Island, on the subject of mole drains. He had them on his place, and he said he found that when they had been put in on plowed land, they had failed, having filled; but where the surface was a sward he had no trouble.-Asking Mr. D. if he had any such experience, he said that it was sometimes the case, but it was due to mal-practice of the parties working the mole, the mole runs easier, and the drain can be made more rapidly in proportion as it runs nearer the surface. Hence a dishonest operator may, and sometimes does, destroy his own work by dishonest practice. If the mole be run deep enough-three to three and a half feet deep in a stiff clay-it will be effectual, even though the surface be as mellow as an ash heap.' Flax vs. Cotton. is enthusiastic over the new process of obtainA correspondent writing from Washington, ing flax-wool. Hear him: "I have before me, as I write, Cotton's king in the shape of flax-wool, about which I will tell you some things. By a new process, the fibre of common flax can be reduced to a beau tiful wool, as white and as fine as any upland cotton. The sample I have was raised in Ohio, It is almost entirely owing to their thorough and the process is a discovery of an Ohio man. under draining that the English farmers man-One ton of flax straw,' will produce one bale age as a rule, to get from 50 to 60 bushels of of four hundred and fifty-two pounds of the wheat per acre. Our Western farmer cannot, wool,' and one acre will produce two tons of A little calculaof course, under drain his farm with stone or straw, or two bales of wool. even tile, but all could avail themselves of the tion will show what immense results will flow mole plow. from the discovery of this new 'emancipator.' The farmer after realizing on an average ten dollars an acre for his flax-seed, sells his flaxstraw at a minimum price of five dollars a ton, or ten dollars the acre, giving him a gross product of twenty dollars, and under an increased demand and favorable circumstances, thirty dollars the acre. This wool can be separated from the straw, cleaned, bleached and baled ready for market at five cents a pound. No cotton will ever compete with it in quality or cheapness. Two men, with the present aids to labor by machinery, can cultivate forty acres of flax, or bring out a result of eighty bales a season. It requires the labor of twenty slaves to produce the same amount of cotton. The climate of the Northern and Western States is peculiarly adapted to flax culture and can give the world enough of this staple to clothe it in fine linen, if not in purple,' and yet not interfere with the production of the other great staples. Who knows but that the OPEN DITCHES VS. MOLE DRAINS. Friend Dunlap will make no more open ditches on his premises. Pat' got a job in 1860, and he was the kind of a mole drain for Dr., as he told me then; but last fall the mole man came along and had put in a mole drain alongside of the ditch, three feet below the surface. The ditch was soon dry, and the influence of the mole extended much further, either side, than that of the ditch. The ditch was four rods from the mole, and yet it was 'Great West' may yet be the clothier, as well as the feeder of the world, and that this little plant, so modest in its proportions, shall work out the great problem of our national difficulties." The Hay Business. DISCUSSION AT NEW YORK FARMER'S CLUB. The question of feeding hay upon the farm, or selling it, was now called up, but there were not many farmers present who could give much practical information. Prof. Mapes said that it was a question that must be decided by the circumstances of each locality. In some parts of New England, stable manure is valued at $5 a cord, while hay is not salable at more than $10 a ton. There, it would be most profitable to feed the hay on the farm. In New Jersey, where I live, manure can be bought for $1 a cord, and hay sold at $15 or $18 a ton, and there it is more profitable to sell the hay and keep up the fertility of the land by fertilizers. I can grow three tons of timothy per acre, and I can make it profitable to sell the hay and apply something else to the land. I believe wherever hay is worth $10 a ton, it is better for the farmer to sell it than it is to feed it. It seems to be a question with many farmers how little manure they can manage to get along with, instead of "how much can I use with a profit?" Some farmers use but ten loads where they could make fifty more profitable. I know market-gardeners who use 150 loads of manure to the acre, and it is a common thing for men to pay a rent of $50 an acre per annum for garden land. Such men could not afford to feed hay on the farm to make manure; but they can afford to raise it, and most farmers could afford to use it more freely. John G. Bergen and Adrian Bergen of Long Island, coincided with Prof. Mapes, and said that many farmers on the Island average $15 a ton for hay sold in the city, and at that they cannot afford to feed it at home; but they can afford to buy manure, and do so to keep up the fertility of their farms. Haying-Machines.-Prof. Mapes-The improvement in haying-machines enables farmers to make hay cheaper and better than formerly. Most of them know something of mowing-machines, but there is another important machine for them to know, as the hay crop is increased by a better system of farming, and that is the "tedding machine," which stirs the hay by horse-power. By the use of this machine, hay cut by the mower, after the dew is off, may be cured fit to go in the barn the same day, if put up with salt. Hay-caps and horse-forks, too, are great helps to the hay-maker. So is the sub-soil plow, for with it old meadows can be renovated without turning the sod, by running it every three feet, and manuring. John G. Bergen-Hay may be cured in one hot day, but as a general thing it must have more time, if cut when in the best condition, that is, before the blossom falls. Clover cannot be cured in one day by any process. Adrian Bergen-I am satisfied that it is best to cut grass early, and use salt, half a peck to a ton, to cure it. WEIGHT OF MANURE.-A solid foot of half A load of rotted stable manure will weigh, upon an average, 56 pounds. If it is coarse or dry, it manure, or 36 cubic feet, of first quality, will will average 48 pounds to the foot. weigh 2,016 pounds; second quality, 1,728 pounds. Weight to the acre-eight loads of first kind, weighing 16,128 pounds, will give 108 pounds to each square rod, and less than 2 pounds to each square foot. give 63 pounds to the rod. An acre containpounds per foot, of any quantity per acre, is ing 43,560 square feet, the calculation of easily made. Five loads will STOCK REGISTER. Sheep in Connection with Wheat Growing. In a recent number of the Journal of the N. Y. Agricultural Society, General Rawson Harmon, of Wheatland, N. Y., gives the following account of his practice with sheep in connection with clover and wheat-growing, which we recommend to the attention of our wheat growing farmers, who have a soil and situation adapted to clover and sheep: For many years we have kept two sheep to the acre of wheat land; say for one hundred and fifty acres, three hundred sheep may be kept, and the regular rotation of the wheat and clover kept up on the one hundred and fifty acres, forty of which should be in wheat each year, and ten in corn and roots. Clover seed should be sown in March or April, six quarts to the acre, and as soon as the ground is dry in the spring, one bushel of plaster should be sown to the acre. Barley or oats should follow corn and roots, and seeded as above; so we have fifty acres seeded with clover each year, ten acres in corn and roots, leaving ninety acres for pasturing and mowing. A team is to be kept for the work on the farm, and three or four cows, for the use of the family; and no other stock should be kept, except hogs, for the family use, and they should be limited, for mutton is cheaper and more wholesome meat than pork. The above, for the use of the family, is all the stock that should be kept on a wheat growing farm, except sheep; and with the above amount of land, three hundred sheep may be kept, and well cared for. They should be kept at the barn till the first of May, when they should be turned on to the fields which the corn and root crops are to occupy, and where the wheat is to be sown, remaining till the clover in the pastures is half grown; then give the sheep a chance in that, which will keep them till the clover commences heading out where the wheat and barley has been harvested. One great cause of failure in sheep husbandry is in letting the sheep run on the pastures long after clover has done growing, and in the spring before it commences growing, when there is no tallow in the clover, and it is gnawed into the ground, and much of it destroyed. For winter management most farmers fail, in giving the sheep too much run. Where they are stabled, or kept in close sheds and not suffered to run at large, from November to May, one-fourth of the food can be saved, the flock kept in better condition, giving one-fourth more wool, and making twiee the amount of the most valuable manure made on the farm. From fifty to one hundred are to be kept in a flock. Sheep of about the same weight should be kept together; where lambs or yearlings are suffered to run with full grown sheep they will not do so well. Lambs should be taken from the ewes about the 20th of August, if dropped in the month of May, and a few yearlings put with them, and they will be more easily controlled, and by the 20th of September they should be fed moderately with oats or bran and a little salt every day, so that by the time they come to the barn they are tame and in good condition for wintering. The first clover in the barley field would be a favorable field for lambs. The corn, roots, and barley should be wholly fed out on the farm; and, with the straw, cornstalks, and hay, all may be well supplied from November till May, except the team, which it may be well to keep in the stable when not at work. All the manure made each year should be applied to the corn and root field. Wethers, three past, and ewes that begin to lose their teeth, should be put in one yard, and grained through the winter, and then they will be fit for the butcher, and will pay for the food they have consumed; and they must be disposed of, so as to give place for the increase. No sheep should be sold from the farm till they have come to full maturity. The selling of lambs to butchers, is ruinous to a flock-or letting butchers go in and take the best of the flock. Old sheep as well as lambs, should have some grain or roots every day while at the barn. Sheep will pay much better for the grain they eat than the man you sell to will. No animal kept on the farm will pay better than the sheep-for their rapid increase with their fleece and meat, give a better return for what they consume than any stock kept on a grain farm. The Taxes, the Dogs and the Sheep. The following article, although written for another section of country, is eminently adapted for this region also: No branch of farming pays a better profit than the rearing of lambs for an early market and the feeding of sheep for the butcher. But to carry on this business with profit, the farmer must have a knowledge of the habits and diseases of the animal and must devote himself to their care and management; for when these are left to the ignorance, stupidity and recklessness which so commonly characterize hired help, disease and loss are sure to follow. Shedding to shelter them from the cold rains of the winter and spring, must also be provided, for there is no animal which suffers more from the influence of wet than the sheep. A drizzling, soaking rain will, in the course of a day or two, penetrate the longest and thickest wool, sometimes even to the skin, which afterwards keeps the poor neglected animal in a state of suffering for many days, particularly if the rain should be followed by sharp and cold winds. The skin becomes chilled and closed, and the lungs or bowels become affected with the most serious maladies. But apart from the loss to the sheep owner from his own carelessness and neglect, and the waste of grain and hay from want of proper superintendence, a heavy loss is suffered in every agricultural district from the ravages committed by dogs. This of late years has become quite a drawback to the breeding and rearing of sheep, and it is asserted on high authority, that the country at large is a great loser, not alone from actual depredations which are committed by dogs upon sheep, but, perhaps more than that, from the apprehensions of attack preventing many farmers from keeping sheep upon their farms. A man who has suffered a severe loss in his flock from dogs, or who has witnessed it in his neighbor's flock, is loth to keep up his stock of sheep or to purchase wethers for the butcher's use. From this cause, the increase of the number of sheep does not keep pace with the advance of agriculture in general, and the price of mutton continues high, while we have not a full supply of homeraised wool. If this loss was computed, it would be found to be enormous; and reflection upon this subject has often suggested the question, Is there no remedy? Let us look around at the farms and through the villages of Chester County, and see what an immense number of worthless curs infest the community; and for what purpose are they kept by their owners, if they have any owners? There are many sporting dogs, it is true; but is it not true, also, that when the assessor goes his rounds, the owner denies his dog, and thus for many animals which depredate on the community as above shown, the community re |