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PUBLISHED BRYOLA, 35 BROADWAY, ALBANY, N. Y.
UBLISHED BY LUTHER TUCKER & SON,

J. J. THOMAS, ASSOCIATE EDITOR, UNION SPRINGS, N. Y.

AGENTS IN NEW-YORK:

C. M. SAXTON, BARKER & Co., Ag. Book Publishers, 25 Park Row.
THE CULTIVATOR has been published twenty-six years. A NEW
SERIES was commenced in 1833, and the seven volumes for 1853, 4, 5, 6,
7, 8 and 9, can be furnished, bound and post-paid, at $1.00 each.
TERMS FIFTY CENTS A YEAR.-Ten copies of the CULTIVATOR and
Ten of the ANNUAL REGISTER OF RURAL AFFAIRS, with one of each

free to the Agent, Five Dollars.

of 16 quarto pages, making two vols. yearly of 416 pages, at $2.00 per "THE COUNTRY GENTLEMAN." a weekly Agricultural Journal year, is issued by the same publishers.

Editorial Notes Abroad.

No. XXXI-VISIT NEAR NORWICH.
The Norwich Cattle Fair-the Grain Market or Corn Exchange-
Plumstead and Agricultural Pupils--the Wire Worm--Live Stock
Merits of Different Breeds of Sheep and Cattle-Pleuro-pneumonia
and Insurances on Cattle and Crops-Threshing. Farm Profits, Box-
Feeding, Gas Lime, &c.-Hedges, a Garden Seat and conclusion.

It was the object of the last letter in this series, to convey a general idea of the County of Norfolk, and the productiveness there attained. With Mr. READ, to whom, by conversation and through the Essay already alluded to, I was indebted for many of the facts there detailed, I had the pleasure of visiting Norwich Hill on the day of the weekly Fair or cattle-market.

We are as yet deplorably deficient, as a general rule, in anything exactly corresponding to the fairs, markets and market-days of Great Britain. I shall not attempt at present to point out their advantages, as opportunities will be hereafter afforded for recurring more particularly to the subject. That they form a part, and an essential part, in the machinery, so to speak, of English Agriculture, no visitor can fail to observe; and, in the facilities for buying and selling, for selection on the part of the farmer who purchases, and competition of bidders for the farmer who has anything to dispose of, their establishment and regular recurrence at stated times supplies an advantage parallel in some respects to that which the British cultivator also possesses over us, in the readier and more abundant obtainableness of experienced agricultural labor.

Norwich is a city of the ancient times, but the old Castle that surmounts its highest summit is now occupied as a prison, and the triple battlements that protected this Norman keep, have not for many years frowned down upon any force more warlike than the humble company that occupies on Saturdays the crowded pens below gathered from every part of the kingdom to eat of the production of Norfolk husbandry, so that in the end the hungry eaters of the metropolis may be filled. In fact it is estimated that not above one bullock in twenty that is

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No. 6.

grazed in Norfolk is bred in the county, and all sorts of cross-bred bullocks find their way thither to be sold and fattened. If I am not mistaken, we saw some of the old long-horned stock, which at one time had a brush with the Short-horns for supremacy; there were also Irish cattle not quite so long in horn or large in frame as those, but thicker, and described to me as better to take on flesh; there was Scotch blood, too, but the canny North Britons have learned, they said, to keep the best at home for their full I think as usual-was made up, and the farmer who own feeding; and so the collection-that day scarcely so went out to buy had need be good in judging to know what to choose and how much to pay. There were sheep and lambs in large numbers, quite generally I think of a Leicester cross, although the marks of other breeds might also be detected. And to conclude, a stable-full of horses were to be brought out at a later hour under the hammer of the auctioneer. The pigs we did not look at.

the animals marketed, and thus an accurate register of the In some cases there are corporation or other tolls on sales is kept. There is no such guide to consult in regard to the number disposed of at Norwich, but with the construction of railroads, the attendance there is said to have been annually increasing in magnitude "to the extinotion of almost all the local fairs in the county." Norwich, it may be added, is a city much the size of Albany.

My attentive conductor also went with me to the cornexchange, where, very appropriately, a portrait of Mr. COKE looks down upon the proceedings of many who cherish his memory and example. Here the farmers of the county, when they are ready to sell their grain in whole or in part, bring samples of what they have, and the corn-brokers and millers who occupy stands in the apartment, examine the quality of what is offered, and conclude their arrangements for purchase. Dispatches constantly received from London show how the markets there are tending, and, if the prices do not suit, the farmers's pocket will carry his samples back again as easily as it brought them. There is generally an ordinary" or general dinner, set at the public houses frequented by the farmers, and as the same circles meet so frequently at the same places, mutual acquaintance and association of interests are promoted. Pipes and tobacco often constitute the concluding luxury, in the enjoyment of which our English brethren have nothing to learn from us-indeed I was scarcely prepared to find the "weed" still in so high and general estimation, puffed in the primitive pipe with long and curving stem.

Some notes jotted down in visiting "Plumstead," as Mr. Read's farm, several miles from Norwich, is calledwill be read, I am sure, with an interest equal to the kind

ness with which he afforded its hospitalities to an unex- some three hundred are annually fed, together with one pected stranger. It is illustrative of the spirit and intelli- hundred bullocks. As to breeds, in conversation with gence which he has brought to its management, and I hope regard to their respective merits, the remark was made not a matter of indelicacy previously to mention that Mr. that formerly meat was grown perhaps more for the genRead is still a young man, graduated as a farmer after try; or rather, that until more recently, flesh was put on some years' experience in managing for others, acquired at a cost, from the length of time required to mature it, upon estates in South Wales, Oxfordshire and Bucking- which the wealthy could better afford to pay, while in hamshire, and having proved his powers of observation in point of fact, the poorer classes consumed comparatively all three instances by the preparation of Reports upon the very little. The South-Down, with its superior mutton, Farming of the Counties named, which received the Prizes | well-matured, for example, still furnishes what a landed of the Royal Agricultural Society. Since his occupancy of proprietor desires to graze for his own eating, or the epihis present farm, he had, like many of the best farmers in cure to buy from his butcher; while, on the other hand, England, taken several pupils for instruction in the practi- the great objects sought by the farmers who produce meat cal details of Agriculture. There are always many de- for the multitude of purchasers are hardiness and size, sirous of such instruction, either the sons of farmers at combined with early maturity. Without these three quasome distance who wish to acquire a knowledge of the lities, each of equal importance it may be the Norfolk systems elsewhere in vogue, or sometimes young men from feeder cannot buy and sell at a profit. Continuing to the city with a taste for rural life and pursuits; and in no speak of sheep, the larger kind of Leicester, or Leicesters way perhaps can a knowledge of farming be so well and with a tinge of Cotswold, (or perhaps Lincolnshire,) are said thoroughly obtained. With three or four pupils, in the to give the desired size and maturity, and at the same time active seasons of the year, the oversight of all the trans-lengthen the wool; the purer Leicesters, as they are someactions of the farm is explained and illustrated, practice in determining upon and performing them, is always to be had, and the exercise of judgment in relation to live stock of different kinds as well as field operations, is elicited and directed to proper standards. Lectures are given twice a week in winter, upon both theory and practice, followed by conversational discussions upon mooted points or farther explanation of difficult ones. I do not doubt at all the correctness of the opinion expressed by Mr. R., that one year of such tuition, following a year or more spent at an institution like that at Cirencester, would provide the best education which an intelligent young man could have before undertaking the management of a farm, and I can not but wish that more of our good farmers could be induced to receive pupils into their families for similar instruction. The price paid there by the pupil is in the neighborhood of $850 per annum, but little if anything being expected from his labor; while, in many cases he provides himself with a horse, it may be for hunting or other purposes, which increases the price paid by him per year to about $1,000.

times regarded, such for instance as those of Mr. SANDAY, perfect as they are of their kind and for some localities, are here considered too fine to produce a cross embodying all essential points so perfectly as the others. The ewes are the Downs, the best of them from Suffolk, hardier in constitution and finer-wooled than the males with which they are put.

It has been claimed here, and the opinion has its adhe rents in Great Britain, that the meat produced is really deteriorated as its maturity is forced; and there is little doubt that if one is content to wait the convenience of some of the old breeds in getting themselves ready for the knife, he may be better suited with the flesh they give him. But with sheep, the cross above described, for example, makes a better leg of young mutton, say when slaughtered at a year old, than could be had at similar age from the best South Down, while the latter would in turn be preferable at three years old. With cattle it is much the same as with sheep. There are still some, although not very many, Devons in Norfolk, notwithstanding Mr. COKE's efforts to popularize them there; they make excel

The land at Plumstead was last summer occupied nearly lent beef, and when ready to kill, you have a “nice fat as follows:

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The usual four-course system of rotation is employed, as might be anticipated. About 32 bushels of wheat per acre, 40 bushels of barley, and 48 of oats are regarded as average crops in this vicinity; 1 to 2 tons of bay are usually cut. Mangolds is a crop in growing favor, and will yield 30 tons per acre, bearing unlimited manuring, while turnips if pushed too hard are found to run mostly to tops and necks. The wire-worm is the greatest foe with which he has had to contend; coming along last spring, attacking the barley, touching the wheat a little, destroying the first sowing of mangolds, and a second sowing of Swedes put in to replace them, and doing much damage to the white turnips, which made a third sowing on the same ground. Some fields of mangolds, however, had escaped, and some of the Swedes had been only badly thinned.

As to live stock, the labor of the farm is partly done by oxen, 4 yoke and 16 horses being kept. The breeding flock of sheep numbers about a hundred, and in addition

little wretch "--but not enough of him; the size and still earlier maturity of the Short-Horn, and of Short-Horn crosses, therefore render their blood preferable to any other. It is observed in Mr. READ's Essay, of the cattle that are now offered for sale on Norwich Hill, that the quality of the Short-Horns has been wonderfully improving, or rather perhaps it was intended to say that the grade of Short-Horn blood has been becoming a higher one from year to year, as it certainly has with the beeves sold at the cattle markets of New-York; and especially he says, that the cattle now brought over from the Emerald Isle, bear very little resemblance to the long-horned breed originally produced there; "by judicious crosses with the Short-Horns," they now obtain what the English farmer calls "very useful cattle," that show "much of the quality of the new blood, yet retain a great deal of the flesh and frame of the old stock."

From the pleuro-pneumonia many cattle had been lost, and few lots of cattle were received from Ireland, Mr. Read informed me, that were not more or less infected with this complaint-if free from it when starting, often taking it, he said, by being crowded together in crossing

$30 to $35 per acre over the farm. The difference between this sum and the land charges for rent, &c., and the sums paid for labor, will constitute, when further diminished by the heavy additional expenditures that are required for fertilizers, feeding materials, wear and tear of machinery, &c., the farmer's net avails for his own time and for interest upon the capital he has invested.

the channel in vessels where diseased animals had preceded them. There are one or more companies to insure against loss from the pleuro-pneumonia, but as they did not take risks exceeding in amount something like half the value of the animal, he had never had recourse to this source of protection. The state of excitement upon the subject in this country, at the time of writing out these notes, is such as to lead me to wish that I had pursued my The box-feeding of cattle, which has been in growing inquiries upon it a little farther. It was introduced into favor, as compared with other systems, Mr. Read was preGreat Britain by cattle from the Continent, and there seem-paring to adopt, I think; there is thought to be less food ed to be little doubt there of its being as infectious as it has here been represented.

The subject of insurance against a particular disease in cattle, was brought up by the casual mention of that of another kind, which illustrates singularly, as such little items often do, how Agriculture in Great Britain has been systematized, like commerce, into a branch of industry with its own risks to run, and its calculated chances of escaping them. Much grain is every year damaged there by hail storms; but by the payment of 6d. (say 12 cents) per acre for the surface sown, companies insure one against whatever loss may result from this cause. A storm the previous year had done much injury to a field of beans at Plumstead, but this insurance having happily been effected, appraisers on examining into the facts of the case, rated the loss at £27, (say $135,) which amount was duly recovered.

Portable engines are now to be found on many of the most extensive farms, for thrashing and other farm purposes, but thrashing is very frequently done by steam there, as in some parts of the country here it is done by horsepower-viz., one or more individuals owning an engine, will go from farm to farm to thrash out the grain as desired at a certain rate per quarter, or per coomb, a favorite Norfolk word, signifying a half-quarter or four bushels. I met a farmer who had been interested in one of these nomadie "steamers," as they are called, and from whom I gathered that the business, originally a quite profitable one, was now suffering rather from competition, or from the too common purchase by farmers of "steamers" of their own. The rent here was 35s. per acre, or with tithes and poor-rates added, equivalent to about 45s., say $11.25. In the agreement between landlord and tenant, it is customary for the former to provide materials for any new erections that it becomes necessary or expedient to build, while the tenant pays for from one-half to the whole of the labor, according to agreement. In repairs, the landlord will keep the exterior of the dwelling and other structures generally, in order, painting as often as may be covenanted, say once in 3, 5 or 7 years, while the tenant must generally bear the burden of whatever interior painting, papering, &c., may be required.

It is a matter of some interest to know to what sources the profit of the farm is due, for in some years of the rotation taken by themselves, there is a constant outlay with little pecuniary return. Through the four years of the course, I understood that the annual cost of labor would average per acre about 30s., say $7.50; while, with prices as they had usually rated for several years, (the low prices of the past season being perhaps regarded as exceptional) the two "white crops," or the wheat and barley years in the rotation, should bring in a gross return of fifty dollars each per acre, and the other two years of clovers and roots, an equivalent to twenty dollars each per acre-that is an average return, for each of the four years, of

consumed, and the resultant manure is considered richer than when the cattle are fed in open yards. By adequate attention in keeping the litter in the corners and middle, level, no odor escapes even if the deposit remains undisturbed in the box from autumn until spring. On the other hand, Mr. R. remarked that the first cost of the boxes is greatly against them, and while tenants gladly employ them if provided by proprietors, the general preference otherwise appears to be for "small yards for 10 or 12 beasts, on two sides of which are warm and wide open sheds."

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The character of the soil is such that draining is not necessary except for the purpose of cutting off springs, when one or two drains will dry an area of perhaps three or four acres. Sainfoin, succeeds well here, a plant that seems to require the presence of chalk or lime to flourish to advantage. Calcareous material may be cheaply had by using lime from gas works-on the subject of which there has been considerable inquiry here during late years. Mr. R. thought it might be a useless, or even a very destructive application, if not rightly employed. His way I understood to be, to spread about three tons per acre upon the land after harvest, for the turnips to be sown in June or the mangolds sown in May of the succeeding year. The price of this gas lime was only 62 cents for a load of about a ton and a half. Salt, which costs say $5.75 per ton, is also a common manure, applied at about two cwt. per acre, with an equal amount of guano for barley or oats after a wheat crop, as on a portion of the land a double grain crop is thus often taken.

As we walked out among the fields that refreshing English summer evening, after an American summer's day, the management of the white thorn hedges was among the subjects that came up, and I remember at least one practical suggestion. It is found better to trim them with a hook, than with shears, for although the latter process is neater and quicker, it is said to produce knots, while the hook gives a clean, healthy cut. I remember too, our sitting under the trees upon some benches in the simple contrivance of which I should have thought there might have been a touch of Yankee ingenuity, and which I should despair of rendering intelligible without the aid of a diagram. The seat was provided with

a

a low back, and was itself composed of two boards, attached by hinges at a, as shown in the accompanying section, so that one of them with the back (b) would turn over and form a roof for the rest of the seat when not in use, keeping it dry and clean in all kinds of weather. One who has gone out in the early morning to find every garden chair a miniature pond, or a favorite roost for any stray bird that has reposed in the vicinity, will appreciate so ready a mode of protection.

In the morning my friend kindly drove me into the

railway station, in season for a train to Elmham, where Mr. FULCHER-to whom I had been indebted for the suggestion of this visit at and near Norwich, as well as for the means, through Mr. Read's acquaintance, of acquiring much information as to the general agriculture of the county was so obliging as to have a cart awaiting my arrival-and by a cart, I mean one of those very handy two-wheeled one horse vehicles, to which I have already alluded as universal there, and as being one of our as-yetunattained conveniences. I was under farther obligations to Mr. FULCHER, which it. will require another letter to explain, while I did not leave Plumstead, short as my visit there had been, without recollections of friendly attentions which I shall long cherish, and of much good farming of which I must again regret that I can now only present so detached and fragmentary a picture. ››

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[For the Country Gentleman and Cultivator.] NUTRIMENT ACCORDING TO SIZE, Ens. Co. GENTLEMAN-There are but few, I presume, more ready than myself to lay aside theory, however plausible, when it is disproved by practice. But there are some things that do not admit of being disproved by practice, or in any other way. If a man was to tell us that he had proved by practical experiment, that a whole acre of ground of any kind would be just as thoroughly irrigated with any given quantity of water, as half the same area, or that it takes no more fuel to generate 1,500 volumes of steam than 1,000; or no more motive power to run a factory with 14 sets of machinery, than 9 sets-however much confidence we might have in his practical knowledge and general correctness, we should of course give these statements no credence, but indulge in the reflection, if not in the remark-even this man, too, falls into errors. I have been to-day looking over some copies of the Co. GENT, which came while I was from home; and the above thoughts were suggested by reading an article from the pen of our friend JOHN JOHNSTON, in the paper issued 2d mo. 9th, in which he takes the strange position that "it takes no more to fat a steer that weighs 1,400 pounds live weight, than it does to fat one weighing 900 or 1,000 lbs.; and that the largest will always gain the most with equal feed, if they are of the same age." Also that "it takes no more feed to fat a lot of sheep averaging 140 or 150 pounds, than it does the same number averaging only 85 or 90 pounds." Or, in other words, it requires no more nutriment to sustain 1,400 pounds of animal organism of any given kind and quality, than to sustain 900 pounds of

the same.

it will require to bring a lot weighing 80 or 90 pounds up to 130 or 140 pounds. But if the position that 1,400 pounds of animal organism requires no more for its support than 900 pounds of the same kind, character and quality, age and all the attendant circumstances being alike, then I ask why should 2,000 or even 3,000 require any more than 1,000 ?

John Johnston says a steer fed 100 days, will gain more the last 35 than the first 65 days. This is no doubt corthin of flesh at the commencement. rect, so far as gain in weight is concerned, if the animal is It takes considerable time of liberal feeding to bring the animal organism up to the highest development of health and strength of which it is capable; and until this is accomplished, the major part of the nutriment is consumed in strengthening and expanding and giving tone to the vascular, and dilathe vital force, adding to the gastric juice and other fluids, ting the cellular system. But when the animal reaches this point, then all the food he is capable of digesting, beyond what is necessary to sustain him in present condition, is added either in natural growth or accumulations of fat. And here lies the rationale of several important facts. The circumstances must be very extraordinary if a man can afford to keep his cattle or sheep poor, or allow them at any time to get poor.

On the prairies of the west, where millions of tons of grass go to waste annually, a man, if very short of food in winter, may afford to let his cattle get thin, if they do not get so thin as to lose their health, because they will recuBut in the perate in the summer without cost to him. middle or eastern states, where food of all kinds is more valuable, it can scarcely ever be afforded. If a man does not feed his stock enough to keep them up to present condition, he loses not only what he feeds them, but a portion of animal flesh every day, and gets a little drib of poor manure in return. If he feeds them just enough to keep them up to present condition, he just has the manure for the feed and labor, unless there be an advance in the market for his class of animals from the time he commences feeding till he sells. But if he gives a little more feed, say as much as the animal can digest to advantage, it adds to the animal in natural growth and accumulations of fat, and he not only has the advantage of any general rise in the market, but he enhances the market value of the animal by making it of a superior quality, and in this way gets paid, not only for what he has added to the weight of the animal, but realizes an advance upon the entire weight. WM. H. LADD. Richmond, Ohio.

[For the Country Gentleman and Cultivator.] COTTON SEED MEAL.

MESSRS. EDS.-As I am now writing, I will give you I think this must be acknowledged to be a fair statement my opinion, for the benefit of Inquirer, of Cotton-seed of the position, for, if it took any more to sustain the meal. Early last spring, I had two cows which were near1,400 pounds in present condition, or in statu quo, than ly dry-they both giving but three quarts a day. I comthe 900, there could not be so much left to go to fat. And menced giving them three quarts apiece of the meal, mixnow I ask if these propositions are not just exactly equi-ed with cut meadow hay and straw, and they commenced valent to those above, and just as palpably erroneous? It seems to me the difficulty arises from drawing conclusions from partial and insufficient data. JoHN JOHNSTON tells us he arrived at this conclusion from feeding cattle meal in stalls, and finding the largest ones gaining the fastest. But he tells us he only gives them three to four quarts of meal per day, and feeds them hay in boxes in the yards, which they go to at pleasure; and further that this hay is of the very best quality.

Now is it not very plain that much the largest portion of the animal's gain is from the hay, of which he may eat as much as he pleases, and that the larger puts on more fat than the smaller animal, simply because he has the capacity to eat and digest more food. A steer that weighs 50 pounds more than another, because he is in that much better flesh, will not require so much food to keep him in that condition, as it will take to bring the other up to his condition; neither will a lot of sheep averaging 130 or 140 pounds, because they are fat, require anything like the food to keep them to that weight, or gaining a little, that

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to improve rapidly in flesh, soon having a coat as glossy and smooth as a well fed horse, and in three weeks time they gave between eight and nine quarts of milk per day, of very excellent quality. Now, considering the poorer quality of hay and straw that I am enabled to work up, I consider that cotton-seed meal and straw does not cost much more (if as much) than good English hay, besides keeping the cattle in much better order, and the manure is worth a third more.

This winter I have used over three tons of the meal. It costs at this place, one dollar and a half per hundred lbs. By its use I have been enabled to keep eight head of cows and a yearling, better than five cows were ever kept on the place before. I cut up all my hay, straw and stalks.

It made some of the old farmers stare last fall, to see me stocking up so much more heavily than common, some of them stating that I had not so much hay as would keep five cows, and that I must remember that if I had to buy hay it would cost pretty dearly before spring. But I had more confidence in the information that I derive from the

COUNTRY GENTLEMAN than in these searecrows which they set up. By feeding in this way, I have sold this winter two hundred dollars worth of milk. By not selling milk, I could have kept the same number of cows with half the amount of meal. GEO. D. FORISTALL. Holliston, Mass.

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is the Danthonia spicata of the botanist. It will grow in these old pastures and fields, where none of the better varieties are found. It is fast gaining foothold over large tracts of pastures and fields in nearly all the older and long settled portions of the hilly, rocky portions of New-England. And where the stock is kept summer and winter on this grass, the cattle generally have a hankering after bones. If cattle back in the interior do not find soda (salt) enough in their food, (and they seldom do,) the farmer usually feeds it to them. If he neglects this, they will let him know their wants, if there is an old meat or fish barrel comes within the reach of their tongues. A certain amount of iron is necessary for the healthy condition of the blood. Sometimes the assimilating vessels do not take up enough from the food for this healthy condition, and weakness follows. Upon application to the physician, he at once understands the "cause and the remedy." He at once administers some preparation of iron as a medicine. This restores the patient to health and strength. So in the case of bone disease. Ground bone is the remedy. But it would, if practicable, be a better way to supply the soil with the necessary phosphates, as has been extensively done upon the long grazed portions of Cheshire, Eng. If "A Subscriber," will place within reach of his cattle horn-piths, or other large bones, and they are eager for eating them, as is the case with the cattle here on many of our old farms, he may be pretty sure that there is a deficiency of phosphates in his hay. If he is not in the habit of giving his cattle salt, it is possible that the "nibbling" may in part be due to that. Please try both, and phos-report the result through the columns of the COUNTRY GENTLEMAN. "Do good and communicate." Warner, N. H., March, 1860. L. BARTLETT.

[For the Country Gentleman and Cultivator.] Cattle Nibbling their Mangers. MESSRS. EDITORS-"A Subscriber," in the Co. Gent. of March 8, inquires "the cause of cattle nibbling the manger and other boards within their reach, while tied in the stable." Doubtless he is right in his conjecture that it is caused by a lack of something in the soil, thereby rendering the hay deficient of something that is necessary to the health of the animal." Probably the hay is deficient in the "bone-forming materials," that is, phosphoric acid and lime. This is the case in some of the older settled sections of New-England, where the pastures have been long grazed, and the fields long mown, without having been top-dressed or otherwise manured. The soils of these old pastures and fields have become so exhausted of the phosphates, that the grasses do not yield to the cows enough of them to supply the daily waste going on in the bones and other parts of the system, and at the same time supply the large demand for phosphates, made by the milk secreting organs, or in furnishing the materials for building up the osseous frame-work of the embryo calf before its birth. Every 40 gallons of milk contain one pound of bone earth, besides other phosphates. The milk of a good cow in a year, contains, of earthy phate, as much as is present in 30 lbs. of bone dust. The milk, and the annual calf, if sold off the farm, and the wasted urine (allowing only one-third of this to run to waste,) of a good cow, annually removes from the soil as much of earthy phosphates as is contained in 56 lbs. of bone-dust. Now it is not surprising, that the grasses of some pastures and fields, that have been grazed and mown for 80 or more years, are deficient in the necessary phosphates, the bone-forming materials of animal food. Cows and young cattle, thus poorly fed upon these innutritive grasses, whether in their green or dried state, instinctively turn to the proper remedy, and neglect no opportunity to gnaw upon any old bones they may be able to find. In the absence of these, they seek out old boots, shoes, or other leather, or "nibble their manger and other boards within their reach." Says Prof. Johnson of Yale-"The results of continued feeding on such poor pastures, are a loss of health on the part of the cows, especially manifested in a weakening or softening of the bones-the bone disease, that is not now uncommon in our older dairy districts."

[For the Country Gentleman and Cultivator.J CHEAP DRAINING.

MESSES. EDITORS-Having noticed an article in the August number of the Cultivator 1859, on subsoiling and ditching plows, I had some ditching to do, but had no ditching plow, and being a small farmer, and not able to get all the new and improved tools, I resolved to try it with a common plow. I commenced by plowing three furrows (all from one way,) about ten inches wide. These were pulled out with a dung hook. I then went up one side and down the other with the plow, thereby loosening about six inches of the subsoil, which was then shoveled out. The plow was then passed up and down again, and the loose dirt shoveled out as before; then plowed again, keeping one horse in the ditch until it got so deep that the whippletrees rubbed on the edge of the ditch so that the plow could not go to a sufficient depth. I then plowed with one horse putting him in the ditch, using a short whippletree that would not rub on the sides of the ditch, thus plowing and shoveling out the loose dirt until I got the ditch from three feet to three and a half deep. I then put in stones, putting a row on each side of the ditch, leaving an open passage in the middle, from three to four inches square, covering over with larger ones. I then put in small stones until the ditch was nearly half full. I then put some straw on the stones, and plowed the dirt in dis-again with two horses, putting them both on one side of the ditch, and as near it as possible, so that the dirt would Cows and young cattle grazed in newly cleared pastures fall in on the straw, and when the straw was covered, I and the clover fields of Western New-York, and fed input one horse in the ditch, and as the earth was all thrown winter on roots, grain, and good English hay, are not out on one side of the ditch I passed the plow along in troubled with the bone disease. Roots, grain and English the ditch, thereby smoothing and settling the earth down hay, can only be grown where the soil is naturally rich, when going one way, and filling in while going the other or artificially made so by the application of manure. In way, until the ditch was about full. I then turned a fur either case the soil contains all the necessary constituents row on the ditch, from each side, thereby ridging it up of plants, and as a sequence, the crops contain all the higher than the ground around it by turning five or six necessary elements (including the phosphates) for the furrows toward the ditch on each side. healthy growth and sustenance of the cattle.

The disease can be partially remedied by directly feeding finely ground bone meal to the animals, mixed with salt or provender of some kind. Two or three gills weekly will answer. Within the past ten years, I have procured many barrels of fine bone-dust, such as is made at the button-mold factory at Brighton, near Boston. Besides, some of our traders keep it for sale as a "medicine for bone-sick cows."

Some persons who write for the agricultural papers, say this story about a lack of phosphates in the soil, bone ease, &c., is all a chimera—an idle fancy.

I believe there are many farmers who think as I did But the condition of the soil and crops are quite differ- that none but experienced ditchers could dig a ditch. By ent from the above, in those districts where the bone dis-doing it when the ground is neither too wet nor too dry ease of cattle prevails. These old pastures and fields year any common farm hands with a common farm team ma after year only produce a light crop of poor, innutritive ditch as easily as to do common farm work. grass, known as the "wild oat grass, white top," &c. It doubt but that tile is better and more durable for under

I have n

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