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FLAX

Change the seed every season. This will greatly increase the quantity, and improve the quality. In nothing else is it more important. In Ireland, the great flax-growing country of the world, they always sow foreign seed when it can be procured. American seed is preferred, and brings the highest price. Experiments with different seeds, on varieties of soils, are much needed. Changing from all the soils and latitudes of our country would be useful. The general rule, however, as with all seeds, is to change from colder to warmer regions.

Soils.—The best are strong alluvial soils. Any soil good for a garden is good for flax. As much clay as will allow soil soon to become dry and easily to be made mellow, is desirable; black loam, with hard, poor clay-subsoil, is also good. Mellow, friable soils are not more important to any other crop than to flax. Land must not be worked when too wet. The land should be rich from a previous year's manuring. Salt, lime, ashes, and plaster, are good applications to flax after it has come up. On light soil with bad tillage, when the flax was so poor that the cultivator was about to plow it up, the application of three bushels of plaster, in the morning when the dew was on, produced a larger yield of better flax from an acre than adjoining growers got from two acres of their best land.

FLOWERS

Floriculture is an employment appropriate to all classes, ages, and conditions. No yard connected with a dwelling is complete without a flower-bed. The cultivation of flowers is eminently promotive of health, refinement of manners, and good taste. Constant familiarity with the most exquisite beauties of nature must refine the feelings and produce gentleness of spirit. Association with flowers should be a part of every child's education. Their cultivation is suitable for children and young ladies in all the walks of life.

House-plants, and bouquets in sick-rooms, are injurious; their influence on the atmosphere of the rooms is unhealthy. But the cultivation of flowers in the garden or yard is in every way beneficial. We earnestly recommend increased attention to flowers by the whole American people. The necessary limits of our article will allow us to do but little more than to call attention to the subject. Those who become interested will seek information from some of the numerous works devoted exclusively to ornamental flowers.

Flowers should be planted on rather level land, that the rains may not wash off the seeds and fine mould. Choose a southern or eastern exposure whenever practicable. Avoid, as much as possible, planting in the shade.

Soil—Should be a deep, rich mould, neither too wet nor too dry, and should be enriched with a little compost, every year.

Sowing the Seeds is a most important matter in cultivating flowers. Many fail to come up, solely on account of improper planting. The seeds of most flowers are very fine and delicate. Planted in coarse earth, they will not vegetate; planted near the surface in a dry time, they usually perish. It is best to cover all small flower-seeds, by sifting fine mould upon them; and if the weather does not do it, use artificial means to keep the soil suitably moist until the seeds are fairly up. Stir the soil gently often, and keep out all weeds. It is always best to plant the seeds in rows or hills, with small stakes to indicate their location; you can then stir the ground freely without destroying them. Flowers usually need more watering than most other plants. The usual application of water to the leaves by using a sprinkler is injurious; it may be better than no watering at all, but is the worst way to apply water. Make a basin in the soil near the plants, and fill it with water. The selection of suitable varieties for a small flower-garden is quite important. We shall only mention a brief list. Those who would make this more of a study, are recommended to study "Breck's Book of Flowers," which is quite as complete for American cultivators as anything we have. The principal divisions are, bulbous flowering roots, flowering shrubs, and flowering herbs—annual, biennial, and perennial—the first blossoming and dying the year they are sown; the second blossoming and dying the second year, without having blossomed the first; the last blossoming, and the top dying down and coming up the next spring, for a series of years.

Bulbous Flowering Roots.—These need considerable sand in their soil. They should be taken up after the foliage is all dead, and if they are hardy, put the soil in good condition, and dry the bulbs and reset them, and let them remain through the winter. They may need slight protection, by spreading coarse straw, manure, or forest-leaves over them late in the fall; but all the more tender bulbs do better kept in sand until early spring. The best list with which we are acquainted, for a small garden, is the following: the well-known lilies, the tulips, gladiolas, hyacinths, Feraria tigrida, crocus, narcissus, and jonquils.

Flowering Shrubs.—The following is a select small list: Roses, as large a variety as you please, out of the hundreds known; flowering almond, Indigo shrub, wahoo or fire-shrub, the mountain-ash, althea, snowball, lilac, fringe-tree, snow-drop, double-flowering peach, Siberian crab, the smoke-tree, or French tree, or Venitian sumach, honeysuckle, double-flowering cherry.

The list of beautiful herbaceous flowers is very lengthy. We give only a few of those most easily raised, and most showy; the list is designed only to aid the inquiries of those who are unacquainted with them: superb amaranth, tri-colored amaranth, China and German astors—the latter are very beautiful—Canterbury bell, carnation pinks (great variety), chrysanthemum (many varieties and splendid until very late in autumn), morning glory or convolvulus, japonicas, Cupid's car, dahlias, dwarf bush, morning bride or fading beauty, fox-glove, golden coreopsis (we have raised a variety that proved biennial, which was superb all the season), ice-plant, larkspur, passion-flower, peony, sweet pea, pinks, sweet-williams, annual China pink, polyanthus (a great beauty), hyacinth bean, scarlet-runner bean, poppy, portalucca, nasturtium, marigolds (especially the large double French, and the velvet variegated), martineau, cypress vine.

FOWLS

We are glad to believe that the hen mania, that has prevailed so extensively during the last fifteen or twenty years, has considerably abated. After all the extravagant notions about the profits of hens shall have passed away, the truth will be seen to be about the following: Every farmer who has considerable waste grain about, and plenty more to supply the deficiency when the fowls shall have gathered up all the scatterings, had better keep a hundred hens. If he has sand and gravel, and wheat-bran and lime for shells, within their reach, and plenty of fresh water, they will do well, without much further care, in mild weather. In cold weather in winter, keep not more than forty hens together, in a tight, warm place, well ventilated; give them their usual food, with burnt bones pounded fine and mixed with mush, given warm, with occasionally a little animal food and boiled vegetables, and they will lay more than in summer. They will lay all winter without being inclined to set. Every family, who will treat them as above, may profitably keep one or two dozen through the winter. Most persons who undertake, with a few acres of land, to keep fowls as a business, will lose by it. A few only of the most experienced and careful can make money by it. It may be cheapest for some persons to raise a few chickens for their own use, although they cost them more than the market-price, though it would not be best to raise chickens in that way to sell. "But some one raised the chickens in market for the market-price, and why not I?" Because, they raised a few that got fat on waste grain, and you must buy grain for yours, and give more for it than you can get for your chickens. Whoever would make money by raising fowls on a large scale, must first serve some kind of an apprenticeship at it, as in all other business. Get this experience, and learn by experiment the cheapest and most profitable food, and keep from five hundred to a thousand fowls, and a reasonable though not large profit may be realized. For store-fowls, boiled vegetables and beets cut very fine, with a little meal mixed in, are a good and cheap feed. When keeping fowls out-door in warm weather, keep no more than fifty together, and them on not less than one fourth of an acre of land. The expensive hen-houses and artificial nests are mostly humbugs. Have many places of concealment about, where they can make their nests as they please. When a hen begins to set, remove her, nest and all, to a yard to which layers have no access, and you need have no difficulty with her. Set a hen near the ground, in a dry place, on fifteen fresh eggs, all put under her at once, and they will hatch about the same time at the end of twenty days. Old hens, of the common kind, are best to set. Let them have their own way in everything but running in the wet with their young chickens—and that they will not be much inclined to do if they are well fed. Much is said about the diseases of fowls and their remedies. We have very little confidence in any of it. Sick chickens will die unless they get well. Time spent in doctoring them does not generally pay. Wormwood and tansy, growing, or gathered and scattered, or steeped and sprinkled about the premises occupied by hens, will protect them from small vermin. Never give them anything salt or sour, unless it be sour milk. The eggs of ducks, turkeys, or geese, may be hatched under hens. Time, thirty days. Hence, if put under with hens' eggs, they must be set ten days earlier, that they may all hatch at once. Fattening chickens may be well done in six days, by feeding rice, boiled rather soft in sweet skimmed milk, fed plentifully three times a day. Feed these in pans, well cleaned before each meal, and give only what they will eat up at once, and desire a very little more. Put a little pounded charcoal within their reach, and a little rice-water, milk, or clear water. This makes the most beautiful meal at a low price. Never feed a chicken for sixteen or twenty-four hours before killing it.

Varieties or Breeds.—This has been matter of much speculation. The result has been (what was probably a main object) the sale of many fowls and eggs at exorbitant prices. When chickens have sold at fifty dollars per pair, and eggs at six dollars a dozen, some persons must have made money, while others lost it. Yet, there is some choice in the breed of hens. The kind makes less difference, as far as flesh is concerned, than is usually imagined. It requires about a given quantity of grain to make a certain amount of flesh. Large fowls give us much larger weight of flesh than small ones, but they also eat a much larger quantity of grain. Large fowls are certainly large eaters. The three best layers are the black Polands, the Malayas, and the Shanghaes. Half-bloods, by crossing with the common fowl, are better for this country than either of the above, pure. Fowls are generally improved by frequent crossing. The best we have ever had, for their flesh, we produced by putting a black Poland rooster with common hens; they grew larger than either, and their flesh was very fine. Shanghaes and half-blood Shanghaes have proved permanently the best layers we have ever had. Early pullets make great fall and winter layers, and late chickens are great layers in the spring, when older ones wish to set.

Ducks we have considered in a separate article. We shall do the same with turkeys. Killing, dressing, and preparing all fowls for market, will be treated under the head of "Poultry." Geese will also be considered in another place. We should give drawings of aviaries, but we consider these generally worse than useless, as they are usually constructed. An airy place for summer, and a warm room for winter, poles with rough bark on for roosts, and plenty of feed and water, sand, gravel, and lime, will give abundant success.

FRUIT

The value of fruit is not fully appreciated in this country. As an article of diet nothing is more natural and healthy. The Creator gave this to man for food, when human nature, physically, was in its normal condition. And why meats have since been allowed, I know not, unless it be the reason why Moses allowed divorce in certain cases, although it was not so in the beginning, viz., the hardness of their hearts. Why the stomach, upon the healthy condition of which all physical, mental, and moral functions so materially depend, should be made the receptacle of dead animals, and especially those so long dead, as much of the meat offered in market, it would puzzle a philosopher to tell.

But we will not write an elaborate article on the healthfulness of a diet composed mainly of milk, fruits, and vegetables. Suffice it to say that experience and observation, as well as analysis and physiology, unite in demonstrating that ripe fruits contain virtues, that go far toward preventing the ordinary diseases of men. They are good, plain or cooked, and for sick or well persons, except in extreme cases. They regulate the bowels and control the secretions, better than any other article of food. They are so highly nutritious, that they sustain nature under arduous toil, better than either meat, fine bread, or the Irish potato. With proper care the fruits are cheaper than any other article of food. They can be raised cheaper than corn or potatoes. They may be enjoyed all the year, are profitable for market, and for food for animals.

FRUITFULNESS

Inducing it in Fruit-Trees.—Fruit-trees often grow luxuriantly, but bear no fruit, or very little. In nearly all cases the evil may be remedied. One remedy is shortening in. This is done by cutting off half the present year's growth in July. This checks the tendency of the sap to promote so large a growth, and forces it to mature blossom-buds for the next season. Another effectual means is to bend down all the principal branches and tie them down. This has a great influence in checking excessive growth and forming fruit-buds. Frequent transplanting has a tendency also to induce fruitfulness. Root pruning is one of the best means of securing this object. Lay bare the upper roots and cut off all the larger ones two feet from the tree. This will check excessive formation of wood and foliage, render the wood firm, and the organic matter of the sap will form abundance of fruit-buds. These methods will produce fruit in abundance on nineteen twentieths of barren or poor-bearing fruit-trees.

GARDEN

The garden has been the most delightful abode of man ever since his creation, before and since the fall. One of the most pleasant pastimes, for ladies and children, is gardening. The flower, vegetable, and fruit departments are all pleasant and healthful.

Situation of a garden is important. This varies with climates. In a cold country the warmest exposures are best, and in a hot climate select the coolest. A garden combining both is the best possible. The warmest exposure is good for early vegetables, and the cooler and more shady for the main crop. Much can be done to regulate this by fences and buildings. They will be warm and early on one side, and cool and late on the other.

Soil.—A rich loam is always best. To convert stiff clay, or light sand and gravel, into a good loam, is an easy matter on so small a plat as is usually devoted to a garden. Draw an abundance of sand on clay-ground, plow deep and mix well, and one winter's frost will so pulverize the whole that it will be in excellent condition. In warm climates, the incorporation of the sand with the clay is effected by frequent plowing and rains. On sand and gravel draw plenty of clay and loam, if it can be easily procured; thus it is easy to form a good friable, retentive loam, adapted to every variety of soil-culture. Decayed wood and forest-leaves are excellent for garden-soils. Manure well; but remember that it is possible to overfeed the soil of a garden, so as to render it unproductive. Deep plowing or spading is very important; it is the best possible remedy for excessive drought or unusual rains. The water will not stand on the surface when it first falls, and will be retained long in the soil for the use of the plants. The soil should be very mellow. Plowing or spading too early, in hope of getting earlier vegetables, is often a failure. The earlier the better, if you can pulverize the soil; otherwise not. Plowing when covered with a heavy dew, or when it rains gently, is equal to a good coat of manure. A garden should be on level land well drained; if much inclined, rains will wash off the best of the soil, and destroy many seeds and plants. No weeds should be allowed to grow to any considerable size in a garden. Early and frequent hoeings are important to success. Directions for the cultivation of each garden vegetable and fruit are given under each of those articles respectively. Methods of gardening at the South and the North vary but little in the main articles. At the North we have to guard against too much cool weather, and at the South against too much heat. Some vegetables that need planting on ridges in the North, to obtain more sun and heat, should be planted on level land at the South, to guard against too much heat and drought. Besides this, the main difference is in the time of planting, which varies more or less with every degree of latitude, or every five hundred feet of elevation. Have no fruit-trees in your vegetable or fruit garden, unless it may be a few dwarf-pears on the quince-stock, and these had better be by themselves.

The plan of a garden is a matter of taste, and depends much upon its size and necessary situation. We prefer ornamental shrubs in front of the house, the flowers adjoining it and passing the windows of those rooms that are constantly occupied, and the fruit-department in the rear of the flowers, while the vegetable-garden should be at the right or left of the fruit, and in the rear of the kitchen. On the other side of the house should be the larger fruit-trees, extending back as far as the fruit and vegetable garden, and in the rear of it, the carriage-house and other out-buildings. The best fence is of good wrought iron, sharp and strong enough to exclude all intruders. When this can not be afforded, a good hedge, made of the plants best adapted to hedges in your latitude, is preferred; next to this a good tight board-fence.

All fruit-gardens should have alleys, eight or ten feet wide, within four rods of each other, to afford space for carting on manures, &c. A vegetable-garden of one acre should have such an alley through the centre each way, with a place in the end, opposite the entrance, to turn around a summer-house, arbor, or tool-house. One rod from the fence, on all sides, should be an alley four or five feet wide; other small alleys as convenience or taste may require. The usual way is to sink the alleys three or four inches below the level of the beds, and cover with gravel, tanbark, shells, &c. We strongly recommend raising the alleys in their middle, at least four inches above the surface of the beds. The paths are always neater, and the moisture is retained for the use of the plants. Excessive rains can be allowed to pass off. This making alleys low sluice-ways for water is a great mistake in yards and gardens.

GARLIC

This is a hardy perennial plant, from the south of Europe, and has been in cultivation, as a garden vegetable, for hundreds of years. It is cultivated as the onion, and needs much ashes, bonedust, and lime, in the soil. It is much esteemed in some countries, in soups. It is but little used in the United States: it is used at the South as a medicinal herb. We know of no important use of garlic for which onions will not answer as well, and therefore do not recommend garlic as an American garden vegetable. Those who wish to cultivate it will pursue the same course as in raising onions from sets. This will always be successful.