PRESERVING FRUITS, &c
The essentials in preserving fruits, berries, and vegetables, during the whole year, are, a total exclusion from atmospheric action, and, in some vegetables, a strong action of heat. We have a variety of patent cans, and several processes are recommended. The patent cans serve a good purpose, but, for general use, are inferior to those ordinarily made by the tinman. The patent articles are only good for one year, and are used with greater difficulty by the unskilful. The ordinary tin cans, made in the form of a cylinder, with an orifice in the top large enough to admit whatever you would preserve, will last ten years, with careful usage, and they are so simple that no mistakes need be made. It is usually recommended to solder on the cover, which is simply a square piece of tin large enough to cover the orifice. Soldering may be best for those cans that are to be transported a long distance, but it is troublesome, and is entirely unnecessary for domestic use. A little sealing-wax, which any apothecary can make at a cheap rate, laid on the top of the can when hot, will melt, and the cover placed upon it will adhere and cause it to be air-tight. All articles that do not part with their aroma by being cooked, may be perfectly preserved in such cans, by putting them in when boiling, seasoned to your taste, and putting on the covers at once. The cans should be full, and set in a cool place, and the articles will remain in a perfect state for a year. The finest articles of fruit, as peaches and strawberries, may be preserved so as to retain all their peculiar aroma, by putting them into such cans, filled with a sirup of pure sugar, and placing the cans so filled in a kettle of water, and raising it to a boiling heat, and then putting on the cover as above; the heat expels the air, and the cover and wax keep it out. Stone jugs are used for the same purposes, but are not sufficiently tight to keep out the air, unless well painted after having become cold. Wide-mouthed glass bottles are excellent. But, in using glass or stone ware, the corks must be put in and tied at the commencement, leaving a small aperture for the escape of steam, and the process of raising the water to a boiling heat must be gradual, requiring three or four hours, or the bottles will be broken by sudden expansion. Make the corks air-tight by covering with sealing-wax on taking from the boiling water. Some vegetables, as peas, beans, cauliflowers, &c., need considerable boiling, in order to perfect preservation. Tin cans may stand in the water and boil an hour or two, if you choose, and then be sealed. The bottles should be corked tight, have the cork tied in, and then be immersed and boil for an hour: take them out, and dip the cork and mouth of the bottles in sealing-wax, and all will be safe.
By one of these processes, exclusion of the atmosphere and thorough boiling, we may preserve any fruit or vegetable, so as to have an abundance, nearly as good as the fresh in its season, the whole year, and that at a trifling expense. All fruits and vegetables may also be preserved by drying. By being properly dried, the original aroma can be mostly retained. The essentials in properly drying are artificial heat and free circulation of the air about the drying articles. Fruit dried in the sun is not nearly so fine as that dried by artificial heat. An oven from which bread has just been taken is suitable for this purpose; but a dry-house is better. A tight room, with a stove in the bottom, and the fruit in shallow drawers, put in from the outside, serves a good purpose. Construct the room so as to give a draft, the heated air passing out at the top, and the process of drying will be greatly facilitated, and the more rapid the process, without cooking the fruit, the better will be its quality. This process is applicable to all kinds of vegetables. Roots, as beets, carrots, parsnips, or potatoes, should be sliced before drying. The object in drying the latter articles would be to afford the luxury of good vegetables for armies and ships' crews, in distant regions, and in climates where they are not grown. Milk can be condensed and preserved for a long time, and, being greatly reduced in quantity, it is easily transported. It is not generally known in the country that Mr. Gail Borden, of New York, has invented a method of condensing milk, fresh from the cow, so that it will perfectly retain all its excellences, including the cream, and by being sealed up in tin cans, as above, may be kept for many months. The milk and the process of condensation have been scientifically examined by the New York Academy of Medicine, and pronounced perfect, and of great value to the world. We have used the condensed milk, which was more than a month old; it had been kept in a tin can without sealing and without ice, but in a cool place. It was sweet and good, differing in no respect from fresh milk from the cow, except that the heat employed in condensing it gave it the taste of boiled milk. If kept in a warm place, and exposed to the atmosphere, it may sour nearly as soon as other milk: but it may be sealed up and kept cool so as to be good for a long time. The condensation is accomplished by simple evaporation of the watery part, in pans in vacuo. No substance whatever is put into the milk. Four gallons of fresh milk are condensed into one. When wanted for use, the quantity desired is put into twice the quantity of water, which makes good cream for coffee; or one part to four of water makes good new milk; and one part to five or six makes a better milk than that usually sold in cities. Steamers now lay in a supply for a voyage to Liverpool and return, and on arrival in New York, the milk is as good as when taken on board. The advantages will be numerous. Such milk will be among regular supplies for armies and navies, and for all shipping to distant countries. All cities and villages may have pure, cheap milk, as the condensation will render transportation so cheap that milk can be sent from any part of the country where it is most plenty and cheapest. The process is patented, but will be granted to others at reasonable rates, by Borden & Co.; and eventually it will become general, when farmers can condense and lay by, in the season when it is abundant, milk for use in the winter, when cows are dry. This will make milk abundant at all seasons of the year, and plenty wherever we choose to carry it. It will also save the lives of thousands of children, in cities, that are fed on unwholesome milk or poisonous mixtures. There is no temptation to adulterate such milk, for the process of condensation is cheaper than any mixture that could be passed.
Preserving hams is effectually done by either of the following methods. After well curing and smoking, sew them up in a bag of cotton cloth, fitting closely, and dip them into a tub of lime-whitewash, nearly as thick as cream, and hang up in a cool room. This is a good method, though they will sometimes mould. The other process, and the one we most recommend, is to put well cured and smoked hams in a cask, or box, with very fine charcoal; put in a layer of charcoal, and then one of hams; cover with another layer of coal and then of hams, and so on, until the cask is full, or all your hams are deposited. No mould will appear, and no insect will touch them. This method is perfect.
Another process, involving the same principles as the preceding, is to wrap the hams in muslin, and bury them in salt. The muslin keeps the salt from striking in, and the salt prevents mould and insects.
PUMPKIN
There are some five or six varieties in cultivation. Loudon says six, and Russell's catalogue has five. The number is increasing, and names becoming uncertain. Certain varieties are called pumpkins by some, and squashes by others. The large yellow Connecticut, or Yankee pumpkin, is best for all uses. The large cheese pumpkin is good at the South and West. The mammoth that has weighed as high as two hundred and thirty pounds, is a squash, more ornamental than useful. The seven years' pumpkin is a great keeper. It has doubtless been kept through several years without decay. Pumpkins will grow on any good rich soil, but best on new land, and in a wet season. Do best alone, but will grow well among corn and better with potatoes. A good crop of pumpkins can seldom be raised, two years in succession, on the same land. Care in saving seed is very important. The spot on the end that was originally covered by the blossom, varies much in dimensions, on pumpkins of the same size. Seeds from those having small blossom-marks, bear very few, and from those having large ones, produce abundantly.
They are good fall and winter feed for most animals. They will cause hogs to grow rapidly, if boiled with roots, and mixed with a little grain. Fed raw to milch cows and fattening cattle, they are valuable. Learn a horse to eat them raw, and if his work be not too hard, he will fatten on them. They may be preserved in a dry cellar, in a warm room as sweet potatoes, or in a mow of hay or straw, that will not freeze through. But for family use they are better stewed green, and dried.
QUINCE
This fruit, with its uses, for drying, cooking, marmalades, flavors to tarts and pies made of other fruits, and for preserving as a sweetmeat, is well known and highly esteemed.
The quince is rather a shrub than a tree. It should be set ten feet apart each way, in deep, rich soil. It needs little pruning, except removing dead or cross branches, and cutting off and burning at once, twigs affected with the insect-blight, as mentioned under pears. The soil should be manured every year, by working-in a top-dressing of fine manure, including a little salt.
Propagation—is by seeds, buds, or cuttings. Budding does very well. Seedlings are not always true to the varieties. Cuttings, put out early and a little in the shade, nearly all take. This is the best and easiest method of propagation.
There are several varieties; the apple-shaped, pear-shaped, and the Portugal, are the principal.
The apple-shaped, or orange quince (and perhaps the large-fruited may be the same) is, on the whole, the best of all. Early, a great bearer, and excellent for all uses. The pear-shaped is smaller, harder, and later. It may be kept longer in a green state, and therefore be carried much farther. The only reason for cultivating it would be its lateness and its keeping qualities. The Portugal quince is the finest fruit of all, but is such a shy bearer as to be unprofitable. The Rea quince is a seedling raised by Mr. Joseph Rea, of Greene county, New York, and is pronounced by Downing "an acquisition." The fruit is very handsome, and one third larger than the common apple or orange quince. The tree is thrifty, hardy, and productive. It is a valuable modification of the apple-shaped or orange quince, superior to the original. Such varieties may be multiplied and improved, by new seedlings and high cultivation.
RABBITS
To prevent rabbits and mice from girdling fruit-trees in winter, is very important to fruit-growers. The meadow-mouse is very destructive to young trees, under cover of snow. Rabbits will girdle trees after the green foliage on which they delight to feed is gone. Take four quarts of fresh-slaked lime, the same quantity of fresh cows' dung, two quarts of salt, and a handful of flour of sulphur; mix all together, with just enough water to bring it to the consistency of thick paint. At the commencement of cold weather, paint the trunks of the trees two feet high with this mixture, and not a tree will suffer from rabbits or mice. Treading own the snow does good, but it is very troublesome, and not a perfect remedy. Experience has never known the foregoing wash to fail.
RADISH
This is a well-known root, eaten only raw, and when young and tender. A rich sandy soil is best. Like most turnips, the roots are more tender and perfect when grown in rather cool weather; hence, those grown in early spring are better than a summer growth. They do well in an early hotbed.
The Scarlet and White Turnip-rooted are fine for early use. They are always small, but fair, and very early.
The Scarlet Short-top comes next, and is a very fine variety. These may be had through the whole season, by sowing at proper intervals; hence, others are unnecessary. Other good varieties are the Summer, or Long White Naples; Long Salmon, a large, gray radish, not generally described in the books (a splendid variety in southern Ohio); and the Black Spanish for fall and winter use. This grows large like a turnip, and is preserved in the same way. The best method of guarding against worms is to take equal quantities of fresh horse-manure and buckwheat-bran, and mix and spade them into the bed. Active fermentation follows, and toadstools will grow up within forty-eight hours, when you should spade up the bed again and sow the seed; they will grow very quickly, be very tender, and entirely free from worms.
Radish-seed is sown with slow-vegetating seeds, as carrots, beets, parsnips, &c. The radishes mark the rows, so that they may be cleared of weeds, and the ground stirred before the plants would otherwise be discernible, and also shade the germinating seeds and the young plants from destruction from a hot sun. The radishes may be pulled out when the main crop needs the ground and sun. For this purpose the scarlet short-top variety is used, because the long root loosens the soil in pulling; and as the crown stands so much above the surface, they may be crushed down with a small roller, and thus destroyed without the labor of pulling. Sowing radish-seed among root-crops, and cultivating early with a root-cleaner, an acre of roots can be raised with about the same labor as an acre of corn.
RASPBERRY
The common black raspberry we have noticed elsewhere as one of the most profitable in cultivation. The other varieties, worthy of general cultivation, are the Franconia, the Fastollf, the red, and the white or yellow Antwerp. Any good garden-soil is suitable for raspberries. It should be worked deep, and have decayed wood and leaves mixed with barnyard manure and wood-ashes. In all but very cold latitudes, raspberries should be planted where they may be a little shaded. None of the finer old varieties produce a good crop of fruit without winter-protection. The canes may live without it, but will bear but little fruit. The best method of protection is to bend down the canes at the beginning of winter, before the ground freezes, and cover them lightly, with the soil around them. They should first have some well-rotted manure put around the canes. Stools should be four feet apart, and have about five or six canes in a stool. Cut away the rest. The best of all manures for raspberries is said to be spent tan-bark. Put it around in the fall to the depth of two inches; work it into the soil in the spring, and put around fresh tan-bark, to the same depth.
The varieties for general cultivation are few. The common black is one of the best. The common wild American red, native in all the Middle and Eastern states, is greatly improved by cultivation. As it is perfectly hardy, and a great and early bearer, it should have a place in every collection. The Franconia is a fine fruit, and, among those generally cultivated, occupies the first place. The yellow Antwerp is fine-flavored and good-sized, but too soft for a general market-berry. The same is true of the Fastollf. The red Antwerp is good, but quite inferior to the new red Antwerp, or Hudson River Antwerp. The Ohio Evergreen is a new variety, hardy, prolific, and a long bearer, fine fruit in considerable quantities having been picked on the 1st of November. On this account, it should be in every garden. There are two kinds of red raspberries brought to notice by Mr. Lewis P. Allen, of Black Rock, N. Y., that deserve extensive cultivation, if they warrant his recommendation. Mr. Allen says he has cultivated them for a number of years, and, with no winter protection, they have borne a large crop of excellent fruit every year, pronounced by dealers in Buffalo market superior to any other variety. Should these varieties prove equally good elsewhere, they deserve a place in every garden in the land.
RHUBARB
There are several varieties of rhubarb now in cultivation.
The Victoria, Mammoth, and Scotch Hybrid, all of which (if they be really distinct) are fine and large, under proper culture. There is much of the old inferior kind, which generally affords only small short leaves, and which is of no value, compared with the large varieties. The method of growing is very simple, and yet the value of the plant depends mainly on right cultivation.
Propagation is by seeds, or by dividing the roots. By seed is preferable. The idea that the largest kinds will not produce seed is incorrect. We raised four or five quarts of seed from a single plant of the largest variety, in one season. Young plants are suitable for transplanting after the first year's growth. They should be set three feet apart each way. The soil should be thoroughly enriched and trenched two feet deep, with plenty of well-rotted manure in the bottom, and mixed in all the soil. Plant the crowns two or three inches below the surface to allow stirring the ground in the spring, without injury. After this they will only want enriching with well-rotted manure in rather liberal quantities, worked in with a fork in the fall or spring. Covering up with manure in the fall is good. Those who raise the largest leaves, lay bare the crowns in spring, and with a sharp knife, remove all the smaller crown-buds. The leaves will be greatly reduced in number, but increased in size. We have often seen a single stem of a leaf that weighed a full pound.
The roots live many years. We know a single root, in St. Lawrence county, N. Y., from which we ate pies and tarts twenty-two years ago, and which is now so vigorous as to yield more than a supply for two families through the season. The only care it has ever had, has been liberal supplies of well-rotted manure. The seed stocks have generally been broken off. They should always be, unless you wish to raise seed, then save one or two of the strongest. New crowns come out on the sides, from year to year, until each plant will cover a considerable space. The one mentioned, as being twenty-two years old, has never been moved during the whole time. It is not the giant kind, but the leaves are large and long. Rhubarb has a better flavor and requires much less sugar, by blanching. This is best done by placing an old barrel, without a bottom, over the hill as it begins to grow. The leaves will grow long, with white tender stems. Use it when the leaves are half or full grown, as you please.
RICE
This, in its value to the world as an article of food, is next to Indian corn. It is the main article of diet for one third of the human race. It is produced only in certain parts of the world, and its cultivation is so simple and easy, and so much a department of agriculture by itself, that we omit directions for growing it. The ravages of the rice-weevil, so destructive to rice lying in bulk, are prevented by the application of common salt, at the rate of half a pound to the bushel.
ROCKS
We frequently find, on some of our best land, large boulders, very hard, and too large to be removed, with any team we can command, and which would be in the way, in any place to which we might remove them. The best way to get rid of them, when it can be afforded, is to burn or blast them into pieces small enough to be easily handled. When this can not be afforded, the best method is to make an excavation by the side of them, deep enough to let them sink below the reach of the plow, and allow them to fall in, being careful not to get caught by them.
ROLLER
This is quite as indispensable to good farming and gardening as any other tool. It serves a great variety of useful purposes. The first is to pulverize soils. No man can get a full crop on a soil not made fine on the surface, however rich that soil may be. It is often the case that land needs rolling two or three times before the last harrowing and sowing the seed. Another purpose is, on all light soils, to place the soil close around the seeds after they have been covered. When this is not done, seeds will vegetate very unevenly, and, in dry weather, some of them not at all. Another advantage of rolling a field-crop is the greater facility and economy with which it can be harvested. It makes a level, smooth surface, sinking small stones out of the way of the scythe or reaper. Rolling makes grass-seed catch, when sown with a spring-crop. All beds of small seeds—as onions, beets, carrots, parsnips, &c.—should be rolled after planting. It will so smooth the surface, that hoeing and cultivating can be done without injury to the plants. The rows are also much more easily seen while the plants are young. Any crop will grow better and larger by not being too much exposed to the action of the atmosphere on its roots. When the soil is coarse, part of the seeds and roots are greatly exposed to the action of the atmosphere, and this exposure is very irregular. The roller so crushes the lumps and fills up the openings in the soil as to cause the atmosphere to act regularly on the whole crop. Few farmers stop to think that the pressure of the atmosphere on their soils is fifteen pounds' weight on every square inch, and that, hence, the air must penetrate to a considerable depth into the soil; and where the soil is coarse, the air enters too freely, and acts too powerfully for the good of the plants. Rollers are made of wood, iron, or freestone. For most purposes, wood is best. A log made true and even, or, better, narrow plank nailed on cylindrical ends, are the usual forms. From eighteen inches to three feet in diameter is the better size. Iron or stone rollers, in sections, are best for pulverizing soil disposed to cake from being annually overflowed with water, or from other causes.