The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1868-03-25
Northern Farming in Florida.

A Florida correspondent Of the Boston Ad
vertiser says that the cotton and lumber busi
ness in that State, as conducted by Northern
ers. has not been success. The business was
overdone, and the returns were less than the in.
vestments. The irrepressible Yankee has, how
ever, concluded to try again. The writer says
These misfortunes have not discouraged i'm
migrants or immigration. Many cotton plant
ers have returned, it is true but many more
remain, and are turning their attention to
other products. Here we see the difference in
the character of the people. The Yankee is a
man of resources Cotton failing, he tries
something else. but the Floridian who has
his fields lie waste. He may talk OF sugar or
oranges, but he does not show his faith BY his
works. OF the new enterprises and new ex-
periments in the State, nine-tenths are made
by Northern men, who form but an inconsider-
able fraction of the whole population.
Perhaps the most important of these expert
ments is market gardening. New Enganders,
who had spent year IN this cEmate, were
struck by the fact that garden vegetables ma
tured here about three months earlier than in
the North. They observed, also, that many
vegetables planted in the fall were ready for
the table in mid winter. The soil produced
vegetables very well, and it was inferred that,
with the prices paid for early vegetables in
Northern cities, market garden could be
made the source Of great profit.
These market gardens, so far as l know, are
all owned by Northern men. They propose to
furnish the Northern markets with green peas
in March, Irish potatoes in April and May,
melons in May and June, tomatoes in May,
and lettuce, radishes, cucumbers, turnips, &c.,
every month in the year. The estimated profits
are fearful to contemplate. Nothing less than
$1,000 an acre is thought Of. Three hundred
bushels to the acre is not at all a large crop OF
tomatoes; $40 bushel is the common price for
them in New York in May, and it cost less than
81 8 bushel to ship them. Ten less one is
nine. Nine times three hundred is twenty
seven hundred.
AS an offset, the writer mentions the fact
that the seasons are treacherous, that frosts
in March often bite shrewdly, and that such
frost would reduce s2700 an acre to mere
nothing. Then again the means OF shipment
are yet limited, and if the crops prove profta-
BILE, and vessels 90 engage in the trade, prices
would 20 down and the profits on the acre
would be materially diminished. In that case,
however, there would still be handsome re-
ward to the farmer. AS to the average crop,
the writer says
Almost all the market gardeners have planted
their grounds with orange trees, and indeed,
almost every Yankee on the St. Johns, what
ever may be his business, has young orchard
of from fifty to thousand trees. The hun
dreds of immigrants to the Indian River are
planting groves as well; and on the banks OF
Lakes Griffin and Harris, and the Ohlamaha
River, find new groves everywhere On the
Gulf Coast am told, there is similar activity
in planting. A few are grating the trees where
they stand in the hammocks, thus securing
groves without transplanting. A Northern
man on Lake Griffin bought forty acres OF
hammock land, cleared away the other trees
and left standing $500 orange trees to graft.
lars he will secure a grove which, at present
m prices, would yield thousand dollars an acre
within four years.