Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1871-05-24
Aoricul tmral.
The Way one Large Farm is damaged.

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At the American Institute Farmers Club,
committee was appointed to visit . Beacon
Farm NOrthport, Long Island. The com
mttee made the following report
In 1868 there were on the place six or
eight cows, pair Of mules, horse or two,
ami over three hundred head of MerinO sheep.
They ma de about IS loa, of manure. he
500 acres Of arabic land was cut into twenty
or more small fields, divided from each other
by old hedge rows, full of briars and small
cedars. Several hundred acres were in an
old common. that yielded scant pasture for
for two or three months in summer. Much
of this common was over grown, with oak
bushes, little cedars and hickory stunts.
Now We fnd the farm stocked with S2hOrned
cattle, OF suTe.ior thoroughbred stock, 50
horses, 81 sheep, rs hogs, 300 hens, ard
IS ducks, and be buys no bay no com or oats,
no roots. lie has fifty acres in one clover
field. The sole outlay for cattle food, is
about $500 for wheat shorts. Instead of IS
loads of manure, we estimate his compost
piles for this spring and summer. to con
tain 1000 loads.
Manure making with this vigorous farmer
rs not theOTy-an eff 1T and wish merely
AS 1t is with thousands. He makes it
There are the immense banks of it standing
a fathOm deep in the main stock yard and
looming above II burrows of all the plOwed
fields. Ills compost pile is not winters ac
cumulatiOns thrown into the yard from sta
BILE doors and windows to be hauled in the
field IN April and May. Manure making
composing goes the year round no day
IN winter so frozen but il sees additions to
the piles of fertilizers No summer morning
without its round Of chores that swell the
heap. "Everything,' he says, - must have
a mother and manure Is the mother of all
things He keeps an OK team, and has
IL l. Il
hauling absOrt ants and composing stuff.
His task is, five loads before dinner ard five
after dinner Of leaves from the woodlands
muck, weeds and salt mud. HIS calcula zion
is that the solid dropplngs of COW or OK
amount to something like ten loads in a year
and that ten loads of muck and leaves should
be composted with it. For manure making
be says four sheep quail a co !, horse equals
two cows, and two hogs equal cow.
Pasture land he does not believe in.
Young animals and mich cows should have
a small range, and run in it an hour or two
for exercise. But quarter of mile day
is all the walk mich COW nee1s. ThI
forcing COW to T tnge over a wide reach OF
hill and swamp and moor and wood for the
material to make milk of Is, he insists, the
crying sin of American darymen. He is a
thorough believer in cooking for all farm ami
mails IN winter, and cutting green food al.
summer. Beginning, for instance, with May,
he goes through the year as follows: May.
old hay, the last oil stalks and roots, and rye
June, clover, and oats. September, sowed
corn, soft heads of cabbage October and
November, turnip tops, corn, beet tops and
roots. November 5 to May ) boiled food
corn stalks, bay and roots teamed together
and sprinkled with meal and shorts, the rate
being about four tons roots to one Of stalks
and hay. He used Prindle's boiler large size.
and a double steam box.
The stalks and roo : are all cut fine.
shoveled into a box, and the steam let On
In about six hours it Is 50 soft that a stick
can be pushed through it. 1t is allowed to
cool to the temp erature of the blood before II
Is given to the animals His roots, Swcdes.
mangUlds and carrots are grown in the fol
lowing manner Draw burrows say two feet
apart, and fill them with manure: then cover
with n double fuTTOw and roll fiat, and open
enough to receive the seed, cultivate with
hoTse-hOe. On land not remarkably fertile
he gets thirty five tons to the acre allow
ing thirty bushels to the ton that crop il
1000 bushels. lie harvests by ploug ching
them out, first clipping the tops while IN the
GROUND with hoe then he harrOws over
the field, lifting Il c teeth as the roots become
entangled, then dump carts 90 on. and gath
er and throw them into long piles by the
road. These piles are covered with tops.
straw and Garth, and loads arc taken daily a.
they are to the barn. With 5000 loads Of
manure be has enough to dress thirty acre.
heavily, and all his Swedes were large, as al
so his carrots many of them, taken from any
part of the pile, measuring three inches
across the crown. lie cut sixty tons Of hay
and we saw at least twenty vet in tic BARI,
middle OF March) for bis dependence is up
on roots. lie had thIrty-two acres in root
IN 1870, and estimates his crop at so, coo
bushels.
Besides these crops be has made extensive
and permanent amellorations. Bushes hay,
been grubbed up, fences rebuilt on all Of thu
place, tn ugh old pastures thoroughly plow-
ed, the forests trimmed and raked, Young
groves Of locusts nursed, gates hung, high
fences built, and roads graded. He has the
best milk house We have ever seen, not ex-
cepting the famous dairies OF Delaware coun-
ty, west of Philadelphia. HIS hog pens are
commenced on excellent me del, but 10
describe all these and bis system in come :
ton with them, would be to write a treatise
on butter and pork making. We submit
this az report Of progress, and have given
the chief features Of his faith as an agricul-
tural thinker, and his practice as a success
full farmer. Nor have we said these emphat-
ic things from a wish to praise Mr.. Crozer
but simply TO let farmers know how striking
the real success of their profession are.