The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1875-04-06
SsrifultnraI department.
CONDUCTED BY ALBERT CHAPMAN
Natural Laws, and their rela-
ton to the Farmer.
CONTINUED

ny HoS y. D. DOUGLAS, OF WHITING.
Continued.
BOTANY.
We should know something of the
structure of our plants, the functions of
their different parts, their classification,
and the terms employed in their
description. Learn to detect imper-
fiction, and TO select the most perfect
seeds, and such varieties of plants as
are best adapted to u given locality, TO
the supply of our own wants and the
wants of the market, Our seeds must
possess perfectly developed germs, be
selected from those plants which by a
long course of good culture have at
tanned the most perfect and symmet-
rical development, and have assumed a
fixed character. Plants, like animals,
may be improved, or by bal manage.
ment may become dwarfed and sickly.
The vigor, the life principle of which 7
have spoken, which the germs of all
healthy seeds possess, may be so re-
duced in its vitality by continued bad
culture, that the rootlets of the plant
will not penetrate the best soils
sufficiently to take up the nutriment
necessary to produce a large crop. A
weak and sickly growth and light yield,
is not always attributable to the soil
which produces it, or to the seasons,
but may often be attributed to previous
bad culture. Of such crops, we say that
the seed has run out, and like produces
its like again. Good culture is but the
observance and application of natural
laws, and bad culture implies their
violation.
AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY.
1t is for us to learn the constituents
of our soils, and also of those plants
which we would grow upon the
different varieties. If all the elements
which enter into the composition of
our plants do not exist in the soil or
atmosphere, it is useless to expect to
mature a crop. That field which once
produced thirty or forty bushels of
wheat per acre. and now produces but
ten, when to the casual observer all the
conditions which ensure good crop
seem equally favorable, when carefully
analysed, will be found to have lost
some of its essential elements, taken
from it, ordinarily, by previous crop
ping. 1t may prove that but one
element is wanting, and that one which
may be easily and cheaply supplied,
while all the others may be present in
abundance. 1t is for us to learn the
cause of failure, whatever it may be,
and apply the cheapest and most effec-
tive remedy.
This implies, also, Il thorough knowl
edge of the constituents of the manures
which we apply, that we may not waste
our money by the purchase and appli-
cation of such elements as the soil
already contains in sufficient quantities
or of those spurious fertilizers which
do not possess the virtues claimed for
them by their vendors. Nature per-
forms no miracles. She can not produce
aperfect work without proper materials
with which TO build, any more than
the mechanic or artisan, but with them,
and favoring circumstances, she per-
forms wonders.
EXHAUSTION OF SOILS.
We should know what crops are
least, and what most exhausting to our
soils, that we may not rob nature of
her material with which to build, and
that we may correctly compute the
profits derived from the production of
each. The cost of seed and labor, and
the amount of our receipts for the crop,
are not the only items which make up
the account by which we determine
our profits. We may receive twice the
income from a field of tobacco that we
do from the same field when in clover,
and after allowing for the difference in
the cost of seed and labor, and also for
the exhaustion of plant food from our
soil, find the clover to be much the
most profitable crop. The tobacco may
have robbed our soil of constituents
much more valuable for the growth Of
future crops than the value of the extra
amount received for the crop itself.
We must know and appreciate the
fact that the farmers wealth is based
upon the plant food deposited in his
soil. If We ignorantly, or purposely,
draw upon that deposit until it is ex-
hausted, we, as farmers, must become
bankrupt. Natural laws, indeed, aid
us in the restoration, but by too slow
process to answer our purpose. We
must, like the banker, husband our
deposits, and learn to make the most
of them; to raise such varieties of crops
as will bring the best pecuniary returns
after deducting the cost of seed and
labor, and also replacing the draft upon
our deposits.
PREPARATION OF SOILS.
1t is ours to understand what
mechanical condition of our soils will
promote the most rapid growth, and
best protect our crops from extremes of
both drouth and moisture, and how to
prepare them in such a manner that
the rootlets of our plants may readily
penetrate them in search of food and
moisture. 1t is practicable to so pre-
pare them that they will support a
luxuriant growth of vegetation, when
other fields present by drought, a
parched and withered appearance, OF
from excessive moisture, Il dwarfed and
sickly heritage; to provide against any
unnecessary delay in sowing our seeds
in spring, and thereby cause so early
maturity as not TO endanger our crops
by frost.
LANDSCAPE GARDENING.
Our dwellings, whether expensive
nd oil NJ oh