The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1882-04-20

that the family consist of eight
souls-mother, father and six chill
dren, from fourteen to four years old.
We now attempt the task of giving
the details of management by which
this family may be abundantly pro-
vided with a generous living. First,
let it be promised, that it will re-
quire a system, and one persistently
pursued after its adoption, as well
as time to mature the whole of the
plan, we are about to suggest
Some capital to start out with of
course indispensable. 1 speak in
the interest of those who have
homes of their own, and who do not
intend to live on wheels. Well, to
begin: Our eight in family will not
possibly need more than one hundred
bushels of corn meal. This can be
made; yea, should be made, by every
one worthy to belong to ''Kirkwood
Grange or any other grange, on
four acres. 1t will not be long be-
fore we will be willing to confess
that every acre we plant in corn
does not return us thirty bushels.
Every one of our sister readers will
admit that for the family we are
now feeding, nine barrels of flour
would be an abundant supply
This will require forty-fve bushels
of wheat, which should be produced,
and might be easily raised, on three
acres. We then have a quarter of
an acre in sweet potatoes, yielding
100 bushels, which would allow for
twenty-five weeks a half bushel of
Irish potatoes, and of that delicious
and sustaining vegetable, (or fruit,
rather sweet potatoes, nearly a
b1shel a week for the entire year.
One good COW, or two Indifferent ones,
will furnish $50 gallons of milk
say for two hundred days-four
gallons each day. From this milk,
at twelve quarts or thereabout to
the pound, we would have about
three hundred pounds of butter a
year, with the butter milk. The
peas raised on our four acres of corn,
with the hay from half an acre of
cast peas, will give an abundant
supply of the best milk giving food
to these two COWS. With the
borders of our gardens set in lucerne
which from the middle of February
TO the last of summer may be cut
every month, the supply would be
uperabundant. Thirty hens will
supply 1,200 eggs or three hundred
chickens. An orchard of apple
trees consisting of twenty-five trees,
standing on just a quarter of an
acre, will at five years old, give
seventy-five bushels Of apples, an
allowance of three bushels of fruit
for every week, six months in the
year. Now add the fruit from
twenty-five peach trees, less than
your writer has on one acre of land
and you have for present use, dry
ing, preserving, not less, perhaps
than one hundred bushels of the
most refreshing and healthgiving
nourishment ever vouchsafed TO
man. Now add the sixteenth of an
acre in small fruits-strawberr
raspberries, and currants, goose
berries, ETC., for the consumption of
the family or for other more needed
things, and we think the most en-
larged expectations in this particu-
lar might be gratified. We have
not yet provided for lard and meat.
The yield of five hogs, kept in stye
and well fed, will produce between
800 and 1000 pounds of meat and
lard which, with the butter already
provided for, would be an abun-
dance. If these five hogs, for the
ten months they were kept up, did
not have a morsel furnished from
the garden, the kitchen or the CLEAN
ings of the field, they could be fully
fattened on one quart of meal a day,
cooked in mush, for each animal.
This would require about 45 bushels
of meal, which could be raised on
one acre and half
We have said nothing of our
horse, with which all this corn,
wheat and other stuff is to be made.
A horse may be kept the year round
in livery stable on seventy eight
bushels of corn, and 1900 pounds
of hay and fodder. With the pas
turage of farm, fifty bushels of corn
and 1,500 pounds of hay would be
ample provision. This would re-
quire two acres in corn and less than
one-half acre in clover and pea-vines.
Let us go back, now we have laid
the foundation in the essentials and
indispensables, and tell of the
seventy-five pounds of honey that
three hives would produce; the
grapes at the rate o a ton TO the
acre that twenty-five Concord vines
would give us; the vast amount OF
the best food enjoyed by the human
race, which should be produced on
one quarter of an acre in the vege-
table garden, and the kids or lambs
! which few acres of enclosure or
the unnumbered acres of our com
mons would support.
Let us now recapitulate.
We asked for four acres for corn
bread, three for wheat, one acre in
| clover OI pea y HIS 1Oi nay III hpASS
and two cows, for the orchard one
acre, for potatoes three-quarters OF
an acre, for garden a quarter of an
acre-the total sum making, we be
lieve, just twelve acres and a quarter.
High farming, such as a Granger
should not be ashamed of, viii ac-
complish all l have assumed in this
paper, and much more, on about
one-half the surface. Indeed, the
small farm system and the reform
which is one day to grow out Of it,
can only be perfected by high cul-
ture. After all, it is true economy,
and will, in one short decade be the
prevailing practice and doctrine.
Now we are about through with
our task. which from the first was
intended rather rs a suggestion to
vou. my friends, than a finished and
exhaustive detail. But as far as we
have gone, we ask you to pause with
us at the conclusion of what we
have offered to your serious thought
and say in what is our plan defec-
tive and untenable. Do we place