News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1884-05-01
FARM AND GARDEN.
A Few SeasonabIe Notes of Interest TO the
Farmer.


A great deal may be done IN improv-
ing such seed as corn, which is very
susceptible to local conditions. An early
Northern corn planted in the South soon
lengthens its season of ripening, while
a late Southern kind planted in the
North becomes earlier each year until
it is acclimated. For this reason it is
best to keep to one variety which has
some good qualities and continue to
grow it, giving it every chance to i'm
prove. Many farmers do this, and some
have seed which is the result of many
years cultivation, some having been
grown on thes farm for forty, fifty, or
more years. Such corn may be called
thoroughbred, and usually yields very
largely.
HOW TO BREED CORN.
Plants may be bred precisely as ami
mails are, and by selection of parents and
good care and feeding may be improved
in similar manner. Corn is easily in
fuenced in this way, and in six or seven
years may be wholly changed in charac-
ter. The ears become longer; the rows
more numerous; the cob smaller, and,
which is of the most importance, every
stalk bears an ear and some two or
more, but one good ear to a stalk is
enough to make 40 or $50 bushels of
grain to the acre. 1t is done by select
ing the best ears for seed to begin with.
These are planted in good soil, well fer
tilted and well cultivated. As the
plants come into blossom every stalk
that has no ear is cut out before the
tassel is mature and can shed its pollen.
The purpose of this is to prevent the
barren stalks from fertilizing the others
and reproducing their worthless kind.
1t is the barrenness of large number
of the plants which so greatly reduces
the yield of the crop, and it is very i'm
portant to prevent this. In few years
these barren male plauts-which are as
useless in a corn-field as surplus bulls or
a lot of steers in a dairy herd dis
| appear, and every plant is perfect one,
producing both tassel male howers) and
silk female fiowers.) As the corn i'm
| proves, the best ears for length, number
of rows, smallness of cob, and depth of
| grain are yearly chosen, and in time the
variety becomes fixed and can be pre-
served pure.
| OATS SEEDING
! There is no reason whv oats should
not be sown early this year. Fall
plowed ground that is dry might have
been sOwn for week past with great
advantage. 1t is not generally under
stood that oats require a long season
and some cool weather to produce
plump, heavy grain; and it is because
of this that the Nova Scotia, New-Bruns-
/ wick, and Scotch oats are so heavy.
Some years ago sowed New Brunswick
oats in March on fall-plowed ground, oil
which the top was dry enough to be well
narrowed, while the subsoil was still
frozen. The crop weighed AZ pounds
to the measured bushel, which was 9
pounds more than the seed weighed.
Some of the same seed sown n month
later. but harvested in the same week,
weighed only 35 pounds to the bushel.
This occurred more than 20 years ago,
and since then / have had similar ex.
perience repeated. Early sowing is in
dispensable to have heavy oats. / have
found that this grain will sprout at a
temperature of % degrees.