Soil Culture

ENDIVE

This is a well-known winter-lettuce. Sow from July to September, according to latitude. It should come into maturity at the time of the first smart frosts. To get beautiful, white, tender bunches, they should be tied up when the leaves are about six inches long. When frost comes, protect by covering. In very cold climates, place it in the cellar, with the roots in moist earth, and it will keep for a long time. It will not be extensively used in this country for soups and stews, as it is in Europe; and but few of the American people care much about winter-lettuce. This is the best variety of lettuce, except for those who have hot-houses and attend to winter-gardening. They will prefer the other finer varieties. There are two varieties of endive cultivated in this country: green curled, which is the most common, and used principally as a salad; the broad-leaved, or Batavian, has thicker leaves and large heads, and is principally used in stews and soups. Still another variety, called succory, which is used to some extent in Europe as a winter-salad, but is cultivated mainly for the root. It is dried and ground to mix with coffee: some consider it quite as good. This is more cultivated at the South than at the North—their winters are much better adapted to it. The medicinal virtues of this plant are nearly equal to those of the dandelion. When it is bleached, by tying or earthing up, the bitterness is removed, and the taste is pleasant; this must be done when the plants are dry, or they will rot. Plant them in a sunny place and in a light soil.

FEEDING ANIMALS

Feed as nearly as possible at the same hours. All creatures do much better for being so fed. Do not feed domestic animals too much: animals will be more healthy, grow faster, and fatten better, by being fed almost, but not quite as much as they will eat. Giving food to lie by them is poor economy; always let them eat it all up, and desire a little more;—at the same time, let it be remembered that creatures kept very poorly for a considerable time, especially while young, will never fully recover from it. This is often done under the idea of keeping them cheap, but it is dear keeping. They never can make as fine animals afterward.

All grains and vegetables, except beets and turnips, are better for being boiled or steamed. The increased value is much more than the cost of cooking, provided persons are not so careless as to allow food to be injured by standing after cooking. Cooking is supposed to add one fourth to the value of food. Grinding dry grains adds nearly as much to their value, as feed for animals, as cooking. If you neither grind nor boil hard grain for feed, it will pay well to soak it somewhat soft before feeding. Variety of food is as pleasant and healthy for animals as for men.

FENCES

These are matters of great importance to the farmers of the whole country, but especially to those on the prairies of the west.

In all localities where stone can be obtained from the fields or quarry, the best and cheapest fence is a stone wall. If the stones are flat, make the wall two feet thick at bottom, and one at top, five feet high. If the stones are very irregular the wall should be thicker. Stone walls should have transverse rows of shingles, boards, or split sticks, about half an inch thick, laid in the wall at suitable distances. If stones are quite flat three rows are desirable, one two, the next three, and the other four feet from the ground. If the wall is made of rough stones it will require one more course of sticks, leaving them only a foot apart. The sticks should be of such lengths as to come out just even with the wall, on each side. The lower courses will be longer than the upper ones. These sticks are to keep the wall from falling down. Dig a ditch one foot deep, two feet from the wall, and throw the earth excavated up against the wall, and the water will run off and prevent heaving by frost, and such a wall will need the merest trifle of attention during a generation, and will last for centuries. A cord of stones will make one rod. We can not too strongly recommend this kind of fence, in all places where stones can be obtained reasonably. The pieces of wood laid in a wall, will keep well for thirty years, when they will need replacing. Next to stone is a good board fence. Well made and of good materials, it is durable and always in its place. Hence it is a cheap fence.

Of the various styles of picket, and other fancy fences for front yards, &c., it is more the province of the architect or the mechanic to treat. Styles vary and are constantly increasing in number. The great point to be secured in all such, to render them most durable, is to have the smallest possible points of contact. A picket fence with horizontal base should never have the pickets standing on the base board. They should be separated, from one quarter to one half an inch. A good style for villages, is a cap, water tight, and wide enough to cover the ends of the posts and pickets with a neat little cornice. It looks well and is very durable.

In all localities where timber is not too valuable, a cheap and substantial fence is made of split rails. The crooked rail-fence, with stakes and riders, is well known. Also that with upright stakes and caps, which is decidedly preferable. It will stand much longer, and the stakes are out of the way. No farmer should ever risk his crop with a rail-fence without stakes. But the best of all rail-fences, is that made of posts and rails. The rails are put in as bars, but so firmly that the fence can not be taken down, without commencing at the end. Where cedar or locust posts, and oak or cedar rails can be obtained, a fence may be made that will not get out of repair for twenty-five years. No creature can tear it down, for human hands can not take it down without tools, or without commencing at the end. This is considered expensive. But as the farmer may prepare his posts and rails in winter, and it will require no attention to keep it up, and is very durable and perfectly effectual against cattle, it is an economical fence. For hedges, see that article.

FENNEL

This is a hardy perennial plant of Southern Europe, and belongs to both the culinary and the medicinal departments. It grows well on almost any soil, and is propagated by seeds, offshoots, or by parting the roots. It is much inclined to spread. A few roots, kept within reasonable bounds, are enough for a family. It is much used in Europe for soups, salads, and garnishes. The Italians treat it as celery. In this country it is mostly used medicinally. It is stimulant and carminative. Very beneficial to children in cases of flatulency and colic.

FIGS

This fruit is native in the warmer parts of Asia: hence, the cold winters of the Middle, Northern, and Western states, and of Canada, would destroy the trees in the open air without protection. But as the trees are low-growing shrubs, they may easily be protected either in cellars, greenhouses, or the open air, and uncovered or planted out in the beginning of warm weather. Frequent removals and transplantings injure the fig less than any other fruit, and our summers are long enough to produce large crops of excellent figs. In New England they are raised in tubs, set out of the cellar in spring, and produce largely. South of Virginia, the fig is hardy, and may be cultivated with profit in the open air. The best method of raising all kinds of fruit, in climates where the winters are too cold for them, is to build a wall twelve feet high on one side, and six feet on the other, with the ends closed, and cover it with glass facing the south. This should only be kept warm enough to prevent freezing, which would require only a small outlay. Men of moderate means might thus have oranges, lemons, figs, &c., of their own raising. In all except our coldest latitudes, such fruits might be raised at a profit.

Soil.—The best is a deep, rich loam, with a dry subsoil.

Propagation is by layers and cuttings. The latter should be taken off in the spring, be of last year's growth, with half an inch of the previous year's growth: they take root better.

Varieties are numerous, and names uncertain. White, in his Gardening for the South, says, some of the best varieties are not in the books, or so imperfectly described that they can not be recognised. This is true of all the fruits, and hence our decision, in this work, not to attempt to describe fruits with a view to their identification. As this fruit is more for the South than the North, we give the whole of White's list, as being adapted to those regions:—

1, Brunswick; 2, Brown Turkey; 3, Brown Ischia; 4, Small Brown Ischia; 5, Black Genoa; 6, Celestial; 7, Common Blue; 8, Round White, Common White, Lemon Fig; 9, White Genoa, White Italian; 10, Nerii; 11, Pregussatta; 12, Allicant; 13, Black Ischia; 14, White Ischia. These, with a few others, are those described in most of our fruit-books. The catalogue of the London Horticultural Society enumerates forty-two varieties. Only a few of them have been introduced into this country. Any of these varieties are good at the South. The five following are the most hardy, and, being in all respects good, are all we need in our more northern latitudes:—

1. Brunswick.—Very hardy, productive, and excellent.

2. Brown Turkey.—The very hardiest, and one of the most regular and abundant bearers.

3. Black Ischia.—Bears an abundance of medium-sized, excellent fruit, very dark-colored.

4. Nerii.—Said to be the richest fig in Britain: from an acid mixture in its flavor, it is exceedingly delicious.

5. Celestial.—This may be the "Malta" of Downing. Under whatever name, though small, it is one of the very best figs grown in this country.

For forcing under glass, the best are the Allicant and Marseilles. With care, the first three of the above list may be raised in the Middle states, without removal in winter. Any variety may be protected by bending and tying down the branches, and covering with four inches of soil. Below Philadelphia, a little straw will be a sufficient protection.

Dried figs are an important article of import into this country; yet they might be raised as plentifully and profitably in the Southern states. Prune only to keep the tree low and regular. The fig-tree is a great and regular bearer, only when the wood makes too strong a growth, as it is somewhat apt to do. The remedy is root-pruning. Cut off, on the first of November, the roots to half the length of the branches from the tree, and occasionally shorten the branches a little, and the fruit will be abundant, and not fall off. The ripening of the fruit may be hastened and perfected by putting a drop of oil in the blossom-end of each fig. This is done by dipping the end of a straw in oil, and then putting it into the end of the fruit. This is extensively practised in France. Compost, containing a pretty liberal proportion of lime, is the best manure for the fig.

FISH

The cultivation of fish is attracting much attention in this country and in Europe. The study and experiments of scientific and practical men have established important facts upon this subject. Fish may be successfully cultivated wherever water can be conveniently obtained. The creeks, ponds, and small rivers of our land may be well stocked with fish. Fish may be raised as a source of profit and luxury, with as much ease and certainty, and at a much less expense than fowls. This is so important to the whole people, that it demands the earnest attention of our state authorities, as it has engaged that of the government of France. The species of fish best adapted to artificial culture, in particular climates and in different kinds of water, have been ascertained. A man may know what fish to put in his waters, as well as what crops to put on his land, or what stocks on his farm.

The following brief synopsis of the best methods of cultivation will be sufficient to insure success. The first requisite is suitable water for hatching eggs that have been artificially fecundated, and for the occupancy of fish of different ages, and for different species of fish. Fish of different ages are much inclined to destroy each other for food; and hence, in order to multiply them most rapidly, they should be kept in separate ponds until considerably grown, when they will take care of themselves. A spring sending forth a rivulet of clear water, and not subject to overflow in freshets, is the best location. Clear, cool water is essential to the trout, while some other fish will do well in warm and even roily water. The rivulet running from the spring should be made to form a succession of ponds, three or four in number. These ponds should be connected with flumes made of plank. If the space they must occupy be small, make the flumes zigzag, to increase their length. Put across those flumes, once in four or five feet, a piece of plank half as high as the sides of the flume, with a notch cut in the centre of the top, that the fish may easily pass over: this will afford a succession of little falls, in which the trout very much delights. These different ponds are for the occupancy of fish of different ages, one age only inhabiting one pond. The flumes should have four inches of fine and coarse gravel in the bottom, making the most perfect spawning-ground. Although you would not wish the female-trout to deposite her eggs in the natural way, but will extrude them by the hand (as hereinafter directed), yet they must have these natural conveniences, or they will not incline to spawn at all. At the upper end of each of these flumes separating the ponds, there should be a gate of wire-cloth, to prevent the passage of the fish from one pond to the other; also one at the outlet of the lower pond, to prevent egress of the fish. These must all be so arranged that freshets will not connect them all together. When trout are about to spawn in their natural waters, they select a gravelly margin, and remove, from a circle of about one foot or two feet in diameter, all the sediment, leaving only clean gravel, among which they deposite their eggs, where they are hatched. They want running water of three or four inches in depth for this purpose. A male and female occupy each nest. If left to themselves, they will gradually increase; but so many of their eggs fail of being fecundated, and so many are destroyed before they hatch, by enemies, and by the collection of sediment in the nest, that the number of young fish is small compared with the whole number of eggs deposited. Artificial spawning, fecundation, and hatching, are far more productive. The process is simple and easy: when the female-fish first begins to deposite her eggs, catch her with a small net. It can not be done with bait, for fish will bite nothing at the time of spawning. We recollect, often when a boy, of trying to catch trout out of the brooks in October, where we could see large, beautiful fish, lying lazily in the places from which we had caught many in the summer, and put our bait carefully on every side of them, and they would not bite. Then we knew not the cause: since studying the habits of fish, we have learned that they never will bite while spawning; with trout, this is done from the 1st to the 15th of October, some few spawning till the last of November. Having caught two fish, male and female, take the female in one hand, and press her abdomen gently with the other hand, gradually moving it downward, and the eggs will be easily extruded, and should fall into an earthen vessel of pure water. Then take the male-fish, and go through the same process, which will press out the spermatic fluid, which should be allowed to fall into the same vessel with the eggs; stir up the whole together, and, after it has stood fifteen minutes, pour off the water, put in more and stir it up, and let it stand as before. This having been done three times, the eggs will be thoroughly fecundated, and are ready to be deposited in the nests for hatching. If the fish are caught before the time of beginning to spawn, the eggs and the spermatic fluid will not be mature, and will be only extruded by hard pressing, and failing to be fecundated, the eggs will perish. The fluid from one male will fecundate the eggs of half a dozen females. These eggs may be hatched in the flumes described above, though hatching-boxes are preferable. The old fish can be returned to the water, and may live many years and produce thousands of fish. These fish, carefully treated and fed, will become so tame as to eat out of your hand, like the "Naiad Queen" of Professors Ackley and Garlick, of Cleveland, Ohio. Among all the hatching apparatus we have seen described, we regard that of the above professors at Cleveland the best. To these gentlemen the country is much indebted for the knowledge derived from their zeal and success in fish culture. At the head of a spring they built a house eight by twelve feet; in the end of the house toward the spring they made a tank four feet wide, eight feet long, and two feet deep; this was made of plank. Water enters the tank through a hole near the top, and escapes through a similar one at the other end, and is received into a series of ten successive boxes, each one a little lower than the preceding one. These boxes were eighteen inches long, eight inches wide, and six inches deep. These were filled to the depth of two inches with clean sand and gravel. The impregnated eggs were scattered among the gravel, care being exercised not to have them in piles or masses. Clean water is necessary, as the sediment deposited by impure water is very destructive to the eggs. If it be seen to be collecting, it should be removed by agitating the water with a goose-quill or soft brush, and allowing it to run off; continue this till it runs clear. But there is a method of preventing impurities in spring-water, that will be always effectual: just around on the upper side of the spring make a tight fence two feet high, and it will turn aside, and cause to run around the spring, all the water that may flow down the rise above in time of rains. The house being near the head, there will not water enough get into the spring, in any storm, to roil the water. On the side of the boxes where the water escapes should be wire-cloth, so fine as not to allow the eggs to pass through. Such an apparatus will be perfect. This great care is only necessary for trout. All other fish worthy of cultivation, will only need spawning-beds on the margin of their pond. A convenient hatching apparatus is a number of wicker-baskets, fine enough not to allow the eggs to pass through, set in a flume of clear running water.

The method of Gehen and Remy, the great fish-cultivators of France, whose efforts and discoveries have contributed more to this science than those of any, if not of all other men, was to place the eggs in zinc-boxes of about one foot in diameter, having a lid over them—the top and sides of the boxes pierced with small holes, smooth on the inside; these boxes were partly filled with clean sand and gravel, and set in clear running water. M. Costa's method, at the college of France, is to arrange boxes in the form of steps, the top one being supplied with water by a fountain, and that passing from one to the other through all the series, and the eggs placed on willow-hurdles instead of gravel.

Another very simple method may be arranged in the house. It is a reservoir—a barrel or cask—set perhaps two and a half feet from the floor, and a little hatching trough a few inches lower, into which water gradually runs through a faucet, from the reservoir. This water running through the hatching-box, escapes into a tub a little below. Whatever plan be adopted, great care is necessary in preventing sediment from depositing. Cleanliness is a principal condition of success. The eggs of the trout thus fecundated and deposited in October or November will hatch in the spring. Young trout need no feeding for a month after leaving the egg. There is a small bladder or vesicle under the fore part of the body, when they first come out, from which they derive their sustenance. After this disappears, or at the end of about a month, they should be fed, in very small quantities. Too much will leave a portion to decay on the bottom and injure the water. The best possible food (except the angle-worm) is lean flesh of animals, boiled and hashed fine for the young fish. The flesh of other kinds of fish, when they are plenty and not very valuable, would be very good. These young fish should be kept in the first pond until a year old. Then let them into the second pond, closing the gate after them, to make room for another brood in the first pond. The next year let them into the third, and those into the second that are now in the first, and so on till the fourth. In the last pond, those of different ages will all be large enough to take care of themselves. But sometimes a trout two years old is said to swallow one a year old. But when they get to be three or four years old, this sort of cannibalism ceases. These principles can be carried out in small streams, by constructing gates to keep sections separate, and by forming banks and waste ways for water, with wire gates so high, that the water will not overflow in freshets, and carry the fish away. In taking trout use angle-worms or the fly. A fine light-colored small line is best. They are very shy. The following is a list of other fish, beside the trout, that are well worthy of cultivation:—

Black Bass.—When full grown, this fish is from twelve to eighteen inches in length. One of the better fish for the table, and profitable to raise in a pond covering not less than half an acre. Chub, being a very prolific little fish, may be kept in the same pond as food for the black bass and other large fish. They are very fond of them. Minnows are the best bait for these fish, though they will bite a trolling hook of any ordinary kind. You may raise them as given for the trout above, or allow them to deposite their eggs in spawn beds of their own selection in their pond. They will do well in water less pure than is demanded for the trout.

White Bass.—Not so large as the black bass. Seldom weighs more than two pounds. One of the best for food. Thrives well in small ponds. Requires the same treatment as the preceding. Spawns in May and hatches soon. Easily caught, as he is a great biter, at almost any bait.

Grass Bass or Roach.—One of the most beautiful of the bass kind, and as a panfish highly esteemed. It prefers sluggish water, and hence is well adapted to small artificial ponds. Spawns in May. May be treated as the preceding. Bites the angle-worm well, and several other kinds of bait.

Rock Bass.—A small fish seldom reaching a pound in weight, but is fine and very easily raised in small ponds of any kind of water. Spawns in May and may be treated in all respects as the rest of the bass family, only it will flourish well in quite small ponds.

Pickerel.—Is one of the best of fish, weighs from three to fifteen pounds. Suitable only for large ponds. Spawns early in the spring in the marshy edges of sluggish water. The eggs may be procured and treated as the trout, only cold running water is not necessary. Best caught by trolling. It is not a good fish to raise with others, as it is apt to eat them up.

Yellow Perch.—Is everywhere well known as a beautiful little fresh-water fish, and good for the table, at all seasons when the water is cool. Perfectly hardy and adapted to sluggish waters, it is one of the best for artificial ponds. Treat like all the preceding; or allowed to take its own course in the pond, it will increase rapidly.

Sun-Fish.—Rarely weighs more than half a pound, but is a good pan-fish. This and the grass bass and yellow perch may be put together in the same pond.

Eels.—May be cultivated with great success in almost any water. But we are so prejudiced against them, never consenting to taste one, that we can not speak in their favor. Of the methods of introducing fish into our rivers and creeks, from which they have nearly all been taken by the fishermen, it is not our design to treat. That subject may be found fully presented in treatises on fish culture, and should command the immediate attention of the authorities in all the states.