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To the same.
LOW MOOR, 18th December, 1845.
SIR,—I promised to communicate to you the results of my attempt to grow wheat on the same land year after year, this being the fourth crop of wheat (the fifth white crop) grown in successive years on the same soil, and though I consider the crop an indifferent one, I don't think the failure ought in any degree to be attributed to the over-cropping, but to the wetness and coldness of the season, as well as other untoward circumstances hereafter to be mentioned.
In a former letter of mine of the 12th October, 1844—which was published in the "Guardian" a few days after—I gave an account of the crop of 1844, which was a very good one, being fifty bushels to the acre throughout the field, and as much as fifty-two bushels in the best part of it. This I considered so satisfactory that I had the field again ploughed up and sowed with wheat on the 9th October, 1844, and it is to the results of this crop that I wish to call your attention. As remarked in my former letter, the field was subsoil ploughed in the autumn of 1843, and this subsoiling was carried to such a depth that most of the drains in the field were more or less injured by it; and although this did no injury to the crop of 1844, owing to the very dry season, yet when the rain came in the winter of 1844, the want of drainage was found to be very prejudicial, and in the wet places large patches of the young wheat went off altogether, and there was a great deficiency of roots in many parts of the field; the long continuance of frost and after that the ungenial weather which continued so long in the spring (of 1845) were also unfavourable, yet with all these drawbacks the appearance of the plant after the growing weather did come, was very promising, and many of my friends predicted that I should have as good a crop as in 1844. On the 24th March I applied chemical manure of the same kind as I had done in 1844, at the rate of about 3 1/4 cwt. to the acre (costing 23s. 6d.), and a fortnight after I had it sowed with 2 cwt. of guano to the acre. When the warm weather came, these manurings seemed to help it wonderfully, and it was, as I have before stated, a very promising crop; but the cold, ungenial weather we had through a great part of the summer, and the continued rain we had whilst the wheat was in flower, destroyed all the former promise: and the manuring with guano, so far from being beneficial, was very injurious—so much so, that I believe every shilling's-worth of it applied to my wheat this year, made the crop a shilling worse than if nothing had been applied; and all ammoniacal manures had the same effect. It may be asked how I know it was the guano, and not the chemical manure. In answer to this inquiry, if made, I may observe, that I supplied two of my neighbours with the chemical manure, and they applied it without guano on very poor land, and they both assert they had never such good crops of wheat before; but everywhere in this neighbourhood, the only good samples of wheat that I saw or heard of were grown on exhausted soil. This appears to me to be a strong proof that chemistry has a great deal to learn before it can adapt its measures to all varieties of seasons, particularly as it cannot know beforehand how the season may turn out. If further proof be required of the injurious effect upon grain crops of ammoniacal manures in general, and of guano in particular, I may mention that in another field of wheat, sowed on the 21st December, and which did not come up until the frost broke, in March (the previous crop having been Swedes), the blade was so yellow and the plant altogether so small and sickly in appearance, that I had it manured with a water-cart from a cesspool in April. This appeared to produce a wonderful improvement immediately, as the plant assumed a deep green and grew very fast, but when it ought to have shot, the heads seemed to stick in the sockets, the blade and straw became mildewed and made no progress in ripening. It was not fit to cut for three weeks after the experimental field, although it was an early white wheat, and the result was a miserable crop—far worse than the experimental field. The instance of injury from the use of guano, I had from a neighbour, who told me he had sowed a patch of oats with it, and that they never ripened at all, and that he was compelled to cut them green as fodder for his cattle. I had a striking proof this season of the much lower temperature required by oats than wheat, when strongly stimulated by manuring. I had gathered an ear of wheat and a panicle of oats the previous season, which seemed to me to be superior varieties; and that they might have every chance, I dibbled them alongside each other in my garden, and determined to manure them with every kind of manure I could procure, as I had an idea that it was not easy to over-manure grain crops, if all the elements entering into the composition of the plant were applied in due proportion to each other, and I also wished to ascertain whether wheat and oats would thrive equally well with the same sort of manuring. I accordingly limed the land soon after the wheat came up, and in March I applied silicate of soda, sulphate of magnesia, gypsum, common salt, and nitrate of soda. A fortnight after this I applied guano, then bones dissolved in sulphuric acid, then woollen rags dissolved in potash (the two latter in weak solution); and the consequence was, that I don't think there was a single grain in the whole parcel—at least I could not find one—the straw was no great length, and the blade much discolored with mildew, whilst the oats were seven feet high, and with straws through which I could blow a pea, and large panicles, although the oat was not particularly well-fed. The inference I have drawn from these experiments is, that as far as is practicable the manuring should be adapted to the temperature, but as this is obviously impossible in a climate like ours, the only way is to rather under than over manure, and to apply no ammoniacal manure to the wheat crop, or at all events very little; for although guano was beneficial to wheat when used in conjunction with silicates, &c. &c. in 1844, yet the injury it did in 1845 may very fairly be set against that benefit. I should feel obliged if any of your readers who may have tried the experiment of manuring grain crops with guano, the last season (1845) would publish the result as compared with a similar crop without such manuring. I feel convinced that such result would be against the use of guano for wheat in 1845. I am the more confirmed in the opinion that ammoniacal manures are unfavourable for wheat, by a series of articles in the "Gardener's Chronicle" on the "Geo-Agriculture of Middlesex," in which the writer states that land in that county which in Queen Elizabeth's time produced such good wheat that it was reserved for her especial use, will now scarcely grow wheat at all, and when that grain is sowed upon it, the straw is always mildewed, and the sample very poor; and this is attributed—and no doubt justly so—to the extensive use of London manure. My crop was only 32 bushels to the acre of 60 lbs. to the bushel; last year the crop, as I have said before, was 50 bushels of the same weight.
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To the same.
CLITHEROE, 7th March, 1848.
On continuing my attempts to grow wheat on the same land year after year, I observed that the crop of 1845 was very seriously injured by the deficient drainage—the old drains having been destroyed by the subsoil plough. It was therefore necessary to replace them: they were accordingly put in four feet deep. This occupied so much time that the season for sowing wheat had gone by, and the ground was cropped with potatoes, which were got up in September, and the wheat might have been got in early in October. But seeing in your paper that sowing too early was not advisable, and also being carried away by the arguments of the thin-seeders, I deferred sowing until the middle of November, and then put in little seed; and the winter proving very unfavourable, when the wheat was coming up, there was not half plant enough in the spring, and I hesitated whether to plough up the ground or drill in barley. I determined to do the latter, which was done on the 18th April, and wheat and barley grew up together, and when cut and threshed, proved to be equal to 48 bushels to the acre.
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LOW MOOR, 31st December, 1844.
HENRY BRIGGS, ESQ.
I duly received your obliging letter in reply to my pamphlet on the growth of wheat year after year on the same land, and now offer my rejoinder to your remarks. You seem to consider the expense is too great under the system pursued by me; and that it was more than was required by the crop, is proved in my opinion by the fact that the fertility of the land is very much augmented since the commencement of the experiment in 1841: as my first crop with guano alone produced only 27 bushels per acre, whilst this year from guano alone the produce was 42 bushels. But still I think that your allowance of manure is far too little, and not exactly what I should apply, and I shall frankly state my objections and opinions, in the hope that they may elicit a reply from you, as it will be from discussion and the experiments instituted to test the various theories propounded, that agriculture will be most materially benefited. You state that Liebig's present theory is, that plants obtain the necessary oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, and nitrogen from the rain and atmosphere, and that the plants merely require the supply of inorganic constituents, and that you are inclined to agree with him. My copy of his work on the Chemistry of Agriculture is his first edition; and I don't know how far he has since modified or altered the opinions therein expressed, which are in some degree at variance with each other. He states that it may be received as an axiom in agricultural chemistry that the nitrogen of the atmosphere is never assimilated by plants, except in the form of ammonia or nitric acid. He certainly states that plants and animals derive their nitrogen from the atmosphere; but why, if this be true, does he attach so much importance to the excrements (particularly urine), of men and animals being husbanded with so much care? and he states that for every pound of urine wasted, a pound of wheat is thrown away. But even if he said it was utterly worthless, every practical farmer who has tried it knows how exceedingly valuable it is. It may be said there are other ingredients in urine besides ammonia, and these are what make it valuable; and in reply to this I would ask what is it that makes the ammoniacal liquor from gasworks so valuable? There are no phosphates or alkalies there, and yet what a powerful stimulant it is. Again, Liebig states that the carbon is derived from the atmosphere; but to say nothing of the argument which might be deduced from the advantage which is derived by plants from having their soil loosened about their roots, the experiments of Dumas and Boussingault prove that a tree which was cut off below the branches expired a large quantity of carbonic acid. It may be asked how I know this was not precipitated by the rain. I don't know; but if the plant would assimilate this, why should it not assimilate that which arises from the decomposition of the carbonaceous matter in the soil? My idea is that it does both, and that carbon in the soil does good if it offers an abundant supply of carbonic acid to the plant when it is in a condition to appropriate it. Your allowance of lime appears to me to be far too small, for if any reliance can be placed on my experiments, lime can be profitably used to far greater extent than you seem to imagine. And, again, you seem to think that where there is plenty of silex in the soil, the plant will be able to obtain as much as it requires. I think that it is quite necessary that the silex should be in a soluble state, as I think that it is not only desirable that all the elements necessary to fertility should be in the soil, but that they should be in such a form that they can be assimilated by the plant. Some of our compounds for producing fertility may perhaps be as absurd as it would be to give muriatic acid to a man troubled with indigestion, because free muriatic acid is found in the stomach of a healthy person. Let me recommend you to try both silex and magnesia in a soluble state, and I think you will be satisfied with the benefit derived from their use.
Recurring again to the quantity of manure necessary to grow thirty-six bushels of wheat, I would ask, why limit yourself to so small a crop? The difference in the cost of your manuring a field, and my manuring it, is more than made up by the increase of fourteen bushels of wheat and the corresponding increase of straw, even if the land did not improve every year by the application; and as the seed, rent, labour, and liabilities of the land are the same whether you grow a small crop or a large one, why not have it as large as possible? Again, if I applied far more manure than was necessary, I ought to have had the crop equally good throughout the field; but on the ridge of the hill, where the soil was thin and poor, neither straw nor wheat were so good as they were where it was deeper and richer. My own opinion is, that the plant is never able to extract from the soil all the manure, and therefore it ought to be brought up to a good standard before good crops can be expected. I am not satisfied with any analogy that I can think of, but the best that occurs to me is that of a cloth in a dye- copper. You can never get it to absorb either all or half the colouring matter, and if you don't use far more than is taken up by the cloth, you will never obtain the desired results. Besides, in chemical combinations it is desirable to use far more than the chemical equivalents, or the experiments don't succeed. I perceive that you intend to use guano next year, and that you intend to use it along with the seed. I trust it will not be sowed in contact with either the seed or the quicklime, which you proposed to use in some of your land. The best time I have found for applying guano is in wet weather, just when vegetation is making a start in the spring—say the last week in March, or the first week in April—as I fear a large part of the soluble portion of it would be washed away by the rains of winter. It is true we have had none this winter, but when shall we have such another? Did you ever use woollen rags as manure? They ought to be excellent, as they are almost all albumen, and are, I fancy, to be had at a very moderate price, not far from you. Can you inform me what it is that causes the land to be clover-sick? If it is the abstraction of something from the soil, what is that something? Sir Humphrey Davy said that a dressing of gypsum would prevent it; but clover does not succeed here (even when dressed with gypsum), if sowed every four years. One reason why I think so small a quantity of manure will not succeed, is based on the theory of excrementitious secretion. Decandolle proved that this secretion took place, but he did not succeed in proving that it poisoned the land for a similar crop. I can only reason from analogy, and it does not follow that an analogy drawn from animal life will hold good when applied to plants; but if we were to feed an animal with pure gluten and pure starch, with the proper quantity of phosphates, &c., are we to suppose it would have no excrements? Let this be applied to plants: are we to suppose that the plant assimilates all that is absorbed by its roots and leaves? When that which is absorbed is what would enter into the composition of the plant, is it not more rational to suppose that the inorganic and gaseous constituents only combine in fixed proportions, and that although the plant may absorb a much larger proportion of one than is required, the surplus is discharged excrementitiously, and perhaps may be unfitted for entering into the plant until it has undergone a decomposition? In conclusion, I trust you will pardon my frankness in so boldly canvassing your opinions; but it is in this collision of opinion that the truth will be elicited, and if I judge you aright, it is that you wish to discover whether it harmonizes with your preconceived notions or not.
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LOW MOOR, 1st May, 1845.
HENRY BRIGGS, ESQ.
I duly received your pamphlet on the use of lime, for which I am much obliged, and am delighted to perceive that you confirm the idea (expressed in my pamphlet on the growth of wheat every year on the same land) that the excessive use of lime is ultimately injurious to the fertility of the soil to which it is applied. This, coming from a gentleman of your reputation and experience, will, I hope, induce someone capable of performing the experiment to endeavour to ascertain with precision how much lime it is desirable to apply to an acre to give the best results, and with the least waste, assuming that the land contained little or none previous to the experiment; and it would also be desirable to ascertain whether it is better, in an economical point of view, to apply a small quantity every year, or a larger quantity every third or fourth. My own opinion is in favour of the former method, except that it is difficult to get it ploughed in, particularly in wet weather, immediately after spreading (which is essential where you grow wheat on the same land every year) without injuring the feet of the horses. You speak of ten days or a fortnight being necessary to neutralize caustic lime, but our horses had their feet injured by it six weeks after it had been spread on the land, last year, although the weather had been wet almost the whole of the time, say from the beginning of February to the middle of March. You appear to think that lime will replace silica in the wheat plant. Whose authority have you for this? It will be very important to establish this supposition, but I fear it is too good news to be true. On referring to your letter, I find you don't say what I supposed you did, but that the lime liberates the soluble silicates, potash, &c. This may be, and certainly the beneficial effects of lime in growing wheat are not to be explained by any other hypothesis with which I am acquainted. I am this year trying some experiments to ascertain (if I can) the cause of clover- sickness, and I hope to be in a position to say whether your supposition that lime, gypsum, &c. will prevent it, is correct. My experiments so far are opposed to this theory, but it is not very safe or philosophical to draw conclusions from one or two experiments only. I doubt the possibility of making silicate of soda by merely mixing lime, sand, and salt together, as my chemical friends tell me this cannot be accomplished unless the silex and the alkali are fused together. If a soluble silicate of soda can be made in the way you mention, it will be a great saving of expense. Has it been tried? You have no doubt seen a report of the enormous crop of wheat grown in a field in Norfolk last year (90 bushels to the acre), and that the Royal Agricultural Society have determined to have the soil analyzed by Dr. Playfair. This is very desirable, but as Dr. Playfair is more of a lecturing than an analyzing chemist, I think it is very necessary that his analysis should be checked by another, made by the most eminent chemist that Europe can produce, for 90 bushels is so unheard-of a crop, that no expense should be spared which would enable us to ascertain what the soil contained to enable it to produce such a crop, which is the more remarkable as the field seems to have been a good many years under the plough. As your Wakefield Farmers' Club has many wealthy members in it, allow me to hint the desirableness of your undertaking this analysis, which, if properly performed, will be worth a thousand times more than its cost. When you are aware that even Davy missed 16 per cent. of alumina in one of his analyses and that the chemists of the present day don't seem to have detected the potash which exists so abundantly in potato-tops, you will, I think, agree how exceedingly important it is that such analysis should be checked by others, made without any communication between the parties. You speak of an original letter of Liebig's appearing in the "Farmer's Journal." On what subject is it? as I have no means of referring to the periodical in question. Does it throw any light upon the new manure for which he is said to be taking out a patent? You speak of humus and humic acid. What do you understand by humus? as, according to Liebig, humus sometimes means one thing and sometimes another, and he appears to treat it very much as modern chemists treat phlogiston, as something which they don't comprehend, but which they need to explain the phenomena of vegetation. If you are a believer in humus, what is it composed of, and how does it act in forwarding vegetation? I suppose you will reply, By combining with oxygen and forming humic acid. But would not the theory of the decomposition of carbon do quite as well? I don't perceive the injurious effects of quicklime upon grass land which you anticipate in your paper, but the contrary, and the more caustic it is the more beneficial is its action, so far as I can judge from my own experiments; and it is my practice in liming grass land to spread it as soon as I can get it into the state of flour. I shall be glad to hear the result of your electrical experiment—at present I am rather sceptical on the subject.
P.S.—Am I to suppose that you have abandoned the idea of manuring an acre of wheat for thirteen shillings?
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THE CULTIVATION OF WHEAT.
October 1st, 1852.
To the Editor of the "Manchester Guardian."
The increasing quantity of agricultural produce consumed in this country makes it desirable that the cultivation of the land should be carried to the highest point consistent with profit; and the increasing scarcity of agricultural labourers will shortly render it difficult for the farmers in some districts to gather in their crops. It therefore becomes increasingly desirable that every mechanical contrivance which will facilitate their doing so should be made as perfect as possible; and also that the crops themselves should be so cultivated as to make these mechanical aids to work to the greatest advantage.
But it has been a difficult matter (at least in the wet climate of Lancashire) to ascertain how far it is prudent to manure for wheat, for in unfavourable seasons the plant runs so much to straw that it is liable to lodge, and become mildewed; in which cases the manure is not only wasted, but becomes positively injurious, as appears to be the case in the South of England this year, and as was also the case in the North in 1845, when every shilling expended in manuring the wheat crops of that year made the crop at least a shilling worse than if no manure had been applied.
But if we could find a wheat so short in the straw that it would bear heavy manuring without being lodged, wheat-growing would be a far less hazardous occupation than it is at present, and we might confidently calculate on a far greater production than we can now.
The following appear to me to be some of the advantages of growing a short-strawed wheat:—
1st. It will bear highly manuring without lodging, and with much less liability to mildew, than a long-strawed wheat.
2nd. The proportion of grain to straw is greater in short than in long-strawed wheat.
3rd. As it very rarely lodges, it will be far better suited to the reaping-machine than a long-strawed wheat; and no doubt other advantages will occur to the minds of experienced agriculturists.
When making these assertions I ought to state that my experience of wheat-growing does not extend beyond the counties of York and Lancaster, but from what I can learn of the agriculture of more southerly districts, I fancy these opinions of mine will be found correct even there. I may be asked to prove my assertion, and I will endeavour to do so.
I have been experimenting on the growth of wheat for the last ten or eleven years—particularly with reference to the practicability of doing this on the same land year after year; and that I might do it in the most satisfactory manner, I have varied my seed-wheat and my manure very frequently: but I very soon discovered that the advantages of abundance of manure and high cultivation did not insure good crops of wheat, inasmuch as in our moist climate, we had not one summer in five that was favourable, and consequently the crop was generally lodged, and the straw mildewed. I found that the time of sowing, and also of applying the manure, were matters of great importance, and it occurred to me that the remedy would be—a straw so short, that it would not lodge when highly manured. I consequently addressed a query to the "Gardener's Chronicle," asking what was the shortest-strawed variety of wheat known, and was told that Piper's Thickset was so; I therefore got some of this sort from Mr. Piper, which I have cultivated since 1847. It is a coarse red wheat, but the quality has improved with me every year, and this season being the third successive crop on the same land, I have nearly eight quarters to the statute acre from this variety.
2. The proportion of wheat in Piper's Thickset is 38 per cent. of the gross weight of the crop; in the Hopetown wheat (I speak of my own crops only), 34 per cent.
3. Not having seen a reaping-machine, it may seem absurd in me to say that short-strawed wheat is better adapted to it than long- strawed; but every report of the working of these machines goes to show that, so far, they are not well adapted to the cutting of laid corn; therefore a variety that always stands upright will be much better suited to the working of them.
I have been trying for the last six years to obtain (by cross- breeding) a wheat of good quality, and with a straw shorter than Piper's, but hitherto with indifferent success; but, thanks to the kindness of Messrs. Brownells, of Liverpool, who furnished me with many samples of Chilian wheat about three years ago, I have now got varieties much shorter in the straw than Piper's, and some which appear to be of much better quality, but these will require to be tested for a year or two before I can speak decisively about them. The Chilian varieties are very difficult to acclimatize. The original samples were beautiful white wheats, very much resembling the Australian, but when grown in Lancashire they resemble rye more than wheat, and three years' sowing has not much improved them. It has, however, enabled me to obtain crosses which seem better adapted to the soil and climate, and so short in the straw that the highest manuring produces no tendency to lodge.
If we could obtain a variety of wheat of good quality, which, instead of two tons of straw and one of wheat to the acre, produced a ton and a half of each, it might be profitably cultivated, and the differences in the chemical composition of grain and straw are not so very great as to make me despair of this being done some time or other. It may be asked, Where can a short-strawed wheat of good quality be procured? To this I am afraid the reply will be, Nowhere at present. But can none of our expert manipulators, who rejoice exceedingly when they cross-breed a geranium or a fuchsia, turn their attention to the cross-breeding of wheat? Cannot the Royal Agricultural Society offer a premium for a short-strawed wheat of good quality? Do none of the great agriculturists themselves see how desirable such a wheat would be for the agriculture of this country? Apparently not; for with the exception of Mr. Raynbird, of Hampshire, I am not aware of one scientific operator who is endeavouring to produce such a wheat. My own attempts at cross-breeding are such as may be tried by anyone who has sufficient perseverance, and (with one or two exceptions, of doubtful success) have been confined to sowing the different varieties I wished to cross in contiguous drills, and then sowing the produce of these. At the second harvest I carefully select such ears as differ from both varieties, and at the same time seem by their quality of grain and the shortness of their straw to be the best suited to my wishes. It has been, no doubt, to the accidental contact of distinct varieties that we owe the numerous kinds now known to agriculturists, and which differ from each other in colour, quality, yield, and comparative value in the various districts in which they are grown.
Fully sensible of my inability to do justice to this important subject, I yet hope (if you do me the honour to publish my letter) that my remarks may induce scientific men to consider it; for it appears unaccountable to me that hitherto they seem to have thought it unworthy of their attention.
P.S.—There is still time to try the experiment during the present season. If any gentleman wishes to try the short-strawed Chilian wheat, I shall be glad to give him a sample of it for the purpose of cross-breeding. Samples were sent to Mr. H. Briggs, Mr. Raynbird, and Mr. Stevenson, Stockport.
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January 27th, 1848.
To the Editor of the "Agricultural Gazette."
You invite persons who have grown good crops of grain or turnips to forward you the particulars. I therefore enclose you an account of an attempt which I made to grow wheat on the same land year after year, that account reaching to the fourth white crop in 1844. As I still continue the experiment, I shall be in a position to continue the account up to the present time (as I am now threshing out the last year's crop), and will send it to you if you think it worthy of insertion in the "Agricultural Gazette."
If the account I now send is not worth inserting, please to send it to your correspondent A. W., who doubted whether there were authenticated instances of land producing eighty, seventy, or even fifty bushels to the acre.
I attribute my success in growing wheat to the use of silicate of soda, and yet, singularly enough, until now I have been unable to induce anyone else to try it. This season, however, several persons have applied to me to procure it for them. Among them is the talented editor of the "Liverpool Times," whose farm at Barton Moss shows what good management will accomplish on very unpromising soils. If, as I hope will be the case, the silicate of soda should supply to peat its greatest deficiency, no one will more readily discover it than Mr. Baines.
In the use of silicates of soda and potash, one precaution is very necessary, namely, that you really have a soluble silicate, not a mere mechanical mixture of ground flint and alkali. This is a very different thing, and one which, if it be not carefully guarded against, will lead to nothing but disappointment.
Again, the silicate of soda may be properly made, in the first instance, but in a long exposure to the atmosphere, the soda attracts carbonic acid, and is liberated from the silex, and this has disappointed my expectation more than once.
Again, though I consider it desirable to defer the application of soluble silicates until vegetation has made a fair start in the spring, yet in one instance I delayed the application of it so long that there was not moisture to dissolve it until the end of June, and then the plant began to send up suckers from the roots, and the crop was seriously injured by it; but this was in an exceedingly dry spring, and may not happen again for many years.
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CLITHEROE, March 7th, 1848.
In continuing my attempts to grow wheat on the same land year after year, I observed that the crop of 1845 was very seriously injured by the deficient drainage—the old drains having been destroyed by the subsoil plough. It was therefore necessary to replace them; they were accordingly put in four feet deep. This took up so much time, that the season for sowing wheat had gone by, and the ground was cropped with potatoes, which were dug up in September, and the wheat might have been got in early in October; but seeing in your paper that sowing too early was not advisable, and also being carried away by the arguments of the thin-seeders, I deferred sowing until the middle of November, and also put in little seed, and the weather proving very unfavourable when the wheat was coming up, there was not half plant enough in the spring, and I hesitated whether to plough up the ground or to drill in barley. I determined to do the latter. It was put in on the 18th April, and wheat and barley grew up together, and when cut and threshed, it yielded 48 bushels to the acre.
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ON THE GRAVELLING OF CLAY SOILS.
There is an old story of a man, who, having a very stony field, determined to experiment on the value of these stones in the growth of his crops.
With this view he divided his field into three equal parts. From No. 1 he gathered all the stones, which he spread upon No. 3, leaving No. 2 in its original condition. He then sowed barley over the whole field, and carefully noted the results. The story ends by saying that No. 1 bore a miserably poor crop, No. 2 a tolerable one, and No. 3 a splendid one.
I quote this story as a text on which I wish to speak as to the advantage of gravelling heavy clay soils. Some weeks since I spent a few days at the village of Milnthorpe, in Westmoreland, and during one day with Mr. Hutton, the celebrated bone-setter, I remarked that the land was very stony, being covered with stones (not pebbles) having very much the appearance of road metal. He replied, that these stones were essential to the fertility of the soil, and said that some years before there was a great demand for such material in the neighbourhood of Preston, and the high prices stimulated the farmers to gather these stones from their land, and send them to Preston; but the consequences were so injurious to the growth of their crops, that they were compelled—at least those who had the means of doing so—to lead stones again upon their land before their crops would grow again with the vigour which they had before the stones were abstracted. This brought to mind what had occurred in my own farm practice. A church was built in the neighbourhood, and the stones for it were hewn on the corner of a field which was afterwards sown with wheat, and I remarked that the straw was much brighter, the ripening was forwarded ten days, and the sample was much better where the stones had been hewn than elsewhere in the field. (The stones of which the church was built were of ordinary sandstone, probably millstone grit.)
Borrowing from this hint, I had the field covered with about 400 cartloads of alluvial gravel (from the bed of the river) to the acre, and the land was then ploughed two furrows deep, one plough following the other. Previous to this gravelling, the land was a stiff, obdurate clay nearly to the surface. The subsequent effect was the doubling, or more probably trebling the value of the land, which has now become a nice friable soil.
I was much amused with the criticisms of some of the neighbouring farmers (men of the old school), one of whom remarked that he had seen land tilled (manured) in various ways before my time, but until now he had never seen a field tilled with cobble-stones. I said, "What is your objection to it, John?" "Why, ye see, it makes th' land so poor." I replied, "Making anything or anybody poor, means robbing them of something. If you had twenty shillings in your pocket, and I filled it up with these cobble-stones, how much poorer would you be? Of what have I robbed this field by putting gravel into it?" "Why, of nothing; but it looks so queer." I said, "John, did you never hear of a man gathering the stones off his field, and then having to lead them back again?" "Yes, I have; but then they were natural to the soil." I said, "What does manuring land mean, but putting something into it of which it is deficient? You don't till a muck-midden. If in stony land stones are essential for the vigorous growth of the crop, is it not exceedingly probable that they will be still more beneficial on stiff land which has no stones in it?"
This is a doctrine I tried many years since to inculcate upon our friend Mechi, and some of his land (I speak of its condition twenty years since) needed such a gravelling as much as any land I ever saw. Whether he adopted my suggestion, or his land remains in the same condition now as then, I don't know; but if it does, I would just suggest to him and to all landed proprietors who own stiff clay lands, if they are near to gravel-pits, to try a small portion by gravelling it freely, and let us hear the results.
December 2nd, 1871.
* * * * *
COTTON.
June 1st, 1842.
J. KINDERMANN, ESQ.
I have for some time intended to call your attention to the importance of attempting to grow fine cotton in Peru, but my inability to do justice to the subject, both from my being practically unacquainted with any mode of growing cotton and my general want of information, has hitherto prevented me; but as I made you a promise to that effect yesterday, I have endeavoured to put a few suggestions on paper, and hope that if they be carefully acted upon, some benefit may be derived from the experiments.
We have been (as you are aware) consumers of Peruvian cotton to some extent for the last six or eight months, and from the observations I have made on it during that time, I have no hesitation in saying that it possesses many excellences: it is long enough (almost too long), very sound in staple, and where well managed of a very good colour. Its defects are coarseness and harshness of staple, and if these could be removed I don't see what is to prevent its rivalling the Egyptian and Sea Islands cotton, any considerable approximation to which would very materially enhance its value, seeing that the highest quotation for Sea Island, was last week 30d. per lb. (2s. 6d.), whilst the highest for Peruvian was no more than 6 1/2 d.
With the view of improving the quality of the cotton in Peru, I would strongly recommend you to send seeds of various kinds, packed in air-tight boxes, particularly Sea Island and Egyptian, which some of the cotton-brokers would easily procure from the spinners using these descriptions, and, judging from what I hear of the climate of both countries, I should think the Egyptian would go to a very similar atmosphere and mode of cultivation to that of the country where it had been raised, which would probably render it more easy to acclimatize, and, of course, make it more likely to succeed than a sort of cotton which had been grown under dissimilar circumstances of soil, climate, and mode of cultivation.
These seeds when sown, ought (with the exceptions hereafter to be mentioned) to be planted at such a distance from all other cottons as to render it very unlikely for the wind or insects to carry the pollen from the flowers of one kind to those of another; for without this precaution, such is the tendency in many genera of plants to hybridize (and I believe, from what I have heard, there is this tendency in the different varieties of cotton) or cross- breed with each other, that, however good the quality in the first instance, they would all revert to the old variety in a year or two in consequence of the great preponderance of that variety over any newly-introduced ones. So much are the growers of turnip-seed for sale in England aware of the importance of attending to this, that the greatest precautions are taken to remove all cruciform plants from the vicinity of the field whilst their turnips are in flower, as there is such a tendency in them all to hybridize that the quality of the seed is often injured by the wild mustard (Sinapis arvensis) springing up in the same or the adjoining fields; whilst, on the other hand, by carefully selecting the best bulbs for seed, and by judiciously crossing one variety with another, new sorts are obtained, combining the excellences of both. This leads me to observe, that probably seed of foreign varieties of cotton may not thrive well in the first instance, and I would therefore strongly recommend the gentlemen who may make the experiment carefully to select seed from the plants on their estates which they see are growing the best and finest cotton, and sow them in contact with a few seeds of each of the sorts you may send out, carefully removing them in every instance as far as may be practicable from the vicinity of all other cotton; and then again sowing the seeds which are obtained from the plants thus raised in contiguity to each other, and carefully examining the cotton grown upon each of them, it is more than probable they will find that some of the plants will be varieties partaking of the character of both the parent kinds, and by selecting the best of these and sowing them only (still apart from all other cotton), there is little doubt that much benefit will be derived by the persevering and skilful cultivator.
I have heard it stated that the origin of Sea Island cotton is to be traced to something of this kind. An observing and experimental planter, by carefully examining his cotton, and by sowing his seed only from those plants that produced the finest and longest staple, at last arrived at the excellent quality which is now known by that name.
Look, again, at what has been done in Egypt by the introduction of better varieties of cotton. There these improved varieties have by no means had a fair chance of showing what they are capable of becoming, inasmuch as the wretched cultivator has not the slightest inducement to improve their quality—he gets no more per pound for the finest and cleanest cotton than he does for the coarsest and dirtiest, and therefore it is not very likely to improve under his care. But with all this neglect and want of management, we can see by what it is, what it would most probably become in the hands of an enterprising and intelligent man who knew that every improvement he made in its quality would be to his own advantage. Assuming that your Peruvian friends could so far improve the quality of their cotton as to double its value in this market (and I don't think myself too sanguine in expecting more than this), with very little extra labour nearly all the additional price would be profit.
But supposing even that cross-breeding, or hybridizing, as the horticulturists call it, does not frequently occur naturally in cotton, it is well known that it is very easy to effect it artificially by prematurely unfolding the petals and with fine scissors cutting away all the stamens before impregnation takes place. This requires to be carefully done, so as not to injure the petals, and they will then close again of themselves, and when they expand naturally, then impregnate the stigma of the flower with the pollen of the kind you want to cross with. We owe many of our finest varieties of fruits to this practice. The late Mr. Payne Knight was very successful in raising new varieties of many sorts of fruit in this way, and it appears to me from the experiments I have made that the more frequently this cross- breeding takes place, the more easy (within certain limits) is it to extend it until cultivation has so completely changed the character of the plant that it bears very little resemblance to its original stock. There is nothing growing wild like our cabbages, turnips, and cauliflowers; nor even like our carrots, celery, and asparagus. Where are the originals of our wheat, barley, rye, beans, and peas? Many of these appear to be so completely transformed by cultivation that we don't know where to look for the parent stocks from which they originated. But I am forgetting cotton altogether, yet beg to refer to the preceding paragraph to show how much is owing to careful cultivation, and trust that it may not be without its use if my letter induces your friends to make the experiments here suggested, even though their first attempts are unsuccessful.
This letter was translated into Spanish and circulated in Peru, but with what success I do not know. It was also published in the "Gardener's Chronicle," and led to a reply from Dr. Royle, which occasioned the following letter.
* * * * *
August 14th, 1845.
To the Editor of the "Gardener's Chronicle."
I am very glad that my letter and your remarks on the improvement of cotton in India have attracted the attention of so able a correspondent as G. F. R. (Dr. Royle), who appears to be conversant with a good deal of what has been attempted there. No doubt there are, as he states, great diversities of soil and climate in so extensive a country as India; and if so, although there may be some which are not adapted to the growth of either the Gossypium Barbadense or the Gossypium Peruvianum, there must be both soil and climate suited to them in various localities in that country.
My chief reason for suspecting that the injury arises from the new kinds hybridizing with the indigenous cotton, is, that very good cotton has been grown from both varieties in the first generation, but when the seed from this first crop is sown again, the quality always deteriorates (at least all the gentlemen say so with whom I have conversed on this subject). I have a sample of Indian-grown cotton of excellent quality from Pernambuco seed, worth twice as much as the best Surat cotton I ever saw; but I cannot learn that anything deserving the name of aught but a sample was ever obtained. We hear of no increase in the quantity of this improved variety; it does not—like cotton in the United States—go on from ten bags to ten thousand, in eight or ten years; on the contrary, so far as I can learn, it dwindles away to nothing. The Tinnivelly cotton brought forward as an example by your correspondent is no exception to this—it is no more like Bourbon cotton, than Bowed cotton is like Sea Island—at least none that I ever saw. Bourbon is a long, silky-stapled cotton, whilst Tinnivelly has the shortness and inequality of fibre common to most of the cotton of India. It is generally much cleaner than the cotton grown on the western side of India, but this arises from the greater care in picking it.
An intelligent friend of mine, now in India, says that the pod of cotton is overhung by a brown leaf (bractea?), and if the cotton is gathered early in the morning, whilst the dew is on the plant, this leaf is tough and does not break, and the cotton is gathered clean; but if it is picked after the dew has evaporated, this leaf is brittle, and gets mixed with the cotton in the picking. But he says that no persuasion can induce the ryots to keep that which is picked in the morning from that which is gathered in the heat of the day. He also suggests that the cotton should be irrigated during its growth, and alleges as a motive for doing this, that in Egypt and Peru no good cotton can be grown without resorting to it. But the cases are not exactly parallel, inasmuch as no rain falls in either of these countries, whilst rain is most abundant in India, eighty or ninety inches of rain sometimes falling at Bombay in three months during the monsoon.
Another intelligent gentleman with whom I have conversed on this subject since my former letter was written, and who has resided at Bombay many years, where he has paid much attention to this subject, tells me that the gentleman entrusted by the East India Company with the management of one of the experimental cotton estates, assures him he has grown excellent Orleans cotton, and that the ryots were so satisfied with its superiority over the indigenous kind that 1,200 begahs (say 300 acres) were planted with it. But this was two years ago, and as the disturbances took place in this very neighbourhood, he fears these plantations have perished, as he heard no more of the matter, and had omitted to inquire of the gentleman entrusted with the management.
I reserved this until I saw the second letter from your correspondent G. F. R., which I have now read, as well as an article on the same subject in the "Manchester Guardian," in which it is stated that 20,000 acres are now under cultivation, planted with this improved cotton. I fear this is too good news to be true. My informant is a gentleman who was in correspondence with Mr. Mercer, the superintendent of these cotton estates, or some of them, and I have again questioned him. He says that the crop which would be gathered in March last, would amount to what I have stated (1,200 begahs), according to Mr. Mercer's letter to him, but he says it is now twelve months since he heard from Mr. Mercer, as he left Bombay for England shortly after. His fear was that none of this cotton would be gathered, as the disturbances which took place in Central India, and which required so long a time to quell them, were in this very district. If your correspondent G. F. R. has got samples of this improved cotton, of the second or third generation, he would confer a great obligation upon me by sending me a small sample of it by post. But this is wandering from what I intended to say, which was most heartily to thank your correspondent for his second communication, which goes far to prove the truth of what I had previously supposed, that the cotton of India is capable of great improvement by being judiciously crossed with suitable foreign varieties. Your correspondent thinks if the old varieties deteriorate the new when growing in proximity to each other, the new ought, for the same reason, to improve the old; and no doubt they will, but to a much smaller extent. It is said that a man leaping up into the air attracts the earth (proportionately) as much as the earth attracts him, and it may be so with the old and new cotton. What I mean to say is, that although some of the old sort of cotton might be hybridized by the new, the improved variety would be in so small a quantity that a thousand to one the cultivator would never observe it; and such is the aversion or indifference to anything new among the natives of India, that if an improved plant were observed, it is again a thousand to one he would take no pains to preserve it; and if he did, it is again perhaps a thousand to one that it would be entirely spoilt in the next generation by being planted among the indigenous sorts.
I trust your correspondent will continue to favour us with his communications whenever he has any fresh information on the subject, which, the more it is considered the more important it seems to be.
* * * * *
PAPERS ON NATURAL HISTORY.
* * * * *
WRENS' NESTS.
THE Editor of Loudon's "Magazine of Natural History," and one of his contributors, Mr. Jennings, were of opinion that the common Wren never lined its nest with feathers. The following contribution was sent to the "Magazine of Natural History" in consequence of this, and led to some discussion afterwards:—
April 17th, 1829.
Mr. Jennings and yourself, in opposition to Montagu, are of opinion that the Wren never lines its nest with feathers; like the knights of the gold-and-silver shield, both sides are right. It is true, many Wrens' nests may be found in which there are no feathers; but did you ever find either eggs or young ones in them?
As far as my observations go, the nest in which the Wren lays its eggs is profusely lined with feathers; but during the period of incubation, the male—apparently from a desire to be doing something—constructs several nests in the vicinity of the first, none of which are lined; and whilst the first nest is so artfully concealed as to be found with difficulty, the last is very often seen. The Wren does not appear to be very careful in the selection of a site for these cock-nests, as they are called in Yorkshire by the schoolboys. I have frequently seen them in the twigs of a thick thorn hedge, under banks, in haystacks, in ivy bushes, in old stumps, in the loopholes of buildings, and in one instance in an old bonnet, which was placed among some peas to frighten away the blackcaps.
* * * * *
August 15th, 1831.
TO PROFESSOR RENNIE.
In your edition of Montagu's "Ornithological Dictionary," just published, you say—speaking of the Wren—"An anonymous correspondent of Loudon's 'Magazine of Natural History,' &c. &c.;" and you remark, "There can be no doubt of these supposed 'cock- nests' being nothing more than unfinished structures of paired birds; otherwise, the story would require the support of very strong evidence to render it credible."
As I am the anonymous correspondent alluded to, I forward you a few observations of facts tending, as I think, to confirm my view of the question.
In the first place, these nests are far too abundant for the birds, which are not plentiful—at least, in this neighbourhood. Again, it is at least five to one that any Wren's nest which is found during the summer without a lining of hair or feathers is ever completed, or has any eggs in it. This I have verified in a hundred instances, when, having found Wrens' nests, I have visited them again at intervals, for the purpose of ascertaining whether my opinion of cock-nests was correct.
Farther, in a small wood adjoining my garden, where I was certain there was only one pair of Wrens, I found at least half-a-dozen nests, not one of which was either lined with feathers or ever had eggs in it; although I discovered they were not all deserted, as I found an old bird roosting in one of them. I was induced to be more particular in my remarks in consequence of my seeing Mr. Jennings's remarks in the "Magazine of Natural History;" and I searched, as I supposed, every bank, bush, and stump in the wood two or three times before I could find the breeding-nest, which I at last discovered in the twigs of a willow on the bank of the river, in the centre of a bunch of tangled grass, cotton waste, and straws which had been left there by the floods, and which the bird had apparently excavated and in it formed its nest, which was profusely lined with rooks' feathers.
The fear of being thought tedious prevents my giving other facts which tend, as I think, to prove the correctness of my opinion; however, I will just add that all the persons with whom I have conversed who take an interest in such pursuits, agree with me in opinion in this matter.
The nest I have just spoken of was also a strong proof that Wrens, although they may not always adapt their materials to the locality they have chosen for a nest, frequently do so; and if this is not with the intention of concealing it, but merely because the materials are at hand, it serves the purpose of concealment also, and very effectually. The one I am speaking of was so exactly like the other lumps of rubbish which had been left by the floods in the same bush, that I did not discover that it was a Wren's nest until I had pulled it out of the twigs; and if a Wren builds its nest in a haystack—which it frequently does—the front of the nest is almost invariably composed of the hay from the stack, which prevents its being seen much more effectually than if the moss of which the body of the nest is composed were visible on the outside.
The fact that the long-tailed tits occasionally associate to the number of six or seven, and have a nest in common, which is mentioned in the same page of the "Magazine of Natural History" as the Wrens' nests, I could prove by the testimony of twenty people who saw the nest and young there spoken of. I should be glad to learn whether the same thing has been noticed by other people.
Among the few rare birds which it has been my good fortune to procure is a Woodpecker, which I killed this summer, and which is not mentioned in your edition of Montagu, although spoken of by Bewick as a dubious species, under the name of the Middle Spotted Woodpecker.
A pair of these birds had built their nest, or rather hatched their young (for there was no nest), in a hole in a decayed ash tree about twenty feet from the ground. There were two young ones, which I secured, as well as one of the old ones, and they are all in the possession of a professional friend of mine, who is a collector of ornithological specimens.
The old one measures 9 1/2 inches long, and weighed 46 1/2 dwts. an hour after it was killed. The forehead is a dirty buff, the whole crown of the head a bright crimson; the irides a dark lead colour, and it has a white ring round its neck. In other respects it corresponds with your description of the Picus major. The sex was not ascertained. The young ones have also the bright crimson head, and differ very materially from the old one.
The Chevy Linnet, as the lesser Redpole is called, is found here throughout the year, and is at no time a scarce bird with us. It frequently builds its nest in the alder and willow bushes, on the banks of the brooks or rivers. It is a late breeder, the nests being often met with containing eggs or young in July. In the winter it feeds upon the seeds of the alder or the cones of the larch, hanging suspended from the twigs like the titmouse.
We have also the Gray Wagtail (Motacilla sulphurea) with us the whole year, but it is rather a rare bird at all times and in all localities with which I am acquainted. (1853:—It is more plentiful now than it was in 1831.)
I very strongly suspect Selby is mistaken when he says, "that previous to its departure in September, it assembles in small flocks or families, which haunt the meadows or bare pastures." This does not agree with my observations of this bird, although quite true when applied to the Spring Wagtail (Motacilla flava); on the contrary, the Grey Wagtail is solitary throughout the year, except in the breeding season, and never frequents the meadows, but is found in the beds of the rivers, brooks, or ditches, where its shrill note often betrays it to eyes which would otherwise never see it.
This bird may be easily distinguished from the Spring Wagtail by its note when flying—yet, notwithstanding the difference is very apparent to a person who hears them both, it is not so easily described. In attempting to do so, therefore, I hope I shall be excused if I don't make the difference so apparent in the description as it is in reality. The latter part of the note of the Grey Wagtail when flying is higher in the musical scale than the former part, and is very staccato, thus: [BAR OF MUSIC] generally being uttered as the bird makes a spring in the air, [10] whilst the latter part of the note of the summer-bird is lower in the scale than the former part, which is more prolonged than in the note of the Grey Wagtail, and is slurred into the latter part, something in the following manner: [BAR OF MUSIC] Of course I don't mean it to be understood that these notes are either of the same pitch, or that they bear the same relation to each other that the notes of the bird do, but as a rude attempt at illustrating what I could not explain in any other way.
A singular habit which I have noticed in several individuals of this species (M. sulphurea) has amused me exceedingly. They were in the habit of looking at their own images in the windows and attacking them, uttering their peculiar cry, and pecking and fluttering against the glass as earnestly as if the object they saw was a real rival instead of an imaginary one (a friend who observed it, insisted that, Narcissus-like, it was in an ecstasy of self-admiration). What is more remarkable, two of these instances occurred in the autumn, when one would not suppose the same motives for animosity to exist that would probably actuate them in the spring.
The first of these instances was when I was a boy, and was repeated daily for several weeks, both against the windows of my father's house and those of our neighbour, who, being rather superstitious, was alarmed about it, and came to consult my mother on the subject. She said there was a bird which her brother told her was a barley-bird (Motacilla flava), which was continually flying against her windows, and as birds were not in the habit of doing so generally, she thought something serious was portended by it. My mother comforted her as well as she could, and I undertook to rid her of the annoyance, which I did by setting a horsehair- noose on one of the window-ledges which it frequented. I soon caught it, and by plucking out the under-tail coverts, with which I wanted to dress yellow duns, I effectually cured it of the propensity—whether, Narcissus-like, it was in an ecstasy of self- admiration, or like the cock which attacked its own image in the boot (which Mr. Robert Warren's poet and painter have immortalized), it would admit of no rival.
It has been suggested, and I think with great probability, that the bird was merely attempting to catch the flies which it saw on the inside of the panes of glass; but certainly it was not so silent about it as these birds generally are when they are feeding.
* * * * *
THE LONG-TAILED TITMOUSE.
To the Editor of "Loudon's Magazine."
Some years ago, when my brother and myself were seekers of birds' nests, we found one of the Long-tailed Titmouse (Parus caudatus), about two miles from home, containing young ones half- fledged. Being anxious to rear them, we hit upon the plan of catching the old ones, and giving them the trouble instead of ourselves. We accordingly set lime-twigs near the nest, and caught six old ones out of the seven of which the colony consisted, and brought them away in triumph; but the old ones would not eat in confinement, and all died but one, which we allowed to escape, in the hope that it would come back and rear the young ones. This it did, and by the most unwearied exertion reared the whole brood, sometimes feeding them ten times in a minute.
Never having seen this social habit stated in any ornithological work to which I have access, I am not aware that it is generally known to naturalists; but it is right to state that I have only found one nest of the species since, and this my avocations would not permit me to examine. I am therefore not aware whether the fact I have stated was an exception to the general habit of the bird, or whether such is invariably the case. Some of your correspondents will, no doubt, be able to give an answer to this inquiry.
* * * * *
IDENTITY OF THE GREEN WITH THE WOOD-SANDPIPER.
To the Editor of the "Magazine of Natural History."
The question whether the Green and the Wood-Sandpiper are the same species seems from Rennie's edition of Montagu's "Ornithological Dictionary" to be undecided; but as a specimen has just come under my notice which appears to me to clear up this difficulty, I shall offer no apology for sending a description of it.
The length from the bill to the tail is 10 inches, to the end of the toes, 11 3/4 inches; breadth, 17 inches; thigh-joint to the toe, 5 1/2 inches. The bill measures 1 5/8 inches from the corner of the mouth, and is very slender; the upper mandible, which is black and slightly curved at the point, is a little longer than the lower one, which is a dark green at the base and black at the point; a dark streak extends from the base of the upper mandible to the corner of the eye, and above it is a patch of dirty white intermixed with minute dusky spots; a small circle of dirty white surrounds the eyes; the chin is white; the cheeks, throat, and forepart of the neck white, spotted with dusky, with which colour a few laminae of each feather are marked their whole length. The breast has a dappled stripe of the same colour as the throat running down the middle of it; with this exception it is white, as are also the belly, vent, and under tail-coverts. The crown of the head and hinder part of the neck are a dingy brown, which on the neck has a shade of ash colour; the bend of the wing and lesser wing-coverts are a brownish black; the whole upper surface of the plumage is of a glossy brownish-green, which is spotted on the middle wing-coverts with minute white spots, that change to a dingy yellow on the back, scapulars, and tertials, the last of which have twelve spots on the outer margin of the feathers, and six on the inner one; the tertials are very long, the longest of them reaching to within a quarter of an inch of the extreme top of the wing, which reaches to the end of the tail; the quill feathers are wholly black, as are also the secondaries; the upper part of the rump is black, and each feather is slightly tipped with white, which forms small wavy lines on that part of the plumage; the lower part of the rump and upper tail-coverts are pure white; the tail, which is even at the end, consists of twelve feathers, which are barred with black and white alternately.
At the end of Bewick's description of the Green Sandpiper there is a very exact representation of a covert feather of the tail, and an inner-wing covert, which will give a better idea of their appearance than a page of letterpress. The legs are dark green, the outer toe connected with the middle one by a membrane as far as the first joint; toes very slender, middle one 1 1/4 inch long; weight, 2 3/4 oz. Killed on the 17th September, 1831, near Stonyhurst.
I have been thus minute in my description from a wish to clear up the doubt that appears to exist as to the identity of these two birds. The one I have now before me is, undoubtedly, the Green Sandpiper of Bewick, but it corresponds in so many particulars with the Wood Sandpiper of Montagu, and appears to combine so many of the peculiarities of both without exactly agreeing with either, that I think it proves their identity satisfactorily. The glossy green of the upper plumage and the barring of the under wing- coverts and the tail identify this bird with the Green Sandpiper; whilst on the other side the yellowish spots on the scapulars and tertials, the black rump, the length of the leg, and the web between the outer and middle toes are characteristic of the Wood Sandpiper of Montagu.
* * * * *
THE STOAT.
I. M. (in the "Magazine of Natural History") says that the Stoat is more timid than the weasel, and that it does not change its colour as in the more northern parts of the world. I know not why he calls it timid, even relatively, as I think it is the most fearless wild animal we have in the kingdom, in proof of which I will mention an incident I witnessed myself. I one day saw a Stoat carrying off a large rat it had killed, and I immediately pursued it, but it stuck so tenaciously to its prey (although it was so encumbered with its load as to be scarcely able to run at all) that I was close upon it before it would abandon it; however, it then took refuge in a wall that happened to be close by. I took up the rat, and the Stoat put its head out of the wall, spitting and chattering with every appearance of the most lively indignation against me for having so unjustly robbed it of a lawful prize. I amused myself with watching it for some time, and then being desirous of seeing how far its evident desire to recapture its booty would overcome its fear of me, I held the rat just before the hole in which it was, when after several attempts, in which its discretion got the better of its valour, it at length screwed up its courage to the sticking-place, came boldly out of the wall, and dragged it out of my hand into the hole.
I know not in what county I. M. lives, nor do I know whether he means to include any part of England in the more northern parts of the world, but I do know that the Stoat is white in the winter in Yorkshire, as I have caught and still more frequently seen specimens of this colour.
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THE MARSH TITMOUSE.
I have been much interested this spring at witnessing in two or three instances the tenacity with which the Marsh Titmouse sits on its nest. Being in a wood near my own house, I perceived a pair of these birds in one of the trees, and having seen them in the same place several times before, and being desirous of finding the nest, I sat down to watch their motions. After examining me on all sides with much chattering and many gesticulations, indicative of dislike and suspicion, the female flew to the root of a tree, three or four yards off, and disappeared, as she had gone to the opposite side of the tree to that on which I sat; and as there were several holes about the root I was at a loss to know in which the nest was built, and began to strike the root with a stick, expecting her to fly out, but nothing appeared. I then examined the holes one by one, and whilst doing so heard her hissing and puffing from within, in such a way that if I had not known she was there I should have thought it was a snake rather than a bird. However, as she would not come out, and the hole was so small that I could not get my hand in, I was obliged to raise the siege until next morning, when I returned armed with a hammer and chisel with which to storm her citadel. As the wood was sound, the hole small, and the nest six or eight inches within the tree, I was five or ten minutes before I could get to it, during which I gave her repeated opportunities of escaping if she chose; but she still sat on her nest, puffing and pecking at the stick that I thrust in in order to drive her off. She at last crept to the further edge of the nest, which I then took out, as I wanted it for one of my friends who is a collector of eggs, but on attempting to blow one I found they had been sat upon too long, and I then felt desirous of seeing whether the old bird would hatch them after having her nest torn from under her, and I turned back to the tree whence I had taken them, and found her still sitting in the hole where I had left her. I regret to add that the humane part of my experiment did not succeed, for although she remained after I had returned the nest to its place, she left it immediately after, and did not return to it again.
Another instance which I witnessed was in a nest containing young ones. This was also at the root of a tree, but the situation did not appear to be so well chosen as is usually the case with the Titmouse tribe; for in this instance the hole went quite through the tree, and on one side was large enough to admit the hand. As the young ones were exposed to the weather, and were also liable to be seen by anyone going along the adjoining footpath, I attempted to remedy this defect by covering the larger hole with a sod, which to a casual observer would appear to have grown there. On taking the sod off one day, to see how the nestlings were going on, I perceived that a clod of earth had fallen from the sod upon them, and I took a stick and hooked it out, lest it should smother them. Whilst I was doing this I perceived the old one sat on the further side of the nest, so still and quiet that until I perceived her eye I fancied she was dead; and she also endured several pokings with the stick before she would move, although the hole on the opposite side of the tree enabled her to escape whenever she thought proper.
Perhaps Mr. Rennie, in his next edition of Montagu's Dictionary, will give us a new name for this bird, as the one it has at present is no more applicable to this species than it is to the Parus caeruleus, or the Parus major, and not half so much so as it would be to the Parus biarnicus; and he has changed good names into bad ones with far less reason, witness Corvus frugilegus into Corvus predatorius. The former name is strictly applicable to that species, and to that alone; and so useful a bird does not deserve the name of a thief. The Chaffinch (which received its name of Coelebs from Linnaeus on account of the males alone remaining in Sweden in the winter, which fact is corroborated by White, who found scarcely any but females in Hampshire during that season) has had its name changed by Mr. Rennie into Spiza. The old name is characteristic of a remarkable fact in the habits of this bird; why the new one is more appropriate (neither understanding Greek, nor having read Aristotle), I cannot say. Will Mr. Rennie condescend to enlighten me?
Once for all—if we are to have a new nomenclature, let a committee of able naturalists decide upon it, or let us submit to the authority of a master (for instance Linnaeus or Temminck), but don't let every bookmaker who publishes a work on Natural History, rejecting names long established and universally received, give new ones in such a way as serves only to show his own presumption and to confuse what it ought to be his business to elucidate.
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CREEPER.
The Nuthatch does not occur in this, and I doubt if in any part of Lancashire, but the Creeper is very common, and is a bird with the habits and peculiar call of which I have been acquainted from my childhood. Mr. Bree, who combines with accurate and extensive information, an amiable and pleasant manner of communicating it, has not, I perceive, witnessed the Creepers associating with the Titmice in winter, at which I am rather surprised, and think if they are numerous in his neighbourhood, he will hereafter not fail to perceive them among the small flocks of Titmice which associate through the winter.
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WRENS' NESTS.
In Mr. Rennie's edition of Montagu's Dictionary, and also in his "Architecture of Birds," after copying what I have said on the subject of Wrens' nests being lined with feathers, he says:— "There can be no doubt, I apprehend, of these supposed cock-nests being nothing more than the unfinished structures of paired birds; otherwise the story would require the support of strong evidence to render it credible." Mr. Rennie afterwards goes on to say that in two instances he had seen nests which had about half-a-dozen feathers interwoven into the linings with hair; and Mr. Jennings, if I recollect aright, as I have not the work to refer to at present, says that Wrens don't line their nests with anything but moss, and he thinks Montagu is in error when he says they are lined with feathers. Along with this I send you three or four Wrens' nests, which you will perceive have abundance of feathers in the inside; and although the Wren will occasionally use cows' hair along with the feathers, yet I am persuaded from the localities in which I have met with them, that cows' hair has been used because feathers were not to be found; but when the nests are in the vicinity of a rookery, a farm-yard, or any other locality where feathers are abundant, the Wrens will use them exclusively. What the "strong evidence" must be which will convince Mr. Rennie about cock-nests, I don't know; but I know of a dozen of these nests at the present moment, several of which have remained in the state in which they were left in the middle of April. Other nests found about the same time have now young ones in them. I doubt not these nests are occasionally used for breeding in: for instance, if the first nest of a Wren be taken, or if it breed a second time, it will occasionally take possession of a cock-nest; as I have sometimes found that after remaining in the same unfinished state for several weeks, they have afterwards been fitted up with a lining, and bred in.
Mr. Rennie asserts that Montagu is wrong when he says that the Wren always adapts its materials to its locality. Although it certainly is not always the case, yet so very generally is it so, that I think it is not surprising that Montagu made this assertion.
Thus, if a Wren build in a haystack, the front of the nest is generally composed of the hay from the stack; if it be built in a bush by the side of a river, and (which is frequently the case) below flood mark, it is generally covered on the outside with the rubbish which has been left there by the flood; and if it build in a mossy stump, the front of the nest is composed of the dark- coloured moss which grows there. (May 22, 1832.)
Along with my last letter, I sent some Wrens' nests lined with feathers, and I could easily have increased them to a dozen of the same sort, only I did not wish to deprive so many of my little favourites of their eggs and young. Every day convinces me more decidedly, that I am right both with regard to the lining of the Wrens' nests, and as to the cock-nests also. The nests I sent you will prove the former, and I know of at least twenty instances of the latter, in nests which I have known of all through the spring, from April to the present time, which have remained in the same unfinished state, although they are not forsaken, as I have found the birds in them, in several instances, when I have examined them. I found one of these nests on the 10th of April, under a bank on the side of the river; and I examined it repeatedly through April and May, and always found it in the same state, although there was always a pair of Wrens about, and I could find no other nest; yet I am sure there was another, for in the beginning of this month (June) there were some young Wrens, which had evidently only just come out of the nest; and there were only two or three bushes grew thereabouts, so that it is not probable they had come from any other quarter, but the bushes were filled with dead leaves, and other rubbish brought down by the flood. However, when I heard them, I looked out for another nest, as I believe (notwithstanding what Montagu says, that there are few birds, if any, that would produce a second lot of eggs if the first were unmolested) that most of the small birds which are early breeders build a second time the same year, even when they succeed in rearing the first brood. I have had proof of this (if anything can be considered proof, except marking the birds), in the Throstle, the Blackbird, the Wren, the Redbreast, and the Hedge Sparrow, whose second nests may be found contiguous to the first; and in point of time, this always happens just when the first brood have left the nest. The cock-bird, too, who had been silent whilst his young were unfledged, begins to sing again, and throwing off the anxious and care-beset manners of a parent, again assumes that of a bridegroom. But to return to Wrens' nests. I found one within ten yards of the one I had known of since the 10th of April, lined, and ready for an egg. As I was anxious to prove what I had so long believed, I pulled out this nest, thinking that the old bird was ready for laying a second lot of eggs; and that when I had destroyed this, as she had no other nest ready, she would probably take up with the cock-nest.
As it was half a mile from my house, I did not visit it again until the 16th of June, and was then delighted to find the old bird sitting on six or seven eggs in the cock-nest, which had remained so long unoccupied. I believe that in this instance there is very little lining (fur, feathers, &c.) in the nest, although I should be sorry to examine it minutely until the young have left it; but I consider it an exception to the general rule, inasmuch as I believe the bird was ready to lay when I pulled out the other nest. As she would have to find another with as little delay as possible, she would not have time to embellish the inside in the same manner as she probably would have done if she had had more time.
On examining another Wrens' nest a few evenings ago, I found the young ones had flown, and as there was a cock-nest in some wrack left by the river in a bush a few yards off, I gave it a shake to see if the old ones had taken possession of it for another brood; and I was surprised to see one, and then a second young one come flying out, and a third putting out its head to reconnoitre. Whether the whole brood was there I don't know, as I did not disturb them further. As I had examined this nest only ten days before, when it had not an egg in it, I was at first at a loss to account for these young ones; but I have now no doubt they were the young from the adjoining nest, which had taken up their quarters for the night in the new house. But how had they learnt the way? Young birds generally roost where night finds them, and if I had found only one, I should not have been surprised, but to find at least three, probably six or seven, in a nest where I am certain they were not bred, was something new to me. I went several times in the evening after this, but never found them; I suppose the fright I gave them deterred them from lodging there again.
The editor of "Loudon's Magazine," in a paragraph appended to this article, says: "We have examined the Wrens' nests sent; their staple materials are moss, feathers, and hair. Into the moss on the exterior of the nest are woven a more or less perfect but feeble frond or two, and separate pinnae as well of Aspidium Filix-Mas, and leaves of apple, elm, and oak trees. Interiorly cows' hair is not scarce, and is partly inwoven with the moss and laces it together, and partly mingled with the feathers; a horse- hair or two are also observable. The feathers in each nest, apparently those of domestic fowls, are numerous enough to fill the hollow of the hand when the fingers are so folded over as not to much compress the feathers."
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ALARM-NOTE OF ONE BIRD UNDERSTOOD BY OTHER SPECIES OF BIRDS.
In Montagu's "Ornithological Dictionary," under the article "Song of Birds," there is the following remark: "Regarding the note of alarm which birds utter on the approach of their natural enemies, whether a Hawk, an Owl, or a Cat, we consider it to be a general language perfectly understood by all small birds, though each species has a note peculiar to itself." I was last April very much pleased at witnessing an illustration of the truth of this opinion. I found a nest of young Throstles at the root of a hazel, and although they could scarcely fly, yet as they were near a footpath, and the next day was Sunday, when many idle and mischievous lads would be rambling about, I thought they would be safer out of their nest than in it; and as I knew that when so far fledged, if they were once disturbed they would not continue in the nest, I took one from the nest and made it cry out, and then put it back again; but in one minute, not only it but its three companions had disappeared in the long dry grass which was round about. On hearing the cry of their young one, the parent bird set up such shrieks of alarm as brought all the birds in the wood to see what was the matter. I noticed the Blackbird, the Chaffinch, the Titlark, the Robin, the Oxeye (greater Titmouse), the Blue and Marsh Titmouse, and the Wren all uttering their cries of alarm and apprehension; even the golden-crested Wren, which usually seems to care for nothing, was as forward and persevering as any of them in expressing its fears on this occasion; indeed, the only bird which seemed indifferent to all these manifestations of alarm was the Creeper, which continued its anxious and incessant search for food, as it flitted from one tree to another, examining them from root to branch without ever seeming to understand or to care for what seemed to have so much frightened the others. (June 30th, 1832.)
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DATES OF THE APPEARANCE OF SOME SPRING BIRDS IN 1832, AT CLITHEROE.
Young Rooks heard, 5th April; House Martin seen, 14th; Sandpiper, 14th; Willow Wren, Spring Wagtail, and Redstart, 17th; Wheatear, 19th (this is generally the first spring bird seen); Sand Martin and Swallow, 22nd; Cuckoo heard, 26th; Wood Wren, Blackcap, and Whinchat, 28th; Mocking-bird and Whitethroat, 4th May; Swift, 7th; Flycatcher, 11th; and Fieldfares were not seen until the 2nd of May, which is later than I ever observed them before. (In the parish of Allesby, near Coventry, Fieldfares were observed as late as the 14th of May.)
No doubt many of these birds were in the neighbourhood earlier than the dates I have attached to them, but they are the periods at which I saw or heard them.
The study of Natural History is perhaps as little followed in this neighbourhood as in any part of the kingdom, notwithstanding the facilities which are offered. Our flora is beautiful, varied, and possesses many rare plants, yet I only know of two herbaria; the birds are abundant, yet there is but one collector of them; and as for insects, although I frequently take what I consider rare species, yet I cannot find an entomologist in the whole district, or I would send them to him.
In conclusion, allow me to say, that the leisure hours a somewhat busy life has enabled me to spend in these pursuits, have been some of the happiest of my existence, and have awakened and cherished such an admiration of nature and such a love for the country and its scenes, as I think can never be appreciated by the inhabitants of large towns, and which I cannot describe so well as in the words of one of my friends in a beautiful apostrophe to England, when leaving it—never to return: [11]—
"To thee Whose fields first fed my childish fantasy, Whose mountains were my boyhood's wild delight, Whose rocks, and woods, and torrents were to me The food of my soul's youthful appetite; Were music to my ear—a blessing to my sight."
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THE ROOK SERVICEABLE TO MAN.—PREJUDICE AGAINST IT.
A strong prejudice is felt by many persons against Rooks, on account of their destroying grain and potatoes, and so far is this prejudice carried, that I know persons who offer a reward for every Rook that is killed on their land; yet so mistaken do I deem them as to consider that no living creature is so serviceable to the farmer as the Rook, except his own live stock.
In the neighbourhood of my native place is a rookery belonging to William Vavasour Esq., of Weston in Wharfdale, in which it is estimated there are 10,000 Rooks, that 1 lb. of food a week is a very moderate allowance for each bird, and that nine-tenths of such food consists of worms, insects, and their larvae: for although they do considerable damage to the crops for a few weeks in seed-time and harvest, particularly in backward seasons, yet a very large proportion of their food, even at these times, consists of insects and worms, which (if we except a few acorns, walnuts, and potatoes in autumn) at all other times form the whole of their subsistence.
Here, then, if my data be correct, there is the enormous quantity of 468,000 lbs., or 209 tons of worms, insects, and their larvae destroyed by the birds of a single rookery, and to everyone who knows how very destructive to vegetation are the larvae of the tribes of insects (as well as worms) fed upon by Rooks, some slight idea may be formed of the devastation which Rooks are the means of preventing. I have understood that in Suffolk and in some of the southern counties, the larvae of the cockchafer are so exceedingly abundant that the crops of corn are almost destroyed by them, and that their ravages do not cease even when they have become perfect insects. Various plans have been proposed to put a stop to their ravages, but I have little doubt that their abundance is to be attributed to the scarcity of Rooks, as I have somewhere seen an account that these birds are not numerous in those counties (I have never been there), either from the trees being felled in which they nested, or from their having been destroyed by the prejudiced farmer. I am the more inclined to be of this opinion, because we have many Rooks in this neighbourhood where the cockchafer is not known as a destructive insect, and I know that insects of that class and their larvae are the most favourite food of the Rook, which may be seen in the twilight catching both cockchafers and the large blackbeetles which are flying at that time in the evening. |
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