There are plants well adapted to hedge at the South, which are too tender for the North. In White's Gardening for the South, we have the following given as hedge-shrubs, adapted to that region: Osage Orange, Pyracanth, Cherokee, and single White Macartney roses. The Macartney, being an evergreen thorn, and said to make as close a hedge as the Osage Orange and much more beautiful, is quite a favorite at the South. They usually train the rose-shrubs for hedge on some kind of paling or wire fence. They render some of them impenetrable even by rabbits or sparrows; this is done by layers, and trimming twice a year, commencing after the first three months' growth. Pruning is the most important matter in the whole business of hedging. A hedge set out ever so well, and composed of the best variety of plants, if left in the weeds, without proper care in trimming, will be nearly useless. A well-trimmed hedge around a fruit-orchard will keep out all fruit-thieves. The great difficulty is the unwillingness of cultivators to cut off, so short and so frequently, the fine growth.
Shear off the first year's growth (a) within three inches of the ground (b). Cut the vigorous shoots that will rise from this shearing, four inches higher, about the middle of July, and similar and successive cuttings, each a little longer, in the two following years; these will bring the hedge to a proper height. The form of trimming shown in end view of properly-trimmed hedge, protects the bottom from shade by too much foliage on the top: the effects of that shade are seen in neglected hedge in the cut.
HEMP.
This is one of the staple articles of American agriculture. It is much cultivated in Kentucky and other contiguous states. Its market value is so fluctuating that many farmers are giving up its cultivation. The substance of these directions is taken from an elaborate article from the pen of the honorable Henry Clay. Had not the length of that article rendered it inconsistent with the plan of this volume, we should have given it to the American people as it came from the hand of their greatest statesman, who was so eminently American in all his sentiments and labors.
Preparation of the Soil—should be as thorough as for flax;—this can not be too strongly insisted on. Much is lost by neglect, under the mistaken notion that hemp will do about as well on coarse, hard land. Plants for seeds should be sown in drills four feet apart, and separate from that designed only for the lint. The stalks should be allowed to stand about eight inches apart in the rows. Plants are male and female, distinguished in the blossoms. When the farina from the blossoms on the male plants (the female plants do not blossom) has generally fallen, pull up the male plants, leaving only the females to mature. Cut the seed-plants after the first hard frost, and carry in wet, so as to avoid loss by shelling. Seed is easily separated by a common flail. After the seeds are thrashed out, they should be spread thin, and thoroughly dried, or their vegetative power will be destroyed by heat or decay. They should be spread to be kept for the next spring's planting, and not be kept in large bulk. Their vegetation is very uncertain after they are a year old. Sow hemp for lint broadcast, when the weather has become warm enough for corn-planting. Opinions vary as to the quantity of seed, from one bushel to two and a half bushels per acre. Probably a bushel and a peck is best. Plowing in the seed is good on old land; rolling is also useful. If it gets up six inches high, so that the leaves cover the ground well, few crops are less effected by the vicissitudes of the weather. Some sow a part of their hemp at different times, that it may not all ripen at once and crowd them in their labor. Cutting it ten days before it is ripe, or allowing it to stand two weeks after, will not materially injure it. Hemp is pulled or cut. Cutting, as near the ground as possible, is the better method. The plants are spread even on the ground and cured; bound up in convenient handfuls and shocked up, and bound around the top as corn. It is an improvement to shake off the leaves well before shocking up. If stacked after a while, and allowed to remain for a year, the improvement in the lint is worth more than the loss of time. There are two methods of rotting—dew-rotting, andwater-rotting—one by spreading out on grass-land, and the other by immersing in water; the latter is much the preferable mode. The question of sufficient rotting is determined by trial. Hemp is broken and cleaned like flax. The stalks need to be well aired and dried in the sun to facilitate the operation. Extremes in price have been from three to eight dollars per hundred pounds: five dollars renders it a very profitable crop. Thorough rotting, good cleaning, and neat order, are the conditions of obtaining the first market price. An acre produces from six hundred to one thousand pounds of lint—an average of about one hundred pounds to each foot of height of the stalks. Hemp exhausts the soil but a mere trifle, if at all; the seventeenth successive crop on the same land having proved the best. Nothing leaves the land in better condition for other crops; it kills all the weeds, and leaves the surface smooth and even.
HOEING.
Much depends upon the proper and timely use of the hoe. Never let weeds press you; hoe at proper times, and you never will have any large weeds. As soon as vegetables are up, so that you can do it safely, hoe them. The more frequent the hoeing while plants are young, the larger will be the crop. Premium crops are always hoed very frequently. Hoeing cabbages, corn, and similar smooth plants, when it rains slightly, is nearly equal to a coat of manure. But beans, potatoes, and vines, and whatever has a rough stalk, are much injured by stirring the ground about them while they are wet, or even much damp. We have known promising crops of vines nearly destroyed by hoeing when wet. Hoeing near the roots of vines after they have formed runners one or two feet long, will also nearly ruin them;—the same is true of onions: hoe near them, cutting off the lateral roots, and you will lessen the crop one half. In hoeing, make no high hills except for sweet potatoes. High hilling up originated in England, where their cool, humid, cloudy atmosphere demands it, to secure more warmth. In this country we have to guard more against drought and heat.