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General View of the County

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The farming interest in some towns, for a few years past, has taken a new direction in another particular. More attention has been bestowed on raising and feeding, stock for market, than formerly. This more agreeable and less laborious mode of farming, when pursued for a number of years, will largely and surely contribute to enrich the land, and restore it to its original strength and fruitfulness. Those who pursue this course, prefer to purchase the young stock rather than breed it.

The farmers evince a laudable zeal to improve their lands, and elevate the standard of agriculture; for they expend annually from $40,000 to $50,000 for Plaster of Paris, as if that were the best and only manure to be had. This lavish expenditure is thrown away, to some extent, and shows a wrong or false economy; for had they turned their attention to the limestone, mans, and bog earths, found every where, almost on every farm of any magnitude, they would have discovered an inexhaustible supply of excellent and more durable manure; and in the form of compost, admirably adapted to almost every kind of soil, and all modes of culture. We commend this more economical and beneficial method of supply, which spends the money still more immediately at home; and the sooner commenced on a large and permanent scale the better. This, we think, is the only true economy to remedy the disease—all other applications are mere tamperings with it. We do not know what other portions of the County are doing on the subject of composts, we believe there are many individuals, farmers and horticulturalists, in the town of Newburgh, and in the vicinity of the village, who, from personal experience, are deeply impressed with its value, and are preparing to use it on their lands in very liberal quantities. There are localities on the farms of Messrs. Thomas Powell and I. Carpenter, which can furnish any quantity of the black bog earth, the principal ingredient of the composition; while lime, in like manner, is abundant in the same vicinity. Durability is one great recommendation of this fertilizer, and makes it economical in the long run. The public survey of the County has developed many valuable deposites of this earth.

The mountain districts, though rugged and forbidding, contain the best qualities of iron ore, and still abound with wood and timber. The manufacture of iron is very extensive in the southern portion of the County, principally in the towns of Warwick and Monroe, and has been vigorously worked at ever since the Revolution. The names of these iron manufactures will be mentioned under their proper heads in the towns in which situated.

The Shawangunk mountain, a spur of the Allegany, from the south, stretches across the extreme western angle of the County, and passes into Sullivan. The eastern face is of easy and gradual ascent, and, in many places, cultivated to the top. The western side is more precipitous and less susceptible of improvement. The elevated range of the Highlands is found in the eastern part of the County, principally in Cornwall and Monroe. It runs in a northeast direction, approximating the Hudson as it proceeds north. The highest summits of the range are known by the names of Butter Hill, Crow’s Nest, and Bare Mountain. The range is not continuous, but broken up into abrupt hills. The central portions are most agreeably diversified with hills of gentle ascent and moderate elevation, and with numerous rich and extensive vallies. The rocks and mountains in the southern part of the County, from Butter Hill in the east to Pochunck Mountain in the southwest, are what geologists denominate granite, a primitive formation, and of that kind called gneiss. These various formations surround the County south, like the segment of a broad and elevated, yet broken, mountain circle. Isolated elevations of the same formation are found in the towns of Warwick, Monroe, and other localities, of which Mounts Adam and Eve, and Snake Hill are examples.