Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 May 1880 — FARM NOTES. [ARTICLE]

FARM NOTES.

Come, let us plant the app'e-tree Cleave the tough, green sward with the spade; Then gently lay the roots, and then Wide let its hollow bed be made; Sift the dark mold with kindly care And press it e’er them tenderly, Ah round the sleeping infant’s feet We softly fold the cradle sheet; So we plant the apple tree. In some parts of Kansas farmers have sown flax and spring wheat in the same fleld. The profit is said to be greater than when either crop is sown alone. One of the occupations of young men who are filling up Western Texas is to breed geese. One of these has 3,000 geese, whose feathers are plucked every two months. Each bird will average a pound and a half a year, worth 50 cents per pound. A well-known fruit grower, in making a new orchard, systematizes matters by setting his apple trees so that the summer apples will be together, then the fall apples, then the winter apples, and so on. It makes it easier to gather them, and avoids the necessity of hauling all over the orchard.

Plants must be allowed air; even those that will not bear the outer air must have the air of the room frequently freshened by ventilation, to preserve them in health. ‘Care should be taken not to let plants stand in a draught, for when so situated one strong gust of cold wind will often prove sufficient to destroy them.

A woman in Wyoming Territory who has raised large numbers of hens says that after vainly trying the recommended remedies for lice she hit upon the plan of giving them once or twice a week a large loaf made of graham flour in winch a handful of sulphur had been mixed. The hens liked it, were freed from the lice and kept liealthyall through the summer.

Experiments in Germany show that if potatoes are fed to milch cows they should be cooked. Rtiw potatoes will give a larger yield of milk, but less butter, than cooked ones. In the case referred to raw potatoes were first added to the daily rations .of hay, straw and other materials. The result was that with raw potatoes the ration gave 282 J pounds of milk a week, yielding six and three-fourths pounds of butter, while with cooked potatoes it gave 2481 pounds of milk, yielding nine and one-fourth pounds of butter. Wood ashes will decompose bones. Expose to the weather a barrel filled with alternate three-inch layers of broken bones and ashes for several months, when, on examination, the bones will be found to be reduced to a jelly-like substance, forming phosphate of potash, one of the most powerful as well as lasting fertilizing materials known, and one which, when exposed to the sun for a few days, may be easily reduced to powder—the very best condition for applying to the land. Do not hurry the operation, but save all the bones and let time and woyd ashes convert them into a rich manure.

The ylmcrican Cultivator records the names and addresses of 150 enterprising farmers who last season, by careful and intelligent management, succeeded in raising an average of nearly twenty tons of sugar beets to the acre, for v liich they averaged a cash return of about SIOO each per acre. This record represented the product of many farmers in different towns and in three States, viz., Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire, which makes it appear that successful beet culture is not so much a matter of soil or locality as of individual effort and skill.

An exchange stiys : It is impossible to convey to the reader an idea of the vast valuable forests of fir, pine, and cedar in Oregon and Washington. Trees 200 and 250 feet high, and six feet in diameter, are never out of view ; eight and ten feet in diameter, and 300 feet high, are not uncommon, gem rally two-thirds free of limbs. Fifty and sixty good timber trees grow on an acre, as a rule, and yield seldom less than 300,000. feet, and instances are on record of 1,000,000 feet from an acre. No acre is worked for profit which cannot yield 300,000 feet at least, and even this yield is rare. An agricultural writer' says his advice to farmers is to try and keep off disease. Keep hogs in clean, good fields; give them access to good water. In the dryest part of the field provide good shelter both from sun and rain. In troughs near their resting-places, two or three times each xveek, place a composition of salt, soda, red pepper, and ginger. To four parts of the first trvo articles, add one part of latter. Common red pepper will answer, well pulverized, and all the ingredients thoroughly mixed. This is no remedy, but a preventive of the injurious effects of the foul gases and the pestiferous filth in which hogs have been allowed to wallow.