Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 June 1880 — FARM NOTES. [ARTICLE]

FARM NOTES.

Dip your shingles in petroleum before placing" them on the roof, and they will last much longer. Kentucky blue-grass, clover and timothy are good for uplands. On low lands timothy and red top will d 6 the 1 test. , I> a fanner commences with one cow, and every other calf she has is a heifer, in ten years the cow and her offspring will drop forty-pne .calves. This shows the rapidity with which a farm can be stocked. Seth Green advocates frog culture. He says that many farmers have fortunes in frog ponds, and that a little care and cultivation will produce a crop of frogs large enough for family use, after supplying the market. • The Brazilian artichoke has much to recommtend it as a prominent plant for the interest of the swine, and in no case should the hog raiser violate the necessity o£. growing a few acres for their particular special benefit. At the next fat-stock show in Chicago, animals 4 years old and over will be excluded. Steers should be finished at most at 3 years old, and the time is near at hand when a 3-year-old will rarely be seen, except in the hands of men who do not progress, or on the plains of the far West. The National Live Stock Journal publishes a statement by Prof. Weber, of the Illinois University, that Dr. Hass’ Jiog-cholera specific is compounded as follows: Cayenne pepper, common salt, calcium carbonate, magnesium, carbonate and water. That probably any amount could be made at 15 cents per pound. A writer in the .Fanciers' Journal, in speaking of ducks, pronounces the Aylesbury and Pekin the best varieties, the former being noted for its large 'white eggs and delicately-flavored flesh, and the latter for the richness of its eggs, good constitution and rapid fattening. The Rouen is pronounced only slightly inferior in flavor and in quality of eggs to the above, matures earlier, and is hardier.

Large quantities, of sugar beets will be grown this year in Canada, Maine, Massachusetts, Delaware and California. Between the beet, sorghum and corn the problem of manufacturing sugar in this country seems likely to be solved. Perhaps the planters of sugarcane in Louisiana will cultivate the beet, as they could doubtless raise two crops yearly, like the Creole planters of tobacco on the banks of the Mississippi. In some parts of Germany, instead of smoking meat to preserve it, it is hung up in a dry, well-ventilated room, and painted over wood, vinegar (pyroligneous' acid), an acid distilled over when wood is burned in air-tight stoves, or . dny other <. place where there is not free access atmospheric air. The painting three or four times with this vinegar answers every purpose of smoking. It protects the meat from insects, fungi, and putrefaction.

A special committee, appointed for the purpose of lestifig an Ayrshire cow belonging to the herd, of Wolcott & Campbell, New York mills, Utica, • state, under oath, that she gave eighty-five pounds of milk per day, several days in succession. This, in all probability, is the largest product recorded of the Ayrshire cow, amounting to about thirtynine quarts. On account of this large record let. no one lightly esteem their cow. ? w,hich gives twenty quarts per day. The best soil for sweet potatoes is a sandy loam. If . sand largely predominates’ they will flourish if well manured. New ground or virgin • soil is especially favorable for this crop. It is the common practice to sow buckwheat on new land for,thc first crop and then to plant sweet potatoes for the second. An abundant crop is the general result. In a heavy loam the vines grow luxuriantly, but the tubers are generally small, rooty and of inferior quality. In clayey soil sweet potatoes w ill not thrive. The New York Tribune says<: “It is folly to keep old sheep. They should be turned, off to the butcher while they arc ill their prime. It does not take half so much to fatten them then. When they get old and thin, in order to put them in condition to slaughter,, the whole superstructure must be rebuilt. Four sets of lambs .are all a ewe can bear; this will bring her to five years, and this is an age when, with a little extra care, she .will round up to a fine carcass. Exceptions may be made when the breed ■is scarce, and the blood is more valuable than anything else. ”' • If taken internally with their food, sulphur will almost invariably keep all kinds of animals free from lice. We have made a practice for years past of giving a heaping table-spoonful once a week jn the feed of each of our cows, and the same quantity to about every toil hens in our flock, and they have never been troubled with lice in them. It may be given in the same proportion as to size when required in the food of poultry’, pigs and sheep. Sulphur is a mild cathartic when desired for this purpose, and in smalt doses, seems to have a general beneficial effect on the animal system, something like salt, though, of course, not Of that nature. At Zwall, Holland, the municipal government have solved the oleomargarine difficulty by setting apart a place in the public market for the sale of this commodity, with a positive prohibition against exposing it for sale anywhere alse. Much ‘ Sinusemcnt seems to have been derived frbm seeing sellers who, only a short time before, had been loudly protesting against the imputation that the article th’ey sold was anything but the Simon-pure milk-butter, compelled to shift their, quarters find place themselves andtfieir wares under the artificialbutter sign. They appear, however, to have borne the cluinge Jwith remarkable equanimity.. . : • . . ' •