Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 November 1880 — FARM NOTES. [ARTICLE]

FARM NOTES.

The United States, while it contains .ess than a sixth of the population of Europe, has four-fifths as many swine, a third as many cattle, and a fifth as many sheep as are in all the Eropean countries together. Perhaps the heaviest returns ever obtained in this country from a single sheep was secured last year by Daniel Smith, of Hinsdale, N. H., who raised from a Shropshire ewe three lambs, which he sold for $lB, and the wool of the ewe for $1.50, making the total income from the sheep $19.50. Friend farmers, prepare your land for wheat better than you ever prepared it before. Harrow, harrow, harrow. If the soil is sandy, roll after sowing or drilling in. If at all inclined to be clayey, roll before sowing. See if the results of this careful preparation do not more than pay the cost. Prof. Budd says, in the lowa Colleye Quarterly, of the Worden grape: “We have the true Worden growing on the college farm, and the merest novice can distinguish between it and the Concord at a distance of ten feet. It ripens in lowa fully ten days before the latter, and the fruit is larger and more juicy.” Chicken Cholera. —Seeing considerable about this disease in the different agricultural journals, I give you a very simple cure, which was communicated to me by a lady friend. We have tried it a’d found it to work “to a charm. ” It is simply a piece of salt bacon or shoulder nailed to a stump or board and placed where the fowls can pick at it. Old wormy stuff—that is not good to eat —is just as good as any, and a large piece can be bought at almost any country store for a mere song. Try it.—Hayseed, in the Son of the Soil. The Coming Fence.—The Farm Journal gives in a few words its opinions concerning the fences of a no distant future. It says: “Ist, the fencing material of the era now dawning will consist more largely of iron than heretofore, but, 2d, iron posts will not be used unless there is a great fall in the price of iron, a circumstance not likely to occur. 3d, to turn cattle and horses only, a fence consisting of wooden posts with three iron No. 6 wires will prove the cheapest and best fence. The bottom wire, about two feet from the ground, may have barbs upon it, to prevent cattle from pushing against it; the top wire should have plastering lath wired to it horizontally, the lath whitewashed, to prevent animals running into the fence. 4th, to turn sheep and hogs wooden fence is cheepost and best. sth, as to the fence of the more distant future for turning cattle, we are not prepared to nameit, but many farmers in the old dairy sections will say ‘fence, no fence.’ The soiling system that will feed and support one hundred cows on one hundred acres requires no fence at all, for the cows do not graze, but are fed at the barn v.inter and summer.” Salt*for Poultry.—Hens often have a habit of biting and pulling their feathers and greedily eating them until their bodies are bare. This practice, it is believed, is occasioned by a want of salt, as when salted food is given them they make no attempt to continue the habit. Salt pork chopped fine and fed twice a week has been adopted with success, while others put a teaspoonful of salt with two quarts of meal or shorts moistend, well mixed, and fed about twice every week. Fowls, like human beings, to be healthy must have a certain allowance of salt. So long as the American people prize sugar sweet cakes, and the New York hotels consume 1,800,000 chickens and poultry, and 5,500,000 of eggs every week, the poultry business in this country will remain a good one. Give your fowls warm, clean houses and dry, grassy runs, if you would have them clear of roup and canker. And feed them regularly with good nourishing food, if you would have them free from disease, lay more eggs, and be more profitable every day. Winter Dairying.—The better class of livers in the United States are beginning to demand good, fresh butter instead of the salted article which has hitherto been eaten through the winter months. In consequence those farmers who try to please the palate by producing a sweet, nutty-tasting commodity, will reap their reward by receiving a remunerating price. Setting ■ aside fancy prices, it is certain that a good, fair rate will always be paid for butter which can be depended upon to come to hand weekly in uniform quality. The best butter-maker in the United States fails unless the cows are fed properly, therefore there must be the right sort of food. The hay should be made from grass cut when in bloom, and this alone will do, but some corn meal and wheat bran will increase the cream and add to the rich flavor of the butter. Also tlie use of carrots will cause a greater flow of milk, and there will be then the peculiarly fresh taste which characterizes butter when cows are in good pasture in June. Of course comfortable stabling, cleanliness, and exercise in a sheltered yard will be requisite for full success. The cows should have their calves in September or thereabouts, and the heifer calves from all good milkers should be raised, which can be done on the skimmed milk. In the autumn there is no forage or food of any kind, better for milch cows as a help to failing ■pasture than pumpkins. I have used them freely for years with the best results, and find the fear of the seeds all nonsense. At the present time I have a fine lot growing among the corn and about three acres planted near the barn, which together will be sufficient to last till Christmas if I can secure a portion of them from frost. After the pumpkins are gone, carrots are better than any other variety of roots, and if fed till grass comes again there need be no loss of quality in the butter. The quantity of the milk will be equal to the best grass season, and will depend upon the cows. Any man having common sense, and managing properly, can obtain double the average given by cows of the kind usually met with, if he will buy good ones and breed from none but deep milkers, and from bulls which are from a deep milking strain.— Correspondence of Country Gentleman.