Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 August 1884 — AGRICULTURAL. [ARTICLE]

AGRICULTURAL.

.To bimove warts on horses, take a piece of concentrated lye as large as a walnut, put it into a bottle with rain water enough to dissolve it and apply with a feather. An Illinois correspondent states that experience has taught him that cattle will thrive better on good, bright flax straw than on oat or wheat straw, and he never knew cattle to be injured from eating it. In selecting potato seed two things should be kept in mind; flrst, plant only snch seed as may be expected to produce smooth, fair-sized potatoes; second, plant only when the seed is in full vigor.— A. W. Cheever. Basswood trees are urged for planting by the roadside, as they serve the double purpose of attractive shade and abundant forage for bees. They also make excellent timber whenever it becomes desirable to fell them. One of the best disinfectants, says the Poultry Bulletin, is Condy’s fluid, which is made by putting one ounce of potass, permanganate in a pint of cold water. For use, one ounce of this fluid should be added to half a pint of water. The cause of club-root in cabbage is claimed by a German experimenter, Woronin, to be a parasitic vegetable, which lives and feeds, on the healthy tissue of different cruciferous plants. All weeds of that order {producing pods, like turnips, mustard, radish, etc.) should He eradicated while land is being rested preparatory to a renewal of cabbage-growing. The Indiana Fanner says the Ben Davis apple is «o poorly flavored that even the coddling moth generally passes it by for some better variety, and the consequence is that but few of these apples are wormy, and, being of high color and handsome shape, they are a very popular apple at the city fruit stands, where they outsell other kinds about two to one on the average.

Trefoil is said to be extensively used in England for alternate husbandry, but it is reported not suitable for permanent pasture mixtures, except in very small quantities. A w riter states that this plant is well deserving *®f cultivation on light, dry and high, elevated inferior soils, and on sttch will yield a greater bulk of herbage than any of the cultivated clovers. It is highly nutritious, and eaten with avidity by cattle. From the great depths to which its ■•roots penetrate, it is not liable to be injured by drought,and is thereby enabled to retain its verdure after the grasses and other plants are burnt up, a fact ■worthy of notice by Western farmers. Farmers who burn green wood are probably not aware of the waste of heat. The sap uses up—that is, carries off in a latent state —a very large portion of the heat produced by" its carbon, or its dry material. As much man and team power is required to haul three or four cords of green wood as for six or eight cords of dry wood. The lesson is: cut the fuel and split it as finely as it is to be used, in the grove; haul it home when well dried, and keep it in a dry place for use. It will be worth far more for heating purposes than if burned green, «i wet, or damp even. The only exception to th s. advice is, when by reason rtf easier hauling on snow, and on account of the leisure of men and teams in winter, it may he expedient to haul home the green wood then; but in all cases let it be well dried before it is used. To stop a colt from pulling back on his halter in the stall, take a sufficiently long piece of half-inch rope. Put the center of it under the tail like a crupper, cross the rope on the back, and tie the two ei.ds together in front of the breast, snugly, so there is no s ack, otherwise it would drop down on the tail. Put an ordinary halter on (a good one), and run the halter strap, or rope, through a ring in the manger or front of the stall, and tie it fast in the rope on the front of the breast; then slap his face and let him fly back. He will not choke or need telling to stop pulling back. Let him wear this awhile, and twice or thrice daily scare him back as suddenly and forcibly as possible. After one or two trials,he cannot be induced to pull back.— Chicago Evening Journal. In England bay is considered so necessary that notwithstanding the difficulty of curing it there it constitutes an important food for stock. In the A Vest, with our hot, dry harvests, the curing of hay is comparatively simple, As a rule the hay may be cut down in the morning and raked the same afternoon. If allowed to lie in the heaps until sweating has fairly commenced, it may then be removed to the stack, and it will come out bright, sweet and comparatively free from dust. When clover constitutes a considerable part of the hay more care is necessary. The leaves form the important part of the value. It is raked into windrows as soon as it is fairly wilted (say when it is half dry), and then put into high, narrow heaps; it will usually cure sufficiently by the next day, or at most the second day, and may then be removed safely to the stack. A mistake with the most of farmers is in supposing that hay may be stacked greener than when it is put in a barn. Such, however, is not the case. In a tight barn it, is less exposed to the action of the air than in the stack. If too green, it will heat in either case, but more destructively in the stack than in the barn, for the oxygen of the air promotes violent fermentations. (The perfect exclusion of the air is the sum of value in pres, rving perfectly green fodder in silos.) Now, the comparative exclusion of the air is the interger of value in the saving of partially dry fodder in the stack. We do not believe in putting up hay so green that it will more than undergo a kindly sweat either in the stack or barn, and for this reason we counsel that hay be fairly air dried. If brittle, it is too dry; if limp and clinging, it is too green. ' The haymaker soon learns to distinguish when hay is just right. One thing must be carefully observed—hay must never bo stocked moist from rain or dew. The moisture of the sap contained is an entirely different thing from that of rain or dew in the economy of preserving

nay; Bence, in naming wnen uamp rrom | dev, the tops of the cock* should be laid on the outside of the stack or next i the sides in the barn. —Breeder ’* Ga- ! mite.