Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 September 1890 — DOMESTIC ECONOMY. [ARTICLE]

DOMESTIC ECONOMY.

HOUSEHOLD AND AGRICULTURAL TOPICS DISCUSSED. A Budget of Useful Information Relating to the Farm, Orchard, Stable, Parlor and Kitchen. Manure. Experiments at the Cornel) (N. Y.> station shew that horse manure thrown in a loose pile and subjected to the action of the weather loses one-half its value as a fertilizer. Manure that simply dries without heating is not damaged materially. It pays, therefore, to haul out and scatter manure as it is made, thereby saving it all; or, in lien of this, it should be covered. Grubs in Sheep. Nir. Boddy, of Morgan County, Illinois, practices a successful method of ridding sheep of grub in the head. He feeds them shelled corn on a barn floor literally strewed with air-slaked lime. The sheep in eating till their noses with the lime, which causes violent sneezing, thus expelling the grub. In a few moments the floor will be covered with grubs, which should be destroyed. The use of this remedy occasionally through fall and early winter has rid Mr. Buddy’s sheep of this pest, as he informs Colman's Rural World. Stop the Leaks. As a rule, the successful farmer is he who practices a wise economy and carefully stops the leaks tha f would drain away the substance of his earnings. The elements are at work continually to scatter and destroy the products of industry, and continued care and watchfulness must be exercised to prevent waste In an infinite variety of forms. Granaries and cribs must be properly constructed to prevent destruction of cereals by rodents or storms. In feeding stock the prudent farmer will exercise due care that wasteful methods do not rob him of a large share of his profits. The leaks and waste of the manure pile should be stopped, to the end that the fertility of the farm may be kept up. The thoughtful and economical man will note a thousand little leakages that may be prevented by the exercise of timely care or caution. In fact, judicious saving must go hand in hand with industrious earning and producing, to bring a full measure of success. Stop the leaks, and more than half the causes of the present complaint will disappear.

Agricultural Items. Cultivation of the soil is not for the mere killing of the weeds; it, is indispensable for the grpwth of crops. A corn or potato crop should be worked once a week. An Irishman who grew big crops of potatoes, was asked how he did It. “Well,” he replied, “I plants good seed; I gives plenty of inariure; I hoe ’em, and I hoe ’em, and I hoe ’em; I am alius hoeing them; and they grows and grows.” All we have to do is to keep soil acting; to make it soluble; to furnish it with organic matter; and to give the rain, the atmosphere and the sun’s heat fullest opportunity to exert their chemical agencies on the soil to make it fit for plant food. It is not necessary to grow crops for feeding stock merely for the making of manure, when the stock cannot be sold at profitable prices. A good fertilizer contains eyery element of plant food that exists in manure. One may sell hay and straw without damage or loss if he spends part of the money for fertilizers. The organic matter required to keep the soil porous may be furnished by plowing under clover, and the remains of other crops. What should be done with the excess of land if the yield of crops can be do’ubled, and one-half the land dispensed with for tliis use? Grow timber. There is no other product of the soil becoming so scarce as this is, and for hundreds of uses, timber is growing steadily in value. A plantation of oaks, hickories, chestnuts, walnuts or birches will begin to yield profit when four or five years old. This is a long time to wait, you will say, but we wait longer than that for profit from an orchard, and yet we wait very patiently for the fruit of it, and never grumble at the time that it takes.

THE STOCK RANCH. Stock and Dairy Notes. A pair of well-matched colts are worth twice as much as two odd ones. And yet how few farmers pay any attention to this in the breeding of their mares. If a colt has not yet been halter broken it should be without delay. The weakest twig is most easily bent and the youngest animals are most easily brought under discipline and training. This applies to calves and heifers which should be educated in early age to all the practices of the dairy. The value of silage is that one cow, if not two, can be fed a whole year from the produce of one acre; the detriment of pasture is that five acres of it keep a cow only six months in a year. Regularity in feeding animals is especially needful for their thrift. When the feeding time comes around, sheep will bleat loudly for their food, and cows and calves will worry. Worry wastes flesh and food. So it is an economy to observe regularity in feeding. It was a pertinent and wise remark made by Dr. Detmers at a recent Institute, that the man who adulterated food should be in the penitentiary, but the man who adulterated milk should be hung. And this because the milk is used by the infants, the weak and the sick as well as by the well, and any injurious matter in the milk is sure death to the person who drinks it. There is one sure and certain specific against milk fever in cows; not as a cure but a preventive. This is to avoid all grain feeding for one month before calving, to gradually dry off the cow two months before it, to feed no grain food for one month after calving, and to keep the cow quiet and remove the calf before it has' sucked. Dairies where this system is practiced never have a case of milk fever. A dairyman remarked about his water supply brought from a distant spring through pipes into his house-yard and barn-yard, “that is worth to me a thousand dollars.” And he proved it to the doubting questioner by showing that the convenience in saving time alone was worth more than a dollar a week, and that was equal to 0 per cent, interest on the Si,ooo, while the improvement in his cows, due to the permanent and pure water supply, was worth even more than this. The man who is always harping upon

the foolishness, or worse, of farmers keeping the common cattle instead of pure bred herds, is a—well, there is no mood strong enough to express the idea. For while there are more than 6,000.000 farmers who keep cows, there are only 92.000 pure bred cows and 40.000 bulls recorded in the herd books, to which good, bad and indifferent all go from the first beginning of the records, and a large number of these are dead. How far would the whole go around all the farmers? One to every 120 farmers, that is all.

THE DAIRY. Hardening Butter After It Comes. W. H. Gilbert, Richland, N. Y., writes to Hoard's Dairyman: In answer to Mr. A. A. Wright, I will say that my butter churned at 01 degrees or even 64 degrees is not softer than when churned at 58 degrees. I stop the churn as soon as butter comes, then rise with cold brine, draw off the buttermilk as close as possible. Add cold water without agitating the churn till the butter is cooled to or near 50 degrees. Then finish washing the butter, after which I salt, work, and print, or pack, Vnmediately. We cannot lay down any definite temperature for churning, as cream varies. 1 aim to churn at as low temperature as possible and get my butter in from twenty-five to thirty minutes with churn about onethird or two-thirds full. Cream from cold setting should bo warmed up to churning temperature to ripen and kept at an even temperature till ready for the churn. If we don’t have, eream enough for a churning it should be kept near 45 degrees till we get enough, when the whole should be warmed and ripened together. Dairy Notes. A dairy school in every State would revolutionize the dairy and creamery business. In these days the fascination of a “pure bred"’ is not strong enough to loosen the purse strings of a business man unless you show that great profit may be had. The idea diluting milk, set for cream, with fifty to sixty per cent, of water is gaining headway in the practice of gO-ahead dairymen. Try it and see how it works in your ease. When your heifers come in, weigh and test their milk for a whole year, so that you can tell without any guess work which produce the most; and when you have any to sell, always let the poorest go. THE APIARY. House Apiaries. In an address before the Colorado State 2 Beekeepers’ Convention a member selected for his subject the advantages of house apiaries or bee-houses. By beehouse he meant neither a shed witli outdoor hives put under it nor a house in which to store honey, but a house in which the hives are arranged in tiers around the inside, each hive having an entrance extending through to the outside. The walls of his bee-houses are made of inch boards, the hives to set back two or three Inches and connected by runways. The space between the hives and wall admits of a passage of air, which keeps the hlyes much cooler than if they were close to the outside, The alighting boards are of different colors and shapes, so that the bees make no mistake by going in at their neighbors’ doors.

Numbered with arguments presented in favor of the bee-houses by this apiarist, who has five—the smallest one holding thirty-eight colonies and the largest house containing eighty-two colonies—was the fact that any beekeeper can handle double the number of colonies, having everything almost within arm’s length. Then, too, when the honey is taken off it is not scattered all over an acre of ground, but is close together in tho bee-house. Another advantage claimed was that by locking tho door one feels certain that his hives will not leave before the next regular visit. And, too, with apiaries one doesnot have to bring tho hives in during the winter and then haul them out again in the spring. They can be left on the summer stands. In this beekeeper’s opinion, a bee-house is even better than a chaff hive, both for wintering and summering, as the atmosphere in the house, where there are a large number of colonies, is kept at a more even temperature. An even temperature, somewhat below the freezing point, is what is wanted to cause the bees to relapse into that semitorpid condition of successful wintering. A bee-house coinesthe nearest, excepting a cellar, to producing this state. Another advantage offered was that the bees could bo handled with less danger of robbing, as the end of the house in which we want to work can be closed and the opposite end left open for light and for the bees to escape. It is also much cooler for the operator. The editor of the American Bee Journal when asked. “What would be the most convenient arrangement for a house to be used for all the accommodations of an apiary of seventy-five to one hundred colonies, to include shop, storeroom for honey, hfves, etc,” replied: “Build it to suit your fancy or requirements. We should prefer it to be two stories high, about 20x30 feet, with two rooms below and one above. The latter should have a double floor to keep the dust from the loweh rooms, in one of which the honey can be stored; the other would make a workshop. The upper room will be excellent for storage.” THE POULTRY-YARD. Success to the Poultry Yard. The secret of success in the poultry yard is not in hatching but in feeding. How to raise the broods is a problem of magnitude, and for this no fixed rule can be applied. Here the breeder who has clung to one variety year after year \vill be best prepared for the work, because he will best appreciate the conditions as well as wants of tho flock. We must reach below the surface and measure the controlling influences.— Southern Fancier. Milk for Fowls. The Poultry World says: Since milk is the only article of food known to contain within itself all the elements necessary to the perfection! of growth and vigor in an animal, it Is not strange that it should be found to be one of the very best egg-producing materials that can be supplied to poultry. Given two flocks of fowls, and treatment, location and original stock being equal in all respects save one, it will be found that those having skimmed milk as a portion of their daily food or drink will give more eggs weekly and for a longer term of weeks than those whose: treatment is exactly the same with this single exception. The Pekin Duck. The Pekin is the favorite duck of Mr. James Rankin, whose success in artificial

duck culture is well known not only In Massachusetts but throughout the United States. He says on the subject of Pekin ducks, in his manual on duck culture: “I have experimented carefully during the last twenty years with all the larger breeds, crossing them in every desirable way to obtain the best results, and am perfectly satisfied with the Pekin. 1 have got through experimenting and. as 1 grow nearly ten thousand ducks yearly, can hardly afford to guess at 1L It will readily be seen that I can only afford to use the bird that will grow the greatest number of pounds of flesh in the shortest time. Nor is this all; it must be a bird that will give you the first eggs of the season, as this will enable you to get your young birds on the market when they will command the highest prices. Anothey advantage of the Pekin is their pure white elastic feathers, which aro largely mixed with down. These feathers are no mean source of income.” — New York World. THE HOUSEHOLD. Economical Living. One of the subjects talked and written about a good deal at the present time is how to live cheaply. Prices of ail the great staples of life are high. Rents uro enormous. Fashions are exacting. Wants multiply while resources diminish. How to make strap and buckle meet is the problem which presses on hundreds of housekeepers. It is what is done to keep up appearances that destroys tho equilibrium between outgo and income, and make life a drudgery and vexation. How to live cheaply is a question easy enough to answer if one will be content witli a cheap living. Substitute comfort for show. Put convenience in the place of fashion. Study simplicity. Refuse to be beguiled into a style of living above what is required by your position in society and is justified by your resources. Set a fashion of simplicity, neatness, prudence and inexpensiveness, which others will be glad to follow, and thank you for introducing. Teach yourself to do without a thousand and one pretty and showy things which wealthy people purchase, and pride yourself on being just as happy without them as your rich neighbors are witli them. Put so much dignity, sincerity, kindness, virtue and love into your simple and Inexpensive home that its members will never miss the costly fripperies and showy adornments, and be happier In tho cosy and comfortable apartments than most of their wealthy neighbors aro in their splendid establishments. It does not follow that in order to live cheaply one must live meanly. The best comforts of life are not costly. Taste, refinement, good cheer, wit, and even elegance, aro not expensive. There is no trouble about young people marrying with no outfit but health and love and an honest purpose, provided they will practice the thrift and prudence to which their grandparents owed all their success, and innko their thought and love supply what they lack In the means of display. Those who begin life at the top of the ladder generally tumble off. while those who begin at the foot acquire steadiness,, courage and strength of arm and will as. they rise Hints to Housekeepers. To fumigate a room, heat an iron shovel and drop vinegar on it. Have the doors and windows open. Fruit cake, if un frosted, may be kept In earthen jars, but frosting keeps best in tin. Cookies and snaps may be put in covered earthen jars, witli cloths to further exclude the air, for they dry very quickly. If tho cellar is not unusually damp, pies would be bettor kept there, on a swinging shelf or screened cupboard. Doughnuts should have an earthen jar with cover, and one kept for them only. Meats should never be exposed to the light whether they are cooked or uncooked. Too careful attention can not be given them. A half-hour’s delay or even a few minutes, Is often enough for their loss. If one has not a refrigerator, they should be carefully covered, taking care that no fly has gotten or can got within the covering, and consigned to the coolest, darkest place available. When a grease spot has dried into silk or woolen goods, the application of French chalk needs to be assisted somewhat. Sift the chalk over the spot and lay a bit of blotting paper over, then apply a warm iron to the blotting paper? Sometimes the blotting-paper alone will bo sufficient to absorb the grease, under heat, without the chalk. Do not have the iron hot enough to scorch the material. For bread, nothing answers so well as a large tin pall with a cover. Bread should never be put away hot. It should cool some hours before ft Is covered, save with a light cloth. And In hot weather it should be examined very frequently for signs of mold. T?ie pails should be washed and scalded, and allowed to dry thoroughly as soon as emptied. In warm weather they may need itoftener. Bread cloths, If used, should be changed oftenTHE KITCHEN. Currant Cake. Half cup of butter, one cup of sugar, two eggs, half cup of milk, one and onehalf cups of flour, two teaspoonfuls of baking powder, one cup of currants stirred in the last thing. Pie Crust. Four cups of flour, one cup of butter, half a cup of lard, half a teaspoonful of baking powder. Sift flour with powder; rub in lard and butter, and add one cup--01 cold water Rice Pudding* One quart of milk, two cups of cold boiled rice, five eggs, one cup of sugar, lialf a cup of butter, quarter of a teaspoonful of salt. Bake thirty minutes. Very Nice Croquettea. A nice way to use cold beef for supper or luncheon is to take one pint of chopped beef, four medium-sized potatoes, juice of half a lemon, half a cup of stock or hot water, one teaspoonful of onion juice, salt and pepper. Mix all together, shape nicely, dip in beaten egg and cracker crumbs, and fry in boiling lard two or three minutes until they are a delicate brown. Superior Blackberry Wine. Bruise the berries, measure them, and to every gallon add a quart of boiling water. Let this stand for twenty-four hours, stirring it three or four times during the interval. The third day strain off the juice, and to every gallon of this strained liquor put two pounds of refined sugar. Cork it tight and let it stand until cool weather, when you will have a wine that you will never voluntarily be without, as it will be found - so efficacious in sickness, and a good and harmless tonic for the feeble and convalescent.