Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 272, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 November 1916 — HARD TASK TO KEEP FARM HORSE WORKING [ARTICLE]

HARD TASK TO KEEP FARM HORSE WORKING

Expensive to Feed Animal That Stands at Back and “Eats His Head Off.”

(By R. M. GREEN, Mls*-„irl Agricultural Experiment Station,) One of the hard jobs on the average farm is keeping horses profitably employed throughout the year. It is necessary to have enough to do the work at the busy season hut very expensive to feed the horse that stands at the rack and “eats its head off” the rest of the year. In its study of the question, the Missouri agricultural experiment station found one young farmer who kept his hoi'ses working and costs down to 6.7 cents an hour, per horse, as compared with 7.9 cents on the average farm. The horse which did the most work worked nearly three and a half times as many hours a year as the one which did least, and nearly twice as many hours as another. The actual numbers of hours they worked were 1,340, 1,239, 1,028, 702 and 391. In these days of efficiency and economy it is highly important that every man should do everything possible, to reduce the total number of horses it is necessary to keep and increase the ways of finding profitable employment for tbem. Of ~eourseTTve stocTsTs very necessary if the soil fertility is to be kept up, but aside from work animals the stock should be something that wtil produce meat, milk or eggs In return for the feed it uses.