Jasper County Democrat, Volume 4, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 July 1901 — GARDEN AND FARM [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

GARDEN AND FARM

HANDY FOR CUTS AND SORES. One of the most convenient remedies for cuts, strains, sores, etc., is crude petroleum. A bottle of this substance should be kept in every barn or stable, and in a convenient place, so as to use it freely when occasion requires. HEDGE GROWING. The first two or three years are the most important with a hedge, whether of Osage orange, arbor vitae or Japan privet. Set the plants two feet apart and cut them back as close to the ground as possible the first year, catting close the second and third years also, in order to secure thick growth near the ground at the start. Of course such work should be done by an experienced person, but the majority of hedge growers do not bestow sufficient attention the first three ytears. TO DRESS POULTRY PROPERLY. Always pluck dry. as dealers never pay a large price for scalded stock, and do not care to handle it. The fowls should fast for at least eighteen hours or until the crop is empty before killing. Commence picking immediately after killing, and the feathers can be removed both easily and quickly. Leave the outer wing tips and half the neck unpicked, and, if intended for the British market, leave the tail feathers. Wash all blood from the head, and allow the bird to thoroughly cool before packing for shipment. MISMANAGEMENT OF CALVES. When calves are not thrifty the cause may be in the management. Irregularity in feeding, overlooking their peculiarities and preferences, and crowding them are reasons that cause lack of thrift. When several calves are together, and their milk poured into a common trough, the stronger ones will secure more than their share and the weaker calves less than a sufficiency. Lack of water in very warm weather during the middle of the day may cause harm, for it is customary with some to water the cows and calves only twice a day where the supply of water is at the - barn only. The remedy is to feed each calf separately from the others and give a variety of food.

NOT CONDUCIVE TO SHEEP’S HEALTH. Damp pastures or low lands are not conducive to the health of sheep, as they prefer upland pastures and a great variety of grasses. It is known that the quality of the food and the pasture has ■lore influence on the wool than does climate. Fat sheep produce heavier and coarser fleeces than do those that are poorer in flesh. 1 hat the food is an important factor in affecting the quality of wool is shown by the fact that when finewool sheep have been taken from the East to the West the fineness is not always retained, although the sheep will gradually become larger and the fleeces heavier. WHY HENS CEASE LAYING. • When hens cease to lay the cause may be moulting or renewal of the feathers of the body. Discarding the old feathers and growing the new ones is a se-, vere tax on the fowls, and they lay during the process, as they cannot produce eggs and feathers at the same time. When feeding fowls, in order to make them lay use meat, either cheap portions, such as liver or chuck, or the commercial ground meat, allowing but little grain. Once a week a mess, composed of one quart of bran, one of ground oats and half a pint of linseed meal will lie found beneficial. f Never overfeed, and avoid feeding three times a day in the summer, allowing meals during morning and night only. MIXED GRAIN FOR FODDERS. The result of the series of co-opera-tive experiments in Ontario last season was to place a mixture of oats, peas and vetches first in point of yield, with an average of almost nine and three-fourths tons per acre. Oats and vetches gave nearly eight and one-half tons, and oats and peas eight tons. While the lowest in point of yield, the latter was placed first In the matter of quality, with 100 points, while 88 points were given to oats, peas and vetches, and only 38 to oats and vetches. The hairy vetch gave an average yield of a little over eight and one-half tons, the grass pea eight tons and the common vetch seven and three-fourths ton.

TIME IN DAIRY WORK. Time is an element of great importance in dairy work. Milk, cream and butter are of exceeding perishable natures, and, like all quick decaying articles of food, they are hotbeds for breeding all kinds of destructive bacteria. The only way to fight this enemy is by celerity of action. Hurry the milk from the cow and out of the stable; hurry thi cream from the milk and spare as little time as possible in getting the cream into the churn and the butter to the customer. To carry out this idea, clean the stable, clean the cow, milk into covered pails, use a separator, use a cream starter, Use a swing churn and start the butter to the customer the night of the day it is made. 'I his is a strict business principle, and should be pushed for all it is worth, and that means large profits for the trouble taken, for it inay be safely stated that you will lose two or three cents » pound on your butter for every day you linger past the thirty-six hours necessary to carry out the plan outlined above. Energy is the clement of success in all lines of business, but particu'arly so in butter making. It may be proper to qualify the above

advice with some don’ts, Don’t hurry your cows' into a run coming from the pasture, and keep dogs away from them. Don’t be in too great a hurry in cleaning up the stable that you half do the job. Don’t hurry milking so that you leave half the strippings in the adder. Don't stop the ripening of, the cream until there is a subaeid taste developed, and the cream runs smooth from the paddle. Don’t hurry the motion of the churn or dasher to bring the butter in Less than thirty minutes, and don’t stop washing the granulated butter in the churn until the buttermilk is all out of it. In other words, make speed, but not unseemly haste.— Home and Farm. GROWING ONION SETS FOR PROFIT. Sets are produced on the tops of .onion stalks. They consist of a number of small bulbs or onions about the size of acorns and when planted grow and produce onions which maturq earlier than those from need. As soon as the frost is out of the ground in spring, prepare and plant in rows two to two and one-half feet apart, and from eight to ten Inches apart in the row. For this purpose use only sound onions of some standard variety. They must have been raised the year previous from seed or gpod sets. Plant them very shallow, so the tops t) will show above the ground. Keep the patch free from weeds. The sets will be matured as soon as the onion stalks are dry. After this they must be gathered and stored in a dry, cool place. Do not allow them to freeze during winter. On one Occasion I secured over thir-ty-five pounds of sets from about onefourth bushel of onions planted. These I sold the next spring at fifteen cents a pound, netting over $6. These onion sets are in great demand in the spring in our neighborhood and at the village. Prices vary somewhat, but range from ten to seventeen cents a pound. Sometimes it has been necessary to leave the sets with some grocer and let him sel! them for us. By taking goods in exchange he made no charge for making a sale. Of late, however, I have usually been able to sell all for cash to neighbors and acquaintances. People frequently come several miles to buy onion sets, as they have learned that they can depend upon what they are getting.—L. O. Foils, in American Agriculturist.

CARE OF COWS. The well bred, high producing cow is more sensitive to her surroundings than the most delicately constructed machinery and is greatly affected by slight causes. A cow in my own herd that under my own personal care produced over six hundred pounds of butter and ten thousand pounds of milk in a year, when ; placed under the care of another and equally well fed dropped off to. about one- half that amount, and on her return to my own stable came back to her former production. Cows should be milked so far as possible, by the same person ; and at the same time of day to realize j their full capacity. There is no time or labor expended in the dairy that brings so large a return for the investment as a proper use of the card and brush three minutes a day per cow for that period in the year when they are confined n the stable. The cow that will produce 250 pounds of butter in a year will, as a rule, by the aid of the card and brush, kindly and well used, increase to 300 pounds on feed and care otherwise the same. I have tried this, and speak from personal and careful experiment. The care of cows includes care of stables. In the dairy business cleanliness is next to godliness—clean bedding, ample absorbents in the gutters—and for this purpose gypsum or land plaster is among the test. Two pounds a cow per day put in the drop behind each cow will do away with most of the offensive smell of the stable and absorb most of the liquid drippings. The effect of kind treatment of a cow can hardly be overrated. She should know and welcome the voice of her master and attendant. If he practices calling her by name and speaking to her when he comes near her she will soon learn to expect and welcome it, and will render a rich return in the pail for the trouble. Of the care of the milk after the cow lias delivered it into the pail there is not time nor space to speak fully. A reiteration of the thought of cleanliness, thorough cleanliness, is never ill timed at any point in the progress of the milk from the pail to the butter in the tub.—C. L. Peck, in Notional Stockman. AGRICULTURAL NOTES. How many old and worthless roosters are you feeding? By looking at some flocks we are led to believe that their owners think the roosters do the laying. The flock of hens that are fed at various times and places hardly ever pay a profit. Method and system In the poultry business count for a great deal. One of the best ways of keeping cows from becoming persistent strippers Is to have all the heifers milked tne first year by the beat and fastest milker on the farm. Never allow n rough piece of ground to lie idle. Stock It with sheep and they will at least pay the taxes, and you are pretty sure to get interest ap well, no matter how poor the land la. Remember when applying the manure that unless you cultivate thoroughly the manure will only be the means of making the weeds grow better. The surest way to get a good crop of weeds 1b to manure thoroughly and not cultivate.