Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 May 1884 — AGRICULTURAL. [ARTICLE]

AGRICULTURAL.

As the fowls begin to mature many of them become afflicted with scurvy leg. This is due to parasite, and increases with the age of the fowl. It is very unsightly, and is an indication of neglect. It is removed by greasing the legs once a week three or four tipies with a mixture of sulphur and lard, or with lard to which a little coal oil is added. The proprietor of a factory in Ohio thinks it is folly to convert sorghumjuice into sugar, when there is an active demand for tan times as much syrup as has ever been produced in the country. He says the cost of fitting up a factory to manufacture syrup is very small as compared with that needed to construct and furnish one for making clarified sugar. A sheep-owner of long experience says that to sheep a change of pasture should be given at least as often as once a month. The change is needed as much to insure that they shall sleep in fresh and clean places as to give them a variety of food. No sheep can long continue in good health if compelled to sleep in a place made offensive by its own excrement.

Prof. Beal, of the Michigan Agricultural College, comes out against the crow, not se much that he pulls the young corn and so perplexes and injures the farmer, as that he kills frogs, toads, etc., which are great contumers of insects, and, worse that all, that he is a persistent rob.b er °f birds’ nests, eating both eggs and the young birds, and the eating food of these birds is insects, grubs, worms, etc.

A dairyman in Sheboygan County. Wisconsin, who had no hay, ent his straw fine by the aid of a windmill. He fed this chaffed straw with a mixture of oats, flaxseed, and wheat, with an equal weight of corn, with a little bran. Of this he fed fifty cows last winter, and from those cows he got, it is said, an average of one pound of butter per day during the,winter months. There is no better feed than this for calves.

There is no lack of proof that sheep are the most profitable of faign stock; yet there are in the United States more farms on which no sheep are kept than there are where these valuable animals are to be found. In many localities the chief reason for not keeping sheep is that the business of raising curs and of growing wool cannot be successfully carried on together. Many owners of sheep seem to have a strong prejudice against trying to keep dogs and sheep together, and of course the sheep must go, for the people must have dogs.

There are twenty thousand Jerseys in the United States and forty thousand of the grades. Massachusetts, which has always been a stronghold for Jersey breeds, has an immense snm invested in the cattle. Jersey butter is to-day the fashionable butter of the most civilized people. In Boston alone one thousand pounds per week are sold at from forty to eighty cents a pound, while ordinary butter brings from fifteen to thirty cents. Moreover, one thousand pounds more are demanded, but can not at present be supplied. For New York one can double these fiugres.

A California stage proprietor preserves the running gear of his wagons much longer in the following manm r: After the woodwork is made, and before it is put together, he soaks every part of the running gear in crude petroleum oil for twenty-four hours, and then, after putting it together, washes the same: with it from end to end, including the wheels. By so doing once in each succeeding ninety days he finds but little repairing to do. He says the oil prevents the wood from either shrinking or swelling, and, costing but a trifle he is satisfied that it has saved him many a dollar in the shape of repairs.— Baltimore Sun.

A correspondent of the Oh io Farmer relates an experience in raising two lots of lambs in one year, from which those who live near the large cities may possibly get a suggestion of value. After shearing he allowed his ram to run •vith breeding ewes, which were then suckling lambs dropped between March 15 and April 15. About the first of the next following November some fifteen or eighteen of these ewes dropped lambs to the service received in the spring. When he began feeding in winter a place was fixed in one of the stables, so that the lambs could enter and the ewes could not. Bran and salt was placed in a trough in this place, and the lambs soon learned to go there and eat. They were fed liberally through the winter, and in the spring were in fine condition.The ewes came through in fine order, and when the lambs were weaned the ewes were in better condition than his had ever been in when he weaned lambs in the fall. •

Thebe is no better time to paint buildings than during the pleasant days in winter; Paint spread in cold weather makes a better covering forthewobd than if laid on when the wood is hot and excessively dry, so that the oil is immediately absorbed, leaving the lead or other material used as a chalky substance on the surface ready in a few months to rub off or be washed by rains. It will require a little more paint at a single coat in cold than in warm weather, as the oil will be thickened a little by 1 lie cold, but then it will stay where it is put, and a secopd coat will be less needed. One advantage in painting now is the absence of flies and other small insects which in warm weather often make freshly-laid paint look anything but attractive. If there is snow on the ground * o cover the earth and prevent dust and leaves from being blown into the paint, all the better. In the very coldest weather it may be well to keep the materials in awa m room, as the paint will spread more easilv than if cold enough to freeze water. It is a good plan, too, as far as may be. to keep on the sunny side of buildings, painting the east sides in the morning and the west in the afternoon. The north sides may be painted in the middle of pleasant days, and the south side when it would he too cold to work anywhere else. All the plain, outside painting of a farmer’s buildings may just as well be done by himself and his ordinary farm

help as by a professional painter, though it might be well to employ one such to to do the more difficult portions and tc give advice and oversee the work. Ex cellent paints now come mixed all ready to spread, so that but little practice will be required for a “green hand” oi ordinary ability to become equal to any ordinary fairm painting. If owners oi buildings would paint them a little oftener, one coat would always be enough to put on at a time. It is the long-neg-lected work that takes oil up at a fearful rate, the wood being full of little checks which absorb like a sponge. A thin coat on the surface of solid wood is equal to a heavier coat half absorbed by air checks. A building painted with one gcod coat every third year will always look well, while the wood will be thoroughly proteoted. A painted house is warmer than an unpainted one, the paint filling many joints that would let cold winds through.— New England Farmer.