Rensselaer Republican, Volume 24, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1891 — VALUABLE EXPERIENCE. [ARTICLE]

VALUABLE EXPERIENCE.

Editor Hoard’s Dairyman: —I hav® sown rye in my corn for several years past. I sow it by hand, and cover it at the last working of the corn, the last part of July. I sow a bushel per acre and use a one-horse cultivator with small shovels Tor the last working so as to leave the ground as level as I think it helps to keep down the weeds, and the land is not exposed to drying winds or hot sunshine after the corn is cut; nor is it so liable to wash with heavy rains. I think the above considerations would pay expenses if there were no Others, The other object are the large amount of feed available for two or three weeks before pastures are ready in the spring, and the amount of fertilizer afforded both by the droppings of the animals’ fed,and the residue of roots, etc., not available for feed left in the soil. Last fall I turned 350 sheep intg fifteen acres of corn and rye and let them harvest the crop and received fair returns for the crop, besides a manifest improvement in the land. S. O. Y. Gurnee. I Dane County, Wis. _ j

FIELD NOTES. T. B. Terry, of Ohio, one of the most successful farmers in America, esays that if he had known as much about clover andjhow to use it profyears ago as he4ogs now, he would have gotten out of debt a good deal sooner than he did. We hope our dairy readers will not forget to sow a few acres of the corn field to rye for late fall and early spring feed. It must be done at once if done at all. Every one who has thoroughly tried it is enthusiastic in praise of the plain Every farmer who keeps cows, and raises young pigs, or calves, would prove himself a wise man if he would grow each year from four to six acres of field peas. Here is the secret of pea growing: Plant deep and sow plenty of seed. As good a way as any is to sow the soil broad-cast on good fall plowing and plow under say four inches deep. Don’t be afraid of planting too deep.

STOCK NOTES. Some cows in the vicinity of Centralia, Mo., have been affected with foot and mouth disease, and Dr. Paquin, the State Veterinarian, has pronounced one of them a genuine Jase of Texas fever. At the Ontario Agricultural Cob lege a favorite food in feeding swine is the following: Two parts ground peas, one part ground barley, one part oats, and one part wheat middlings.

The annual convention of Holstein Friesan breeders will be held at the Grand Pacific Hotel, Chicago, Thursday, Nov. 19, 1891, at 3 o’clock. All breeders in attendance at the live stock show are invited to be present. Fully fifty per cent of the fertilizing elements of manure are lost by throwing out into a pile and left to rot. The Cornell University Experiment Station characterizes it/‘a terrible loss,” amounting to 62 per cent in horse, and 39 per cent in cow manure, in an experiment. The agricultural commissioner of Georgia calls attention to the fact that the castor bean is a deadly poison to horses and cattle when eaten in any quantity. A few sound seed are rather beneficial than otherwise, but when the seed are undergoing decomposition the poison is of such a character as to produce death in a very short time. The opinion prevails widely that the demand for thin cattle will probably be better throughout the coming early autumn mouthsthan at the same season for some years. This is because both of the improved prospects of beef-making and of the unusual amount of feed of all kinds reasonably certain to be on hand for disposal during the coming feeding season. One of the greatest risks attendant u[K>n sheep husbandry is the dog risk. The Southern Planter gives a good plan of a trap that answers the purpose of holding the stray dog when he makes his visits in search of meals that he fails to get at home. And those that value the well-being of their flocks can gain a point by tho advice thus given. The correspondent of the joui nal alluded to advises the building of a pen six feet square at the bottom and narrowing at the top, in order to allow sides to slant so that the dog can easily mount to the top. The sides having been smeared with broiled meat, some of which is placed inside, the dog climbs up the outside and jumps down, but is unable to get out, and is held as a prisoner until shot or released, as the attendant of the trap sees fit. This plan has the advantage over poison, which is always more or less unsafe to use, and is far in advance of the shotgun, as the trap is always ready, set night and day, to receive the first trespassing dog. It takes half of the food in dog days to support the flies. Put it another way. It takes twice as much food to get a pound of gain in Julv and August, when stock are fed all the time in the fields, as It would if they were kept in cool and darkened stables away from the flies. It is worse with little animals with thin skins.—-Farm Journal.

DAIRY MOTES. An lowa farmer woman writes: .The creamery has been the longest jstep out of the old into the new. It has taught us to skim the milk be'fore it spoiled and to have sens* enough to stop churning before w< spoiled the butter.