Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 October 1879 — AGRICULTURAL [ARTICLE]

AGRICULTURAL

The rise in cotton is said to have nettedJSkmthern traders $10,000,000. Hogs may be kept from measles, trichinosis, etc., by mixing a handful of good wood ashes with their food twice a week. The following rule in plowing is recommended: Never turn up over one or two inches of unfertile subsoil in one season, and, when so turned up, the land should receive a dressing of manure. Crops must eat, as well as the owner, and therefore the soil should be well manured. Crops which leave land better than they found it make both farm and the. farmer rich. The best fertilizer of any soil is a spirit of industry, enterprise aud intelligence. / j■; Beware of drinking to much col*! Wkter while you are working in the sun, and do not plunge suddeuly into a cold bath. If you are near a brook, wet your head, put leaves into your hat, and frequently put the hands into water, letting them remain there for a considerable time. The effect will be soothing upon the whole system, and it will reduce thirst. * .The farmer who has a supply of roots on hand with which to feed nis stock is now reaping the reward of good management. Roots fed at this season not only serve to increase the flow of milk and give color and flavor to the butter from fresh milch cows, but. cleanse the blood, tone up the system and place all classes of cattle in a generally healthy condition. * Let any farmer try the experiment of cultivating and curing a lot of second crop clover while the stock is yet green, or about the time it is fairly in in oom. Let it be well cured (without rain, if possible) and stowed away under some good shelter for the use of his hogs in winter, and if his heart rejoices in the happiness of God’s creatures, it will do him good to see how his hogs enjoy a feed of clover once a day—how they will pick out the heads, leaves and small stems, and leave nothing but the coarsest portion of the stalks. He wil l then find little difficulty in. agreeing with us tl at stock hogs require a little roughness in winter as well as other stock, and therefore should not be confined exclusively to solid grain.

A great many farmers make a mistake in buying their curry combs. They buj them in the spring, at about the time when they get a new hired man. The proprietor tells hb man to cleanse hb horses well. So the new groom, with the new comb, scratches the horses up and down, backward and forward, for five or ten minutes. I would like to see a horse that would not get angry with sueh treatment. I always buy my curry-combs in the fall—-November or December is a very good time. At that; time the horse has a very thick coat, and then there b not much danger that you will scratch a horse so badly that ne will bite or kick at you. J know a man who always has horses that kick or bite, and I am satisfied that it b hb own fault. He licks and kicks hb horses more in one week than I do mine in five years. I advise those who. want to buy horse brushes to buy the best they can get. Eleven years ago I bought a brush that cost $2.50, and it b as good yet as it was when I bought it. “The best is always the cheapest.”