Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 21, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 December 1899 — AGRICULTURAL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

AGRICULTURAL

Home for Winter Brooders. The plan here given has been fonnd well adapted to the use of winter-brood-ing hens. It consists of a partly underground basement, over which a double sloping roof is placed with glass on thd south side. By protecting the lower part of the house, which is built up of stone concrete —or if of wood, the walls are doubled and the sash doubled, with an air space of four inches between, artificial heat will not be needed, except perhaps for a few of the coldest days and nights in the winter. For these, sufficient warmth may be secured by means of an oil stove or a panful of redhot wood or coal set on the floor. The shutters shown on the front will make a good protection during stormy weather when the winds are blowing cold. In the front is a small entrance'door which is kept closed when not in use, and the main door is on the further end opposite the ventilator in the front gable. The house faces the south and the lower part is five feet deep from the level of

the ground. This kind of a house is in use on several large poultry farms during the winters. Cow Peas. Cow peas may stand until the first pods get full grown, but not ripe. This 1b especially necessary if they are to be fed to young stock of any kind. At this «tage they have the bone, muscle, hair and wool elements In them, and not too much fat. We wish we could Impress feeders that fatty foods like corn and beans and peas when ripe are positively hurtful to growing stock. A little corn or fat-making feed Is needed In cold weather to keep up animal heat. Hundreds of thousands of pigs, colts and young cattle are annually stunted and dwarfed by a food where the fat is out of all proportion to the bone and muscle making part of the feed. The margin Is so small now we must look into these details, the observance or neglect of which may turn the scales to a failure instead of a success. To express it another way, growing animals must have a protein feed, and fattening animals food rich In fats. To those who want to feed fattening stock, milch cows, brood sows and breeding ewes let beans and peas get to that stage we call fodder. .Let the seeds get into a hard dough. At this stage pea pods will begin to turn yellow and dead leaves at the base of the stem turn yellow. The beans must be thoroughly field cured and the seeds get dry and hard, for the reason that In 100 pounds of soy bean seed there is only a small fraction less than seventeen pounds of oil or fatty matter. If they are bulked damp they will heat and mold. Peas are not so rich in fat and will stand bulking sooner. . Cut with mowing machine for hay. Peas are hard to pitch off the wagon. We take a hay knife and cut the load the long way, and cross cut It two or three times, when they are as easily handled as common hay.—-Farmer’s Advocate. Feeding Crops at Home. Edward Atkinson has advised the farmers to compress their cornstalks into bales for market as they do their hay. A writer in the New York Tribune suggests that they had better compress their hay, stalks and’grain Into milk and market them in that 1 form. But cannot that be improved upon? Why not compress the milk into butter and cheese, and the balance of the fodder and grain into beef, pork and mutton, or good, well-trained young horses? Then they would be selling less of the fertility of the farm, and more of their labor and skill, and paying less tribute to the railroads and other transportation companies. When it takes the pr?-e of a bushel of grain or of two bushels as It did a few years ago to pay for carrying another bushel to the consumer, or when the farmer can get for his hay but one-half what the consumer has to pay, he should look about to see • how be can compress his products into packages of less weight and bulk, that he may receive more of the proceeds for it, and the railroads less. And when he finds that of every dollar he receives for products one-half must go to restore to the soli that which the crop has taken from it, he should look to see if he cannot manage to retain at home some of the nitrogen, potash and phosphoric acid that he is sending away, and which he replaces from ihe mines of Chile, Germany and South Carolina. Porto Rico Guano. It is reported that samples of Porto Rican guano, or something called by name,’have been sent to this country with a view of selling it here for fer-

This would be 340 pounds of insoluble phosphoric acid, valued by experiment stations at 2 cents a pound, or $6.40 a ton. The 48 pounds of potash at 4% cents would be $2.16, and 20 pounds nitrogen at 15% cents would be $3.10. This would show a possible valuation of about $11.50 per ton at old rates, but we think prices now are a little lower. We doubt, too, if it can be taken out so free from soil or other poorer material that a cargo would* analyze as high as the samples sent, and It would scarcely pay the cost of importation unless gold higher than sl2 a ton when bagged. Farmers would do better to grow nitrogen in clover, cow peas or other nitrogenous crops, and buy potash as muriate and , phosphoric acid in aold phosphate, in which it is soluble. One hundred pounds of muriate of potash contains 50 to 52 pounds, or more than is in a ton of the Porto Rican deposit, and a ton of acid phosphate should have about 260 pounds of soluble phosphoric acid, worth about 6 cents a pound, or more than twice as much as the 340 pounds of insoluble material.—Exchange. Care of Tools. There ought to be a society for the prevention of cruel and abusive use of farming tools and machinery. When we see mowing machines and reapers sheltered in winter under apple trees, plows and harrows in fence corners, and other tools just where the owner left them when he used them last, we feel indignant, says the American Cultivator. We know that it helps to make trade good for the manufacturer, and gives employment to‘many men who must supply new tools in place of those rusted and broken, but we know that before the new ones are bought many a horse will work harder on these machines than he would have needed to if they had been properly cared for, and men and boys must work harder as well and do less effective work. Some tools we know are not sheltered because the owner has not roof enough to cover all that he owhs, but in more cases it Is but the result of carelessness. This is one of the leaks on the farm that prevent the stream of prosperity from filling the farmer’s pockets and building up his bank account. Try to have them all housed before winter, and before spring comes have them overhauled and cleaned, iron work oiled, wood painted and every part in working order to begin with the next season.

Northern-Grown-Corn. We are not prepared to assert that yellow corn is more valuable for feeding purposes than white corn, but we believe that Northern yellow corn is better than Southern white com of the same year’s harvest. It may be because of more thorough ripening, but we think the fact has been proven both by analysis and by feeding tests. This has been used as an argument to persuade Northern farmers to grow their own corn, which we think they can afford to do, even if It is not better than Southern, if the* farmer has light, warm land, easily cultivated, and plenty of help to work It at a fair rate of wages. Of course the gardener near a large city can grow crops more profitable, and he could not afford to grow field corn on land that is assessed at a valuation of SI,OOO or $2,000 per acre, nor to employ labor at $2 a day to work It/ To pay such taxes and labor cost he needs either two or three crops a year from his land, or a crop that will yield SSOO or more per acre.—American Cultivator. • ————— Blindfolding an Animal. Breechy cattle are often forced to carry a heavy board blinder upon their heads—the weight and chafing of this

being an unnecessary piece of cruelty. Use a bit of canvas cut and fitted in the manner shown in the cut, with rings to slip over the horns and

a strap to fasten beneath the jaw. Let the rings slip on the horns far enough so the cloth will not easily come off.— American Agriculturist How to Grow Pumpkin*. Pumpkins are usually grown in the com field, under the supposition that it is economical to grow them in that manner, but the land does not respond to two crops as favorably as to one. The proper way to grow pumpkins is to prepare a piece of ground for them and grow them as a special crop, apart from om. They can then be better cultivated and will produce a greater weight than when grown in the corn field. As a food in winter in connection with grain, pumpkins are excellent, especially for cattle. Ingenuity of Anta. A naturalist found that black ants were devouring the skins of some bird specimens on a table, so he made tar circles on of paper; and put one under each leg of the table. Ants will not cross tar. Pretty soon he found the ants busily at work again, and, looking at the tar circles, found each one was bridged by bits of sand, which the clever ants had brought in from the street Protecting Apple Tree* from Rabbit* Put an old cloth mitten on one hand; take a box of axle grease in the other hand. Then take a little grease on the ' mitten and rub up and down the tree j till you get a Utile all over as high as ' the rabbits can reach. Do not put too ’ much on, just a little all over. Don’t I be afraid to use it for fear of hurting the trees. / J

HOUSE FOR WINTER BROODERS.