334 STATE BOAKD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Among the most important things to be absolutely required in all breeding 

 animals is a strong healthy constitution, and good antecedents "through many 

 generations past." It is to my mind anything but a recommendation for any 

 domestic brute, to say "He can live on nothing and keep fat." But as it is 

 my motto, that 



In killing, care, and feed 



Consists two-thirds of every breed 



let tis now turn our attention to rule 2d: "Treat all you do keep intelligently 

 and kindly. '^ 



If my motto is correct, or nearly so, then there is too much importance attach- 

 ing to the care or treatment of live stock to allow us to pass lightly over this 

 branch of our subject. I have already suggested the matter of killing in con- 

 nection with the intelligent treatment of domestic animals. Some poultry fan- 

 cier has laid it down as a rule that " no one will become a good breeder who is 

 not a good killer of fowls." 



I have no doubt there is quite a portion "of the stock kept by farmers through 

 the country that is a burden upon their owners and actually running them in 

 debt continually. If such be the fact, arising from the native inferiority of the 

 animals, the sooner they are dispatched the better, even though their hides must 

 be taken off and their carcases go to the compost heap. The room they occupy 

 and the food they consume could then be given to the remaining more worthy 

 ones, who have too long been partially robbed by these dead-heads. But let mo 

 caution you not to go home and make a merciless slaughter until you have 

 decided whether the blame all lies in the inherent inferiority of the animals, 

 and no part of it attaches to their owners. Is it certain that you have done the 

 fair thing by your flocks and herds? If you find you have not, then repent and 

 reform and soon you'll be surprised at the rapid improvement in your breeds. 



But some of you may say if raising and keeping stock on our farms can be 

 made a j^aying business, please tell us exactly how it is to be done. I will try 

 to answer specifically. Let us, for illustration, start with a single calf a day 

 old. He is a good one, weighs say 75 pounds. I prefer to take him from his 

 dam and teach him to drink ; give him new milk for four weeks at least, all he 

 will drink ; then gradually mix with new milk that which has stood twelve hours 

 and been skimmed, decreasing the former and increasing the latter, adding 

 carefully and increasingly oil cake meal, shorts, barley, and oatmeal alternately 

 as he will stand it, without scouring, until he will eat like a pig. Give him 

 plenty of nice grass and pure water, and continue so to feed and treat him that 

 he will make some groivth every day he lives. AVhen the autumn storms and 

 wintry blasts come on, give your calf clean, dry, comfortable quarters, keeping 

 up the supply of pure water, and as much good nourishing food as he will eat 

 clean (don't give him a spoonful to leave or waste). If at any time you have 

 over-fed, let him fast until the appetite is restored. Give a few roots often 

 through the winter, and when he is a year old, just put him on the scales, and 

 if he does not weigh from eight to ten hundred pounds, it will be pretty evident 

 you started off with the wrong calf, and should do better next time. Your calf 

 is now twelve montlis old, and if you choose to sell he will bring you as much 

 money, and is worth more to the purchaser, than three pairs of little miserable 

 orphans of the same age that have been obliged to shirk for themselves, take 

 shelter in fence corners, and shiver all winter to keep themselves warm. But 

 you keep the pet calf another year, following up your plan to make him grow 

 every day, and weigh him now that he is two years old, and he kicks tlie beam 

 at twelve or possibly fifteen hundred. Your blind, churlish neighbor, who ven- 



