THE KIND OF FARMING THAT PAYS BEST. 471 



give an experience : How many of us raise our own Timothy seed ? Two 

 years ago I sowed an acre or two of Timothy seed and after cutting it mowed 

 the stuijble. It was about five inches long. In winter I filled one end of the 

 sheep rack with that stubble and the other end with clover hay, and the sheep 

 ate the stubble in preference to the clover, and so did the cows and horses. 

 I got four bushels of seed worth three dollars per bushel, making $12 per 

 acre. Since then I have raised Timothy seed every year. 



Chemistry says as to why stock like the Timothy stubble, that plants 

 develop sugar and starch while the seed is forming. This stubble is not 

 juicy — it is dry, but it is good. Timothy that will give one and one-half tons 

 per acre will give eight bushels of seed per acre, worth 124, and one ton of 

 stubble hay, and that hay I save for my stock to do their spring work on. 

 So of clover seed. To get it we must cut the first crop in June. It will not 

 seed if you leave it uncut till July. Why not? 



Voice : Not enough bumblebees. , 



Mr. Willis: Exactly. So save the bumblebees; don't kill a single nest. 

 I prefer large clover because it comes just in time for the bumblebees. I 

 feed large clover till about 10th of Jane, and when it seeds get three to five 

 bushels clover seed, and then get six weeks' pasture afterwards. It is much 

 better than wheat. 



Mr. Armstrong: As to raising Timothy seed, I wish to warn you. In 

 the Genesee valley Timothy was their main crop, and they got two to three 

 bushels per acre. Their flats were flooded each year, and fertilized with 

 the richness of the uplands, and yet this process could not be kept up, but 

 gradually, yes rapidly, impoverished their land. They tried clover and plaster 

 — the larger clover. They found it a good subsoiler, and with an abundant 

 supply of plaster they succeeded in restoring and steadily increasing the 

 yield of their lands. I knew of one man there who cut 3,000 bushels of 

 wheat from 60 acres on a farm from which his predecessor had been starved 

 off. 



Mr. Peabody: Debt is the great diflSculty in the way of profitable farm- 

 ing. I think in Palaski and Hanover there is no farmer but that succeeds if 

 he is free from debt. 



Voice: That's so. 



Mr. Peabody: I think the curse of the farmer is making too much of the 

 dollar and cent view of his business. They sacrifice body and soul and 

 happiness to it. That kind of farming does not pay. A farm does not pay 

 where the owner has 500 acres, but not a picture on the wall of his house. 



Mr. Goldsmith: In farming we must do business on business principles. 

 What would you think of a merchant who, when you ask his prices, should 

 say, ''Well — I don't know." What busines has the farmer to raise an ani- 

 mal and have no knowledge as to what it is worth? Let him take his papers 

 and know the markets and sell according to demand. If demand is great, a 

 high price will result. If light, the high price cannot be had. What business 

 has a farmer to have hundreds of dollars' worth of his machinery out doors 

 to go to ruin? 



Mr. Geo. A. Smith : Farmers, like others, are creatures of circumstances. 

 The man who makes a yard of cloth has mighty little to say as to what he is 

 going to get for it, and reading the papers won't fix it. The most intelligeot 

 of you can't tell what wheat will be worth two weeks from now. What we 

 want is to take a broader view of life. We are not independent, there is no 



