SEVENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART X. (i41 



germs will eventually get to the alfalfa, but if they are put there with 

 the seed they will be ready for business at once and there will be one 

 excuse less for not succeeding with alfalfa. I have several barrels 6'f 

 surface scrapings from the old alfalfa patch to be applied on the new 

 seedings next August. 



For lack of space and time I have carefully avoided figures and data 

 on this subject, but gave you the consensus of opinion of leading and 

 successful alfalfa growers of the humid states and the instructions from, 

 the experiment stations plus my own experience — hoping that it may lead 

 to the fulfillment of that much desired end: An Alfalfa Field on Every 

 Farm ! 



THE SILO. 



Wallace's Farmer. 



Dairying is one of the most profitable lines of business that can be 

 undertaken on the western farm. Dairy communities are always well- 

 to-do. Their soil is more fertile; their farms better improved. Every- 

 thing is more home-like and there is usually better society in a dairy 

 section than in any other. 



There is but litle probability of the supply of butter and cheese ever 

 being greatly in excess of home demands. If our readers •^111 examine 

 the reports of the department of agriculture for the last twenty years they 

 will find very little variation in the number of cows required per one 

 thousand of population in the United States. The number of cattle, hogs 

 and sheep vary greatly; but the percentage of cows is confined within 

 very narrow limits. 



Dairying is not nearly as profitable as it might be, however, for rea- 

 sons that we have frequently pointed out. Perhaps one-third of the cows 

 of the United States today are kept at a loss. Another one-third about 

 pay expenses; that is, pay for the grain and forage and labor. The re- 

 maining one-third pay a very handsome profit. 



The loss in keeping these cows is due to two causes. One is that they 

 are not dairy cows to begin with; do not have a capacity of milk pro- 

 duction that will justify their keep; and this can not be changed. If 

 farmers knew how many poor cows they had, which they can easily find 

 out by the use of the scales and the Babcock test, they would send these 

 to the shambles or sell them to the steer raiser. 



Another reason is that they are not properly fed. They are not given a 

 balanced ration. There are thousands of cows in the corn states that 

 have paid poorly this year because they have been fed on corn and timothy 

 or corn and corn fodder alone, or corn and straws of various kinds, or 

 inferior clover hay. 



The experience of the last thirty years has shown that a balanced ra- 

 tion can be grown on the farm without the purchase of any feeds contain- 

 ing protein, as, for example, bran, oil meal, or cotton seed meal. It has 

 shown that forty pounds of silage and eighteen pounds of good clover hay 

 will make a fairly well balanced ration for an ordinary cow; in other 

 41 



