314 AMERICAN CATTLE. 



the taste of cattle, as the grain is to the human palate when 

 cooked for the table. Even after the ears are plucked for table 

 use, if suffered to grow so long, cows will eat the entire stalk 

 when cut close to the roots, as we have often tried. Swine, 

 so fed, will eat the stalk entire, greatly to their benefit, while 

 with other varieties, they seldom eat anything below the setting 

 of the ear. The sweet corn is as easily raised as the others; the 

 seed, too, is easily produced, and with no more expense than the 

 common field kinds. 



If a trifle of salt be sprinkled on each mess, as fed, it will be 

 better. Give the cows all the food they will eat. If the green 

 food be too loose in its action on the stomach of the cattle, a 

 little mixture of finely cut hay or straw with it, will correct the 

 difficulty. It is scarcely necessary to say that the stables should 

 be cleaned night and morning, thoroughly ventilated, and every 

 thing kept scrupulously neat as when the cows are at pasture. 

 A good plan, when cows are soiling, is to turn them, when not 

 feeding, into an adjacent, well fenced, mowing field, where the 

 hay crop has been gathered, if in season, or on another field 

 where their droppings may be useful to enrich it for a coming 

 crop, thus saving much labor in removing their manure other- 

 wise made in the barn, or feeding yards. 



The system of soiling has long been practiced in Britain, and 

 on the European continent, particularly in the neighborhood of 

 large cities, for milk dairies, and found to be the most profitable 

 mode of summer feeding. Lands, for that purpose, when advan- 

 tageously located, frequently rent for $25 to $75 an acre for tho 

 season. It is becoming much practiced near our own larger 

 American cities, where land is high in value, and proximity to 

 a good milk market important. It will also tell equally well in 

 our cheese and butter dairies, where a continuous full flow of 

 milk is necessary. The labor of the soiling process, is not greater 

 than that of driving back and forth to pasture, the repair offences, 



