1838] 



F A R xM E R S ' REGISTER. 



735 



ed that sixteen or eifrlileen pounds of ixooil liny 

 would he enouiili for eacli; bui (hero is no innova- 

 tion wiiicii the fliriii servants have irsisicd vviiii 

 more persevpranre than this, and liie horses are 

 allowed at least a iialf more. They are very 

 constanily and rPLi^ularly worked nine hours a day, 

 and are very seliioni a day idle; on this reiritnen, 

 tiiey liave iieen always ,'iealihv and in jxood con- 

 diiioti. The Slate in which a horse is eapahle ol 

 the irreale.st exeriion and sjieed, is not one niosi 

 conducive to healih, and lor ahorse employed in 

 ordinary liirm worlc, rich and concentrated Ibod is 

 not only unnecessary, hit injmious. Green suc- 

 culent ve<retab!es are alone quile sufficient f)r him. 

 When this cannot he had, and there are no turni[ s, 

 boiled grain and chafl'are, to a irreat extent, a sub- 

 stitute, and the tbod described as jriven in this 

 shape, miirht, it is believed, be ''eneficially increas- 

 ed. This siipp isilion is Ibimded, in some degree, on 

 analoiry of what has been ol^served in lin^iilinir 

 milch cows and youiiir cattle. When cows lliat are 

 feedinif on straw or hay ijet boiled chafJ, their bow- 

 els are iinmediaiely brouirht into a liealihlul state, 

 and their condition iiislanlly imi)roved, and a very 

 small quaniily oC turnips, half a dozen even, a 

 day, produces similar etiects. '^hese effects pro- 

 ceed not from ihe addition of nutriment supplied 

 by the boiled chaff, or the turnips; but from the 

 power which these yive to the intestines to ex- 

 tract more nourishment li-om the fodder. It is not 

 unlikely, that if all the oats the horses ijet were 

 boii^d with cliaffj a smaller quantity wonld be 

 sufficient. 



2. Shesp. — The most profitable slock of this 

 descripiion that has been tried has been black- 

 laced, or Cheviot lambs, purchased in the month 

 of August, and sold to ihe butcher the Ibllowins 

 June and July. For the first two months of 

 sprinii-, however, the pasture is so exceedinirly 

 bare, that they were found very difficult to keep 

 vviihin the fences, and ewes are now substituted. 

 They are purchased as soon as the grass is up, 

 the lambs are sold as they become ready to kill, 

 and the ewes are fit lor ihe butcher by December. 



3. Cattle. — These are entirely the Ayrshire 

 dairy breed, and are both a dairy and a breeding 

 stock. * From fifteen to eighteen is the number 

 of cows kept, and six or seven gray calves are 

 annually reared. The calves get fi-om ten to 

 twelve quarls of new milk a day lor the first six 

 weeks. By the time they are ten days old, they 

 will eat a little, and are supplied with hay and 

 grass. They are then gradually weaned by mix- 

 ing the new milk vviih an increasing quantity of 

 skimmed milk, or the whey of new milk cheese. 

 When two months old, they ijet whey alone, which 

 is continued to them through the season. They 

 are allowed to run loose in a yard with a shed, 

 and are supplied with green fbcd in cribs. When 

 ihegrreen food is at an end, they iret, with straw, 

 as many turnips as can be afforded to tliem, o-en- 

 erally, a small quantily. The second and third 

 seasons, they are pastured, and in winter, get 

 with straw, a small portion of turnips, if they be 

 to spare. 



* An excellent account of this breed of cattip, and 

 of the dairy system, will be found in a work publish- 

 ed a few years ajzo by Mr. Ayton. The book is not 

 at hand, but the title of it is believed to be " Ayton's 

 Account of the Dairy Husbandry of tlie counties of j move easily through the mass. Squeeze down the tur- 

 Lanark, Ayr. and Reiifiew."' 1 nips, and add three pounds of pea-meal. Give this to 



Experiments on the nutritive matter in Ihe 

 straw of difii'renl kinds of frraiii, similar lo those 

 conducted by Mr. Sinclair relative lo ihe grasses, 

 are very desirable. Horses and cattle seem to 

 eat the straw of fieans and peas as readily as hay; 

 and Ihe expeiience of ihis farm leads lo ihe belief, 

 that the straw of wheal possesses much nourish- 

 iiieni. It is coarse and woody indeed, biil contains 

 a ureat deal of saccharine matter; and if used 

 wiih a very small adtiilion of turnips, the cattle 

 are Ibiind to thrive on it. Last season, there were 

 fed here from ihe beginning of November to the 

 middle of May, eight grays, rising three years old, 

 five rising two, and five rising one. They had 

 two acres of yellow turnips, a middling cro|), and 

 the oldest two lots had nothing besides but wheat 

 straw. The largest proportion of the turnips was 

 liiven to the younu'est lot; for some lime, the eld- 

 est two got scarcely any, and Ibr six weeks previ- 

 ous to the irrass, wheal slraw alone without a tur- 

 nip, was thefbod of these. They all grew well, 

 Hiid retained their condition, and no fidling off on 

 the part of the latter during the last !^ix weeks 

 was perceptible, 



'Inhere is no reason to doubt that the mode de- 

 scribed, of fi^eding (luriiiix the first season, is pre- 

 fera'ble lo pasturiuii. Besides the excellent dung 

 produced, the animals arrive, under this treatment, 

 at a much greater size. As they approach having' 

 calves, some of them are sold, the best being se- 

 lected for ihe dairy, where they are milked fbr 

 three or four years. They olien have calves at 

 two years old, and if they have previously at- 

 tained sufficient size, and the feeding be after- 

 wards good, a milch cow is thus obtained at very 

 moderate cost; but otherwise, they will remain 

 siirall, and probably not take the bull again the 

 season after calving. 



The Avrshire cows are generally allowed to be 

 the best that are known for the purposes of the 

 dairy. In the end of autumn, when the nights 

 become cold, they are kept in the iiouse after sun- 

 set, and get a little fodder; and from the middle 

 of November, till the pasture be again ready for 

 them, they are fed entirely in the house, and let 

 out only in fine weather to get water. They are 

 regularly curried, and kept as clean as possible. 

 Having not a sufficient quantity of green crop to 

 supply them with succulent Ibod, the milk is put 

 ofi' I hem as quickly alter they are taken from the 

 ijrass as it can with safety. Those that are to 

 calve late in spring, and are continuing to give a 

 considerable quanlity of milk, get a little extra 

 feedinix; the rest have slraw alone. When the 

 calving time approaches, they get chatt' or cut 

 hay boiled in a good deal of water, and enriched 

 with a few potatoes, or a little pea-meal vviih hay 

 to eat. In this way, they go to the grass, which 

 happens in general about the middle of May, in 

 as irood condition as when they left it. No food 

 is found to produce so much effect as pea-meal, 

 and will be profitably bestowed at the ordinary 

 price of the grain ; and though given in very 

 moderate quantity.* Till the beginning of June. 



* Take a bushel of chafl'and eight or ten sound yel- 

 low or Swedish turnips, having the tops and tails care- 

 fully taken off, and boil them together four or five 

 hours. Add as much water as will cause the hand to 



