RAISING CALVES. 203 



good calf oil the hand system. For a time I gave up raising 

 calves, from the fact that I could buy just such herb-tea, skim- 

 milk calves, from six to eight months old, from three dollars 

 fifty cents to five dollars, much less than I could raise them. 



I have come to the conclusion that if a calf is worth raisingr 

 at all, it is worth raising well. My method is to put two good 

 calves to one cow. If at the season of the year that stock is 

 kept at the barn, the calves are kept in a stable by themselves, 

 with a manger convenient for feeding; they are turned to the 

 nurse twice in twenty-four hours, just long enough for them to 

 take the milk clean, wliich is done in a very few minutes. They 

 are then returned to the stable and fed with plenty of rowen hay, 

 with roots of some kind finely cut, which they soon learn to eat, 

 if placed in the manger. A light feed of shorts or oats is most 

 excellent, and in the absence of roots is absolutely necessary. 

 In the summer season, with plenty of feed, I let the nurse and 

 calves run together in pasture, and have no further trouble with 

 them until they come up to the barn, when, if they are of proper 

 age, which is at least six months, and if older no harm, they 

 may be shut entirely away from the nurse and fed on the best 

 of hay, with a mess of roots, shorts, or oats daily. In this way 

 we never have any stunted calves. In this way. there is no 

 standing still or going back three months after weaning, and 

 the calf at one year old is heavier and worth more money than 

 the average of calves raised in the ordinary way are at two 

 years old. 



But, says the careful farmer, there are objections to 'your 

 mode of raising calves : First, they contract a habit of sucking 

 which they never forget. Second, the great cost, keeping cows 

 solely for raising calves would not pay. Third, calves forced 

 along, or bread and buttered up as the saying is, the first year, 

 are like house plants, and when they come to be exposed, or 

 brought to hard fare, they will wilt. They cannot endure 

 starving and banging, like those that are toughened in raising ; 

 and have less constitutional strength. 



Now I can answer all the objections brought forward, to my 

 own satisfaction at least. In regard to the first objection, I have 

 never had any trouble at all. Shut them apart for some weeks 

 and they are weaned, and I never knew them take to sucking 

 again. 



