52 Soiling. 



" How can a farm support such a heavy cropping? ' r 

 You will notice that where I had not quite doubled 

 my acreage for marketable crops, I had three head 

 of cattle for every one formerly kept. Nor was this 

 all. My stock was not only producing three times 

 as much barnyard manure in quantity, but its qual- 

 ity, especially during the summer months, was at 

 least doubled compared to what it would have been 

 if made at pasture, where it is mostly destroyed by 

 bugs and worms, or makes a rank growth where it 

 drops, which all cattle shun for a year to come, and 

 will only eat of it when absolute hunger compels 

 them. There is another item of saving of land. 

 All the land occupied by inside fences may be saved 

 and turned to producing crops instead of being a 

 yearly expense. 



Here is a sample of how the soiling system works, 

 and may be demonstrated by any one who has the 

 courage to try. May i, 1880, we turned twelve 

 milch cows to pasture in a field containing four and 

 one-half acres. At the end of the fourth week we 

 were obliged to take them out, as they were getting 

 very thin and shrinking badly in flow of milk. The 

 pasture was exhausted. They were turned into the 

 sheep pasture until June yth, when we began soiling 

 them, and the same twelve head were supported with 

 all they could possibly consume for the next four 

 months from the product of four acres, making one 

 acre soiled from equal to four pastured, while the 

 condition and comfort of the stock was so much bet- 

 ter, and their yields so much greater, that there was 



