WINDBREAKS, SHELTERS, ETC. 89 



make blossoming trees. You will then have a shelter 

 for your bees as well as honey-making food. But a 

 grove or double row of basswood, where there is 

 abundance of land, will prove exceedingly valuable, 

 both as a windbreak and honey producer. This tree 

 should be planted much more freely in our streets, 

 and everywhere, as the great American shade tree. 

 (2) Give to your pastures corners where the wind 

 cannot penetrate. This, even where your land is not 

 extensive, will be no loss, but by affording your 

 animals comfort will increase the flow of milk as 

 much as good pasturage. It is the misery of animals, 

 both in the cold of winter and the heat of summer, 

 that makes them less valuable as milk producers. A 

 very convenient arrangement can be made by grow- 

 ing vines preferably grapevines over a group of 

 small growing trees, wild apples, or thorns, or Eng- 

 lish elms, or any trees with tough wood. You get 

 your crops of grapes, or your cowboys do, and your 

 cows get their shelter. They will accept of it at all 

 seasons, for it is a mistake that the cow does not 

 appreciate the beautiful. I think I never saw a cow 

 lie down with her back to the moon and to a pleasant 

 outlook. 



You will probably be astonished to find how 

 much the general humidity of your acres is increased 

 as you increase your windbreaks. For the same 

 reason grow grapes all over your houses and barns. 

 Let them climb not on the clapboards, but by a series 

 of wires running a few feet apart across the whole 

 of the faces of the building. You will then staple 

 your wire at convenient distances, and tie the grow- 

 ing vines as they climb. Here once more you will 



