44 THE COMPLETE FARMEB, 



give milk, or a failure in the quantity of milk will be expe- 

 rienced. Wherefore, instead of keeping twenty cows poorly 

 fed and but half of them stabled, sell ten and give the re- 

 maining ten food in amount equal to what the twenty ori- 

 ginally had ; procure constant stabling for them, and you 

 will receive quite as much milk and butter in return as was 

 derived from tiie former mode of treating twenty. Sweet 

 potatoes, carrots, pumpkii.s, and ground oats, are unques- 

 tionably among the best articles for food for milch cattle ; 

 and they occasion the milk and butter to assume a fine flavor 

 and color, as well as increase of quantity."^ 



Wi7iter food for Cows. Mr. Chabert, the director of the 

 veterinary schools of Alfort, had a number of cows which 

 yielded very great quantities of milk. In his publications 

 on the subject he observed that cows fed in winter on dry 

 substan<;es give less milk than those which are kept on a 

 green diet, and also that their milk loses much of its quality. 

 He ])ublished the following receipt, by the use of which his 

 cows aftbrded him an equal quantity and quality of milk 

 during the winter as during the summer. Take a bushel of 

 potatoes, break them while raw, place them in a barrel 

 standing up, putting in successively a layer of potatoes and 

 a layer of bran, and a small quantity of yeast in the middle 

 of tne mass, which is to be left thus to ferment during a 

 whole week, and when the vinous taste has pervaded the 

 whole mixture, it is then given to the cows, who eat it 

 greedily. 



Pure water is an essential article for cows. Dr. Anderson 

 says he knew a man who acquired great wealth by attention 

 to things of this nature, and one of his principal discoveries 

 was the importance of having a continued supply of the 

 purest water which could be obtained for his cows, and he 

 would on no account permit a single animal to set his foot 

 in it, nor allow it to be tainted even by the breath of ani- 

 mals. 



Parsnips cause cows to give milk in abundance, and that 

 of the best quality. 



Working Cows. An English cultivator, whose observa- 

 tions are published in the appendix to Plymley's Survey of 

 Shropshire, says, ' Cows are fattened easier and are better 

 laborers than oxen. The uses of cattle are to work, milk, 

 and fatten. I have seen barren cows work as well as oxen ; 



* Trentcn Emporium. 



