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THE "LANCASTER FARMER. 



f October, 



become established wiih new fibres before se- 

 vere winter sets in. Bj- that method success 

 is more certain. Nothing gives such life-lil<e 

 beauty to the general winter landscape as do 

 evergreen trees and shrubs. Every farm house 

 should be garnished witli a few of them, and 

 every gentleman's broad lawn should be em- 

 bellished with many of them. They are more 

 successfully transplanted than the deciduous 

 species, as they make a more numerous fibre. 

 growth. Uig holes larger than the spread of 

 the roots, pulverize the soil well to put about 

 them, and cover the surface with long straw 

 manure or tan-bark or saw-dust. 



I have been through many leading tree nur- 

 series of late, and they have an abundant 

 stock of suitable sizes to set out, of the various 

 evergreen and deciduous trees and shrubs, for 

 ornament, and the same with fruit-bearing 

 trees and berry bushes. Hedge plants, too. 

 are plenty, and of different species. Pur- 

 chasers should send their orders early to the 

 nurserymen and get the best, as they are sent 

 off first.— vl)i Old Planter, Philadelphia, Sept. 

 2oth, 1876. 



For The Lancaster Farmer. 

 LIVE GATE POSTS. 



Some years ago I wanted a post at a certain 

 spot where there were only a few inches of 

 earth on top of some rocks, along the stream 

 or creek. I planted a walnut tree, and now I 

 have a post that the floods don't tear out. 

 At another place, while digging a hole for a 

 gate post, 1 struck rock about fifteen inches 

 from the surface, and could not tighten the 

 post to hold agate without stays ; so I planted 

 a good-sized locust tree alongside the post, 

 and it will soon be large enough to hang a 

 large gate on. Along the creek I planted a 

 row of willow stakes a few years ago ; now 

 they are a fine row of trees about thirty feet 

 high, with timber enough to make a good cat- 

 tle and flood fence. Whenever I set a post to 

 hold a foot-log or flood-gate along the stream, 

 I plant a tree alongside, and the roots will 

 soon help to hold the post tight until the tree 

 is large enough to answer for a post. — J. B. 

 E., Lime Valley. 



FACTS ABOUT BIRDS. 



Is it not a marvel that a mere bird, that is 

 much inferior in intelligence to an elephant or 

 an ape, can find its way back to its residence 

 of last summer, even though it be six or eight, 

 or even nine thousand miles distant V And 

 yet such is the fact. Every year, as spring 

 approaches, we see birds coming from the trop- 

 ical regions, passing by us, or stopping but a 

 short time, and then we soon hear of their ar- 

 rival in the colder regions of the north, where 

 they have gone to lay iheir e!;gs and to tarry 

 until they are hatched and their young partly 

 grown. 



Now it is only by very careful calculation, 

 and by constant watching of the sun, moon 

 and stars, and by carefully measuring distances, 

 that mariners can find their way across the 

 ocean, and so travelers on land, where the 

 country is new and unsettled, have to use very 

 much the same means to keep in a particular 

 direction, or they will soon be lost. But here 

 are these birds, without chart or compass, or 

 any waymarks on the ocean to guide tliem. 

 without any knowledge of astronomy, and yet 

 they find their way over the trackless sea and 

 forest, and often even occupy again their old 

 nests. The Creator has mercifully given them 

 this remarkable power, which we call inMnct, 

 and this often serves as a safe and perfect guide 

 in other matters. 



In a recent article we spoke of the bones of 

 birds being hollow, especially of those that fly, 

 and of their having numerous air-sacs over 

 their bodies which are inflated like a balloon, 

 so that they are much lighter, and can more 

 readily sustain them.selves in the air and fly. 



These air-sacs are both filled and emi)tied at 

 pleasure by the bird, as occasion requires. 

 "When they wish to descend rapidly to the 

 earth, like the eagle or hawk to .seize upon 

 some living animal, the instinct of the bird 



leads it to contract the muscles connected with 

 these sacs as to expel or squeeze out the air, 

 and thus the buoyancy or lightness of the body 

 is lessened, and it falls more swiftly to the 

 ground. The same instinct leads the bird at 

 such times to fold its wings as closely as possi- 

 ble to its body, thus reducing still farther its 

 bulk. 



All this will now help you to understand 

 how the same bird that can soar^so readily for 

 many hours high in the air, can also plunge 

 like an arrow into the water, and move so 

 swiftly in it, that it easily catches the swift- 

 moving fish in its own element. The Solan 

 goose has been caught in fishing nets more 

 than two hundred feet under water, where it 

 had gone for its prey. These air-vessels are 

 so completely contracted at such times that all 

 the air is expelled, and thus the body of the 

 water-fowl is much reduced in size. But this 

 is not all. The air in the bones is also re- 

 moved, and so the buoyancy is still more di- 

 minished. To prove that the air in the bones 

 is in connection with the lungs, the experi- 

 ment has been tried of breaking the leg of a 

 bird, and also of making a hole in it so that 

 the air could escape, and it was found that the 

 bird could not then fly. So, also, when the 

 bone was thus broken, the wind-pipe of the 

 bird was closed by the experimenter, so that 

 it was impossible to breathe through its throat, 

 and yet the bird was able to breathe for some 

 time ihrouyh the opining in the hone of the leg, 

 showing that these various receptacles of air 

 are all in communication witn the regular 

 breathing apparatus of the bird — that is, its 

 lungs. 



How plainly do we here see the skillful hand 

 of the Creator in not only giving to the bird 

 these difl'erent air-holders, but also the instinct 

 to use them at the right moment, and use 

 them also in ways so different and so wonder- 

 fully adapted to its wants ; contracting them 

 all when it wishes to descend, and expanding 

 and inflating them when it desires to rise. How 

 absurd to suppose that a bird could educate it- 

 aelf to do all this ! So, then, we see that the 

 Almighty condescends to teach even litt!e birds 

 what it is needful for them to know. 



The heads of birds are also worthy of special 

 notice. C(Ui:imencin£; with the beak, we find 

 the head always more or less of a wedge-like 

 shape, whicli fits ihem for cleaving alike both 

 air and water. The bills or beaks of some are 

 very peculiar. For instance, take the wood- 

 pecker's and examine it closely, and you will 

 rind it has a long chisel-shaped instrument, 

 with a hard, horny substance at the end. Now 

 this is just what the bird needs to bore into the 

 bark of trees in search of the insects on which 

 it feeds. 



So the bill of the snipe is long and narrow, 

 that it may probe the marshy ground for food ; 

 and as this food is mostly out of sight, the bill 

 has nerves oifieliny, so that when the end of 

 the bill touclies the food, the bird is instantly 

 informed of it by these wonderful nerves at 

 the bill's end, which are the same as eyes to 

 the bird for discovering different substances. 



The common duck has much the same ar- 

 rangement, with strainers at the side for sepa- 

 rating the food from the water. The bill of 

 the parrot is adapted for climbing as well as 

 for cracking nuts and picking out the kernel. 

 The bills of some birds are good fly-traps, and 

 actually serve for that purpose as they sweep 

 with open mouth through the air in quest of 

 insect food. 



The tongues of birds are also very extraor- 

 dinary contrivances. The woodpecker has a 

 very long tongue, or rather a long handle to it 

 in the back of its mouth. In fact, the tongue 

 of this bird is really a bnrbed spear, having a 

 double barb at the end like a harpoon. This 

 is necessary to pierce the unseen worms it finds 

 under the bark, and draw them out. 



The wonderful eyes of birds may well sur- 

 prise us. How far can you distinctly see a 

 mouse or a small bird V Probably not more 

 than a few rods. But some birds of prey, like 

 the kite and hawk, will soar so high as to be 

 quite out of our sight ; and yet from that great 

 height they can see such smallobjects as mice, 



and will dart so swiftly down in a straight 



line that, active as they are, there is no escape. 

 This explains why such birds fly so high— they 

 have from such heights a vastly wider field to 

 explore, and must soon see, somewhere, some 

 prey. 



Now here we may well stop a moment to 

 ask the question: How has all this come to 

 pass that birds find their way back to their old 

 homes,"eight or nine thousmd miles distant ¥ 

 How is it that they expand and contract the 

 numerous air-vessels inside and outside of their 

 bodies V How came they to have such vessels? 

 How came they to be all connected with the 

 breathing apparatus of the bird— that is, its 

 lungs ? How came the beak of the wood- 

 pecker to be so perfectly adapted to boring old 

 trees for the[^food it most relishes ? How came 

 its tongue to l)e a real harpoon of hard, horny 

 substance, just precisely what is needed to 

 draw out the hidden worms when found V 



And so we might go on inquiring how the 

 beaks of the ducks and snipe have the power 

 to /(c/ the right kind of unseen food? And 

 also how some birds have eyes so much like 

 powerful telescopes, that they can see their 

 prey miles distant from them V 



To say that they, the birds, themselves made 

 all these wonderful contrivances would be the 

 most absurd nonsense, since they are the 

 handiwork of Him who "doeth all things 



well." 



^ 



THE SELECTION OF COWS. 



In order to answer various private inquiries 

 made by readers of the Country Gentknidn 

 upon this topic, I will give a convenient 

 method for the dairyman to weed out and se- 

 lect from his owu herd the choicest animals 

 that come into his hands. It is well known 

 that dairymen are seldom able to give any 

 deflnite account of the comparative value of 

 the individual cows of their herds. How much 

 less is any one able to make a critical selection 

 from the herd of another ! There are very 

 few who can tell, of the cows they milk, 

 whether one gives .500 or 1,000 pounds more 

 than another'in a season. They know that 

 one gives more than another, but they have 

 no accurate idea of what the difference is. 

 Yet it must be evident that this knowledge is 

 of great importance, for it often happens that 

 the whole profit of a herd is paid by one-half 

 the number, the other half scarcely paying 

 their keeping. 



If the dairyman knew which paid and which 

 sunk his capital or labor, he would soon sift 

 out the dead-heads. The moment he began 

 to note, accurately, their individual product, 

 he would also begin to form a standard to 

 which they must come to be worthy of reten- 

 tion in hi.s herd. If the dairyman would but 

 study his own herd, it would form a basis for 

 improvement far beyond anything yet adopted. 

 Almost every herd has some good milkers and 

 profitable cows. These would at once become 

 the standard to which he would strive to bring 

 his whole herd. 



The first point the patron of a factory would 

 wish to know is quantity— the pounds of milk 

 form the basis for his dividend. Many would 

 be glad to know the pounds of milk given by 

 each cow through the season, but think the 

 labor would be too great in gaining this 

 knowledge. I have adopted a simple plan of 



Weighing Each Cow's Milk 

 every fourteenth day, from the beginning to 

 the end of the milking season. This will give, 

 practically, each cow's product for the whole 

 season, and he can compare them all and know 

 the exact value of each, so ftir as quantity is 

 concerned. He .should weigh the night and 

 morning's milk each time, so as to have one 

 day's milk. Now by adding together the 

 amount of milk of all the days on which the 

 milk is weighed, and dividing by the number 

 of days, he will have the average pounds of 

 n)ilk given by each cow for every day in the 

 season. Suppose the milk has been weighed 

 21 days, at intervals of two weeks ; now di- 

 vide the number of pounds given for all the 

 Weighings by 21, and you have the average 



