Proceedings of the Farmers^ Club. 173 



profitable for my purpose to have them calve only once in eighteen 

 mouths. I feed moderately on grain — generally oats and corn 

 mixed, with the addition of roots during the winter — so that my 

 cows, though they may milk down thin during the first six or eight 

 months, "s\'ill always come up again in flesh before I dry them off. 

 I never let them go dry less than two months; three is better if it 

 occurs in summer, and I always take away the grain as soon as they 

 are dry, and sometimes before if too much inclined to milk. For 

 two or three weeks before calving, I keep them on a spare but laxa- 

 tive diet — if in winter, eai'ly-cut hay or corn fodder, and hay with a 

 few roots, but no straw. After calving, give one pound of epsom 

 salts, and a few hours after a warm bran mash — scalding the bran 

 with boiling water — commencing to feed a little hay in twelve 

 hours from calving, and gradually increasing to full feed after two 

 or three days. Since I have adopted this course, I have had no 

 trouble with the bag but what would readily yield to a few appli- 

 cations of hot water followed by dry rubbing. 



CANADA THISTLES. 



Mr. A. Wachleigh, Hartley. — I have been a farmer more than 

 forty years. The way I destroy thistles is to cut them down when 

 in blossom, and it is quite as effective to cut them some four inches 

 from the gi'ound. A few will appear the second year, which are 

 to be cut the same way, and that will be the end of them. Now, 

 as regards plowing and hoeing to destroy them, I have a piece oJ 

 land that has been hoed fifteen years, and there are ten thistles 

 now where there was one when I commenced. 



TO CURE A KICKING COW. 



Mr. C. Taber, Brooklyn, L. I. — Nothing is so good as a strong 

 strap three feet long, with a buckle on one end, passed around both 

 hind legs, just above the gambrel joint. It crosses between the 

 legs so as not to slip down, and when drawn up tight brings the 

 legs pretty close together. Strapping up the fore leg, compelling 

 her to stand on the other three, will usually suffice, but a deter- 

 mined kicker will sometimes stand on two legs long enough to do 

 mischief with one of the other legs. 



PAPER PAILS. 



The American Papier Mach6 Manufacturing Company, Green- 

 point, L. L, exhibited a few neat pails made of papier mache. 

 This is a new invention. The paper, by a peculiar process, is 



