356 Transactions of the American Institute. 



side up. It was suggested that a committee be designated to go 

 and supervise the operation of this implement at some convenient 

 time and jjlace. 



FEEDING STRAW. 



Mr. Lewis Lewis, Prospect, Oneida county, N. Y. — I think it is 

 a good time to call the attention of farmers and dairymen to the 

 ju'oper mode of feeding coarse fodder and hay together. We may 

 talk and write about feeding turnips, ruta-baga, mangel-wurzel 

 and beets, but it remains a fact that in the dairy districts cows are 

 kept over winter with hay, straw and other coarse fodder, and the 

 question is how to feed hay and straw to cattle, and make them 

 take hold of the straw, when it is laid before them, as well as the 

 hay. I have seen some take trouble to mix the two, and I have 

 kno^^^l others to feed straw in the forepart of winter, but milch 

 cows will get low and poor with it, and when hay and straw are 

 mixed, they will pick out the hay and leave the straw; but my prac- 

 tice has been to feed hay in the morning or forepai't of the day; 

 give them all they will eat, and when they are put in the stable in 

 the afternoon, I give straw, and they take right hold, and seem to 

 say: "We got hay in the morning, all we wanted, and it is a long 

 time to wait till to-morrow morning, and we might as well make up 

 our minds and eat this straw, because we shall not get anything 

 else." But if I give straw in the morning, they will eat as little as 

 they can, and seem to say: "It will not be long till we come 

 in after being out to water, and then we will get all the hay we 

 want. What is the use of eating this straw?" So, by careful 

 feeding, I have, these twelve years or more, fed out all the straw I 

 had along with hay every day as long as it lasted, and made all 

 answer, and kept a clean barnyard and manure heap, and with some 

 meal I got my cows to come out in a good thriving condition in the 

 spring. 



HOW TO BUILD A CORN-CRIB. 



Mr. J. S. Keith, Newton, Pa. — I have one that has stood for 

 twenty years, and has never had a rat, and but one mouse, in it to 

 my knowledge. Posts ten or eleven feet long and eight inches 

 square; mortise two feet from one end; for side and end sills, two- 

 in(?h mortise, with tusk. Taper post from sill to the end by hewing 

 ofl' inside until the end is reduced to four inches in diameter, make 

 smooth with draw-knife, and nail on tin smooth half way to the 

 end, below the sill. Let sills be eight inches squai'e; also, end-tie 

 them and the rafter plates strong with moderate inter-ties. Brace 



