1867. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



507 



"splendidly," and were of the size of ordinary 

 two-year-olds at their first shearing. Indeed, 

 this is the ordinary course of those who breed 

 tegs to sell at high prices. With great care 

 and judgment, and especially in small flocks, it 

 may ordinarily be safe enough — but we have 

 known too many severe disasters to grow out 

 of the practice not to caution the mass of 

 sheep-growers against it. We esteem pam- 

 pering sheep at any age, except when they are 

 being fattened to kill, injurious — and especially 

 60 before they reach their second year. Their 

 natural habits are unfitted to it, and their con- 

 stitutions will not safely bear it. When they 

 are appearing best, the destroyer sometimes 

 comes so suddenly and fatally as to defy all 

 discovery of j^roximate causes and baflie all 

 remedial measures. 



For both the fall and winter feed of tegs we 

 prefer, among the grains, oats and bran. 

 Both (unlike corn) tend to the pi oduction of 

 muscle (lean meat) instead of fat, and there- 

 fore promote growth instead of unnecessary 

 obesity. They afford aliment in a less con- 

 centrated and therefore less stimulating form. 

 They are, in popular phrase, less "heating" 

 and less "feverish," feed, i. e., they do not so 

 much predispose the system to inflammatory 

 tendencies and attacks. If fed separately, 

 equivalents of them in weight are probably 

 about equivalents in nutriment — but we much 

 like the plan of feeding them mixed, say one 

 jiart oats to two of bran ; and to Merino tegs 

 well brought into winter, a gill of bran and 

 half a gill of oats, per head, with a little green 

 feed (say a gill of turnips,) with a full allow- 

 ance of bright, fine, early cut hay, ought un- 

 der ordinary circumstances to be a sufficient 

 daily allowance for "store" tegs in winter. 

 By "store" tegs we mean those not fitted up 

 to sell, or show at Fairs, or raise "brag" fieeces 

 from — but those intended to be kept in the 

 flock for regular wool growing purposes. 



Fine, green, early cut and well cured hay 

 is almost indispensable in wintering tegs. No 

 grain or root feed can properly supply the 

 want of it. We would rather winter tegs on 

 it without any grain, than on coarse, dry, over- 

 ripe timothy, with any amount of grain and 

 roots. We esteem fine, red clover, cured 

 "green as tea," a very important, if not neces- 

 sary ingredient in hay for tegs. We would 

 prefer to have it form from a third to a half of 

 the mow. 



Cold, severe autumn rains benefit no sheep, 

 and are perceptibly injurious to tegs, especially 

 if they are thin and backward. When these 

 rains begin to fall, tegs should be brought near 

 the barn, and run in during their continuance, 

 and as winter approaches, also during cold, raw 

 nights. If kept up more than half a day, 

 they should be fed hay in a rack. But we had 

 rather they should remain out of doors than to 

 be crowded into some little, stinking (that we 

 should use such a word !) hole, with mud or 



wet dung up to their fetlocks, there stand fast- 

 ing for twelve or twenty-four hours. 



It is useless to talk about ventilation, and 

 perfect dryness under foot, in a sheep shelter 

 of any description. These topics are stale. 

 But we may suspect some men, who are not 

 used to it in their own houses, do not know 

 what proper ventilation is. We propose the 

 following tests : — When a night's confinement 

 of the flock in the sheep house produces even 

 a slightly disagreeable animal smell, or a tem- 

 perature above 60 degrees, the house is not 

 properly ventilated. — Dr. Randall. 



FODDER COBN". 



The season has been so excessively wet in 

 New England that an argument based on &, 

 severe drought in a section as near as Western 

 New York has an air of novelty with us. Mr. 

 Harris of Rochester, author of "Walks and 

 Talks on the Farm," published in the Ameri- 

 can Agriculturist, thus states the reasons for 

 the resolution that "another year I will not be 

 without a piece of fodder corn, on rich land, 

 near the barn yard, to be cut up in August 

 for milch cows :" — 



We have had one of the most severe droughts 

 I have ever known. I have always been par- 

 tial to a dry, hot summer — it gives such a 

 splendid chance to kill weeds — but this is 

 rather too good. At the East, I understand, 

 they have had a very wet summer, and the 

 papers complain that the potatoes are rotting 

 in consequence. Here we shall have few or 

 none to rot. Corn will not t>e half a crop. I 

 did not sow any corn for fodder, but we have 

 been obliged for some time to cut up corn for 

 the cows. As it was drilled in, and was a 

 little too thick, I do not begrudge it the cows as 

 much as if ic was planted in hills. There is a 

 heavy growth of stalks, and 1 am astonished to 

 see how little ground we have to go over for a 

 day's supply. Another season i will not be 

 without a piece of corn fodder, on rich land, 

 near the barn-yard, to be cut up in August for 

 milch cows. Some of my neighbors had a 

 piece this year, but it was sown broadcast, and 

 the dry weather parched it up. In moist sea- 

 sons, corn sown broadcast sometimes does well, 

 but, as a general rule, it should be sown thick- 

 ly in drills, and thoroughly cultivated, and the 

 more highly it can be manured, the better. 

 Rich land, thick seeding in drills, say three 

 bushels per acre, and thorough cultivation, are 

 the essentials in raising corn fodder. And in 

 such circumstances it is astonishing how much 

 feed can be obtained from an acre. 



— Prof. Turner of Jacksonville, 111., received 

 last year $100 for grapes growing on an elm tree. 

 For years he tried to prevent the vine going into 

 the tree. 



