170 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Aprii. 



purchased fat stock, who were the most suc- 

 cessful and made it most proHtable, were those 

 who ftd meal largely. If a farmer has pota- 

 toes or otber roots it is well enough to feed 

 the^e in part, but a farmer will do better to 

 exchange some of his roots for corn, than to 

 feed roots altogether. It is important to feed 

 regular I3' and not too often, as the stock will 

 eat and lie down and ruminate. It is better to 

 feed cattle but three times a day, and sheep 

 but once. 



MILLET. 



The Pairal New Yorker gives the following 

 statement by Mr. Whitman at a meeting of 

 the Herkimer County, New York Farmers' 

 Club :— 



Millet may be sown in June, after the time 

 for planting corn, or, indeed, that for any 

 other crop except buckwheat. It produces an 

 excellent 3 ield, both of stalk and grain, and 

 cattle like it better than hay. The seed is 

 particularly relished by fowls, and it was a 

 profitable crop to grow for this purpose alone. 

 He said we have occa>ion many times to 

 break up lands late in the season. Corn and 

 other grain crops are not unfrequently de- 

 stro>ed at a time when it would be too late to 

 re-plant. In such cases millet could be used 

 as a late crop with the be~t results. He found 

 the average yield to be at the rate of twenty 

 to twent\-tive bushels of seed to the acre, and 

 one and a half tons of straw, after the seed 

 was taken out. 



He always made a point of cutting millet 

 while the stalk is green, and when harvested 

 in this way cattle prefer it to hay. It grows 

 to a good height, reaching to the shoulder, 

 and may be cradled and bound like grain. 

 Mr. \V. said he had not been very particular 

 in taking all the seed f lOm the straw ; he did 

 not care to do that. His usual course was to 

 throw the bundles on the floor, beating out the 

 seed that would shell readily with the flail. 

 The straw, with the remaining seed, was then 

 fed to his cows, and it produced the very best 

 results. In feeding millet to domestic ani- 

 mals he had not found it objectionable in any 

 case except when used for horses. The seed 

 was too riuh and o;ly for this purpose, and, 

 as he thought, was the occasion of horses pass- 

 ing too much urine. 



CoMFOUTABLE Stalls FOR Cattle. — One 

 of the niObt disagreeable chores a farmer boy 

 has to do is to tit down to milk a stable cow. 

 lie feels cross and so does the animal, and 

 the conseq'ience is he, does not get a lull flow 

 of mi;k, and she is gradunlly dried up. 



To make your cow stabile comfortable, pin 

 down a two inch plank where their hind feet 

 stand, {)utr,ing an incti ttrip under the edge of 

 it towards the cow's head so as to give it an 

 inclination towards the aisle or walk. Now 



fill the space from this plank to the forward 

 part of the stall with sawdust or some similar 

 material to a depth of about four inches — a 

 level with the upper edge of the plank. By 

 this arrangement the excrements and urine 

 are mostly dropped behind the plank in the 

 walk, leaving a high, dry and warm bed for the 

 animal. It is as easy for her feet as though 

 she stood upon the sod of mother earth — as 

 warm a bed as down to a human being. 



I have haa the fixtures in use about a month, 

 and to-day the hams and flanks of my cows 

 and calves are as clean and dry as in the sum- 

 mer. About once a week there needs an ad- 

 dition of sawdust to the bed. Just the com- 

 fortable looks of the cattle in an evening when 

 they are reposing upon their comfortable bed 

 is worth many times the cost of the fixture. — 

 W. H. Cavjldd, in Western Farmer. 



Preserving Beef. — Mr. Foster of Madi- 

 son county, writes to the New York Farmers' 

 Club, that in the first place he puts the beef in 

 weak brine and soaks all the blood out of it, 

 letting it remain therein a week or ten days, 

 then for one hundred pounds of meat he pre- 

 pares a brine of nine pounds of salt, two 

 pounds of sugar, two ounces saltpeter, two 

 ounces black pepper and six gallons of water. 

 Boils and skims this and pours it hot upon the 

 meat afcer it is packed in the barrel. In the 

 spring he draws the brine from the barrel by 

 tapping it at the base, scalds and skims it, adds 

 a little salt and pours it on the meat agiin 

 while hot; and he has no difficulty in keeping 

 the beef nicely the balance of the season. If 

 at any time the brine should begin to smell 

 bad, it should be drawn off, scalded and 

 skim'ued as before, and returned. Dr Hexa- 

 mer had used the same receipt for many >ear3 

 with the exception of the black pepper, which 

 he did not regard as essential to preserve the 

 meat. If more salt was used than the amount 

 specified it made the beef hard ; but the 

 receipt would save beef perfectly. 



Good Teams — As a general thing, the 

 teams of the farmers in Northern Ohio are 

 too light. Mechanics, in selecting their power, 

 act wi^er than farmers, for when they buy an 

 engine, care is taken to get one heavy enough 

 to do their business thoroughly ; but too often 

 the farmer buys a cheap, light team that is 

 not cap.^ble of performing one-half of the ne- 

 cessary labor, and the result is, that he gets 

 into the habit — which is indeed a matter of 

 necessity — of gauging the depth of his f jrrow 

 by the strength of his team, and as a result 

 he impoverishes his farm, and realizes small 

 crops, and finally becomes discouraged and 

 tries some other business. 'J here is hardly 

 any labor performed upon the f.irm with a 

 team but that the firmer would realize the 

 superior advantages of a large muscular team. 

 I admit it will require more to keep such a 



