Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 369 



We have visitors from Berks county, and would be glad to know of 

 them how it is that they make such profit on capons. 



Mr. John Ketchum — It gives us little or no trouble to raise capons. 

 We have a few men in our country who know just how to open a 

 fowl, and we pay them say two or three cents ahead forgoing through 

 the yard. Not more than two in a hundred die or fail. After the 

 operation they grow faster and the flesh is all good ; no difference 

 between breast and red meat. It is all tender and juicy. It is no 

 uncommon thing to sell a capon that weighs seven pounds. As to 

 breeds we have a variety, and think a cross of Dorking . or Brahma 

 makes a good fowl for caponizing. Brahma, Dorking, Game and 

 Dominick are the chief breeds in our county. We make it a rule 

 always to change roosters once a year. 



Dr. Isaac P. Trimble — I like the old-fashioned Dominick and the 

 Game, but for eggs alone I have no better hens than my white Leg- 

 horns. For eggs as a special product, the Brahma would not be a 

 good selection, for they are too fond of becoming mothers. 



Using Bones and Killing Moss. 

 Mr. Charles L. Spaulding, Cavendish, Yt. — I have a lot of bones 

 which I wish to convert into something that will make corn grow. 

 How is the best way to do it without much expense ? I can get 

 wood-ashes for twenty-five cents a bnshel, and lime for one and one- 

 half cents per pound. I want to use it on apiece of old pasture land 

 which had been cultivated long ago, but has laid in pasture at least 

 forty years, and become entirely moss bound. It did not produce 

 grass enough for one sheep to the acre. I plowed two acres of it last 

 June eight inches deep, and found that it had never before been 

 plowed more than four inches deep. The land is a gravelly loam, free 

 from stones, looks like good corn land ; how is the best way to man- 

 age it ? Plow deep and try to cut up the moss sods, and tear them to 

 pieces with the harrow, or plow light and let the moss lay and rot 

 where it is, for the corn-roots to work in one year? I have a small 

 place of about forty-five acres, which I bought last spring ; did not 

 cut over three tons of hay last season ; at least twenty-five acres are 

 in pasture. It lays well for cultivation. Some of it was plowed and 

 cropped long ago, and some never was plowed, but might be, and 

 another portion of it was wet, and some stony and mucky, but my 

 farm is termed a poor one. I think there is or may be some virtue 

 that lies more than four inches deep in the soil. I want to work my 

 land all under cultivation and soil my stock. But the trouble is to 

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