8 THE OOLOGIST 
Just about as much can be expected 
of boys and girls as from a newly set 
orchard if both are started and then 
allowed to shift for themselves. The 
old Harry in the shape of weeds and 
ill manners, borers and bad habits is 
sure to get them. No slipshod or ab- 
sentee oversight will give satisfactory 
results. ; 
It pays an owner in dullars to give 
his buildings a good coat of paint and 
make the premises shipshape if he is 
contemplating selling. It will give 
just as large a return in chunks of 
solid satisfaction for himself and fam: 
ily if he isn’t thinking of selling. Es. 
pecially is such improvement of thé 
place to be commended from _ thé 
Standpoint of the passerby. 
In most states the law as to fences 
requires a railroad to provide its right 
of way with a fence of the kind whick 
the farmer has or may want to erect 
adjacent thereto. To illustrate, if 4 
fandowner wishes to fence hog tight 
a tract of land bordering on the right 
of way, the railroad would have ta 
erect a fence of this description on the 
line bordering such tract. 
Following one line means success in 
a majority of cases, but did not with 
the Illinois farmer who got fine 
homestead land at $1.25 per acre sixty 
years ago, has grown nothing but 
wheat and corn on it since and today 
gets but two bushels of wheat and ten 
of corn per acre. and even to get this 
paltry return has to let his land rest 
part of the time at that to get its 
breath. He was one of your practical 
fellows who followed in the agricul- 
tural ruts of his forefathers and had 
no time for lead pencil farmers or ex- 
periment station bulletins. 
The pasture should be one of the 
best assets on a well managed farm 
and if properly handled should give 
as large a return with as little outlay 
of work as any other acres on the 
place. One way in which its efficiency 
may be increased is to give it a light 
top dressing of fertilizer with the 
spreader, paying special attention to 
the spots where the soil seems to be 
the thinnest. In this way an effective 
disposal can be made of much of the 
manure which accumulates about the 
stables during the summer months, 
which if not carried out would lose 
about half of its fertilizing value from 
exposure to rain and weather. 
A discerning contributor to a well 
known dairy paper in accounting for 
the financially strapped condition of so 
many dairymen in sections of New 
York which he visited finds the chief 
reasons for their unenviable condition 
to be poor cows, the buying of much 
feed that ought to be raised on the 
farm, failure to utilize to their full 
value the crops that are produced, es- 
pecially corn, and waste of money in 
extravagant personal habits when it 
ought to be spent for supplies for the 
home and feed for the dairy cows. The 
causes cited by this investigator would 
seem to be sufficient to account for a 
good deal of low ebb dairying and 
farming. 
It is a fact conceded by all dairymen 
and feeders that pasture grass is as 
nearly a perfect feed as it is possible 
to have. There are several reasons for 
this One is that it is juicy and succu- 
lent and, entirely apart from its nutri- 
tive properties, is eaten with keen rel- 
ish by all domestic animals. Added to 
this is the fsct that it contains in nice- 
ly balanced proportions the several 
nutritive elements required for meat 
and milk producticn. Another point is 
that it is not eaten in stuffy. ill venti- 
lated and poorly lighted barns, but in 
the open, where with every mouthful 
of grass taken ‘into the stomach a 
breath of sweet fresh air is taken into 
the lungs, purifying the blood, aiding 
the heart action and increasing to 1 
maximum the animal’s power of as- 
similation, which in turn makes possi- 
ble the consumption of stil larger 
quantities of feod and an increased 
production of milk and meat 
