18J4] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
219 
tive to these insects. As the ducklings grow 
older they may have more liberty and a greater 
variety of food. If they have not plenty of 
.grass its place should be supplied by lettuce, 
■onions, cabbage, or other green succulent food. 
If you desire exhibition birds of the largest 
size, it is particularly important that the duck- 
lings should be fed regularly, and at frequent 
intervals, having all the food they can digest. 
Five times a day is none too frequent feeding. 
We have usually succeeded quite as well with 
ducks as with chickens in a village yard. 
When grown, we give them a larger range. * 
Future Prospects of Wheat Culture. 
■ 
It has now become a settled fact that in the 
future the wheat product of Great Britain will 
steadily decrease. The importations into that 
country the present shipping season will not be 
far from 100,000,000 of bushels. It is the de- 
mand for this va3t Quantity of grain that has 
kept up the price in our own markets to a 
profitable point ; and it is the future demand 
that will govern the price of our wheat in the 
future. If that demand shall keep even with 
the surplus which we have to spare the price 
will be satisfactory ; but if our production shall 
overrun the necessities of our foreign custom- 
ers, the price will be so iow that it will not pay 
the cost of producing it. The fact, therefore, 
that large tracts of land in Great Britain and 
Ireland have been withdrawn from wheat cul- 
ture and have been turned into grazing fields 
and the production of meat, and that American 
fields are now looked to for the supply of grain, 
should not tempt us to go out of our way to 
largely increase our wheat production. On the 
contrary, our plan is to follow their example, 
to keep our wheat production stationary, and 
to increase our stock of beef cattle, sheep, and 
hogs, as much as possible, so as to supply our- 
selves and leave only a moderate excess for 
shipment. If Europe needs 100,000,000 bush- 
els and we have but 90,000,000 to dispose of, 
the price of that 90,000,000 and that of all we 
need at home, in fact the price of the whole 
crop, will advance up to the extreme point that 
our customers can pay. But if we have but a 
small quantity over their needs the price of our 
whole production will depend upon what they 
are willing to pay. It would not then be wise 
to increase our growth of wheat, but rather to 
turn our attention to growing grass, and our 
meat and dairy products. 
How to Manage Sitting Hens. 
A good deal of the success of the poultry 
crop depends upon the management of the 
birds while sitting. Hens that steal their 
nests and follow their own instincts do very 
well if they are not disturbed, but frequently 
they get frightened or robbed, and the eggs are 
lost. As a rule, it is better to have all the sit- 
ting birds completely under your control, and 
make them follow your will rather than their 
own instincts. With a well-arranged poultry 
house it takes but a little time daily to have all 
the birds come off for food and exercise. But 
without this we manage to make the sitters 
regular in their habits. We usually set the 
hens near together in a sheltered sunny spot, in 
boxes, or barrels, that we can cover, and thus 
perfectly protect them against enemies, and at 
the same time compel them to sit until the 
box is uncovered. Wherever they may lay, 
when they want to sit we remove them to the 
hatching-yard by night, and put them securely 
upon a nest full of eggs. We usually take 
Asiatic fowls for mothers, as they are very con- 
tented upon the nest, and cover a large number 
of eggs. We have never failed to make them 
take kindly to a new nest. They also bear 
handling better than most other varieties, and 
are very patient, good - tempered mothers. 
Every day about twelve o'clock we remove the 
covers, and carefully take the hens from their 
nests for food and water. In pleasant weather 
they have from a half hour to an hour to 
scratch in the dirt and take their dust bath. 
Most of them return to their nests voluntarily 
before the time is up. Occasionally a bird 
will take to the wrong nest. It takes but a 
few minutes to see every bird in her place, and 
make her secure for the next twenty-four 
hours. As the hatching time approaches, we 
dip the eggs in tepid water every day to keep 
the pores open, and to facilitate the hatching. 
This moistening of the eggs we have found of 
special service in the hatching of the eggs of 
water-fowl set under hens. By this method we 
have good success with sitting hens. * 
A Corn-Marker. 
The annexed engraving is one of a marker 
for corn or potatoes which we recently saw in 
use. It is a very light, neat, and useful im- 
plement for those who plant these crops by 
hand in check rows. The markers are strips 
of plank four feet long, two inches thick, 
and six inches wide, into which gains are cut 
to fit the crossbars. Iron straps are fastened 
over these gains, in which holes arc made. 
Holes are also made in the crossbars, and as 
the markers are moved along the bars, as they 
may be set wider apart or otherwise, they are 
held in their places by iron pins inserted 
in the holes. The crossbars are connected by 
two flat iron rods, and a tongue is fixed and 
braced to them. A handle is also fixed behind 
to guide the motion. At the rear end of 
each marker wings of wood are attached by 
A COrtN-MAEKER. 
which fvfrrows are made. The seed is dropped 
into these furrows at each intersection of the 
cross furrows. 
Feeding Meal to Cows. — The best way to 
give meal to cows is either to mix it with some 
cut hay, moistened so that the meal will adhere 
to it, or to scald it and give it in the shape of a 
thin gruel as a drink. In the first place it is 
necessary to perfect digestion that the saliva 
should be mixed with the food and that the 
food should be returned from the first stomach 
to the mouth for a second chewing or rumina- 
tion. This is only done when the food is 
bulky, requiring considerable chewing. In the 
second place the gullet, or passage from the 
mouth to the stomach, in ruminants, opens 
directly into the third stomach, having inter- 
mediate longitudinal openings closed by lips, 
by which the food enters the first and second 
stomachs. If the food is bulky and solid it 
separates the lips of these openings and finds 
an entrance to either or both the first and sec- 
ond stomachs. If otherwise, it passes over the 
closed lips and enters the third stomach. In 
the first case, by a periodic inverted action of 
the gullet, the food is thrown in small quanti- 
ties from the stomachs to the mouth, where it 
is reduced to a soft semi-liquid condition, in 
which state it is passed easily to the third 
stomach for digestion. In the second place it 
misses this process of rumination, and is there- 
fore not in a condition for perfect digestion, 
and the meal is seen to pass away in the dung 
in considerable quantities unaltered. 
The Timber Culture Act. — A recent 
amendment of the Act of Congress to encourage 
the planting of timber upon the western prai- 
ries, provides that 160 acres of land, or less, may 
be entered by any person w 7 ho is the head of a 
family or who is 21 }'ears of age. One fourth 
of the land shall be planted with trees. One 
fourth of this required quantity must be broken 
the first year and planted the second year. 
Another fourth must be broken the secoud 
year and planted the third, and the remaining 
half must be broken the third year and planted 
the fourth. After eight years' cultivation a deed 
will be granted. The fees are $18 for each entry. 
How to Kill Skunks. 
During all the breeding season, sitting hens, 
ducks, geese, and turkeys are exceedingly liable 
to the depredations of skunks. These creatures 
forage in the night, and will come into sheds, 
barns, and cellars in quest of food. They are 
very fond of eggs, and when they have once 
got a taste of this delicate food they will come 
so long as there is an egg left. If a dog is 
set to catch them, the skunk carries too many 
guns for his enemy, and the result is a per- 
fumed watchman upon the premises for the 
remainder of the season. If trapped or shot 
he dies game, and not infrequently leaves a 
gamey odor in one's clothes that puts them per- 
manently upon the retired list. A correspondent 
to whom we sent some choice Rouen ducks' 
eggs last season was robbed by one of these 
marauders, and we are indebted to him for the 
following method of destroying skunks, which 
we give in his own language : " A skunk got at 
the nest, and sucked all but two of them before 
we suspected that it was not the hen that broke 
two eggs every night. She was sitting in a 
cellar carefully guarded, except the drain, 
which had an outlet about fifty feet from the 
building; it was through this the skunk came 
in. As soon as we suspected the true cause of 
the mischief we closed the drain, aDd I sucked 
out a part of the contents of an egg through a 
small hole in one end, and put. in a little pow- 
der of strychnine, shook it up well, and cov- 
ered the hole with court-plaster, and left it at 
night near the mouth of the drain, which I had 
closed up. The next morning the egg was 
partly eaten, and about two rods distant lay a 
dead skunk. I think this is the best way, in 
