186:.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
323 
Hue of the fence, then driving stakes crossing 
so as to support rails over these furrows, the 
lower rails " breaking joints," as the carpen- 
ters say, with the upper ones. Such a fence is 
strong, and one not likely to be broken through 
by common cattle, if the rails are stout. — Eds.] 
Cost of Raising Com by the Old and 
New Methods. 
The sight of a man on a Sulky Cultivator, 
sweeping through a cornfield astride the rows, 
and leaving scarcely a live weed behind liim, 
has led us to speculate a little upon the cost of 
raising corn by the old and new methods. AVe 
will take a piece of 80 acres, 160 rods long and 
80 rods wide, and calculate four rows to the 
rod running one way. If the breaking up and 
harrowing cost two dollars per acre, we have 
§160, as the cost of preparing the ground for the 
crop. There will be 320 rows in the plot, and 
With a drill drawn by one horse, the corn may 
be dropped 1 foot apart, and covered in four 
days, the horse walking 20 miles a day. At 
$2.50 a day, this would be §10. It will take a 
man and pair of horses four days to cultivate 
once, which at §3.50 per day, will cost $14, and 
for cultivating five times, §70, making the 
whole cost §240. The 80 acres with this atten- 
tion, on good laud, would produce 40 bushels 
to the acre or more, say 3,200 bushels. The 
corn fodder, we think, would be a fair offset 
against the expense of harvesting and storing, 
as it is now generally admitted that, well cured 
and cared for, it is worth two-thirds as much as 
*the best hay. This would make the cost of the 
corn a trifle less than eight cents a bushel. 
Cultivating the same piece by the old method, 
the cost of preparing the ground would be the 
same, §160; marking out the ground both ways, 
witli plow, §20; planting at §1 an acre, §80; 
cultivating or plowing between rows, both ways, 
b'ix times, §S4; hand-hoeing three times, at 
§1.50 an acre each lime hoeing, §364; making 
the expense about §708, or 22 cents — nearly three 
limes as much as by the new method — the pro- 
portions, if not the figures, being nearly accurate. 
There are variations of these methods, in- 
creasing or diminishing the cost. Some do not 
use an} - drill or planter, but make rows both 
ways and plant by hand, covering with the 
hoe, and do all the cultivation by horse-power. 
The hand planting increases the cost. The use 
of fertilizers increases the expense, but adds to 
the yield enough to make up the difference. 
If the land is poor and the yield is less, of course 
the corn costs more. On some farms the cost 
of raising corn is probably a dollar a bushel. 
On the prairies, under favorable conditions, it 
does lipt probably exceed ten cents per bushel. 
There is, on an average, we think, a difference 
of two hundred per cent, in favor of the new 
methods. Farmers at the east, with their eyes 
open, should invest early in rock and stump 
pullers, and beat their hoes into sulky cultivators. 
How the Paper Pays. 
A good many farmers are still shy of agricul- 
tural papers. They say it don't pay to lake 
them. They never made an experiment but 
they lust money by it. The same men will talk 
about crops by the hour with their neighbors, 
comparing their own practice with what they 
sec ami hear of in others. The agricultural pa- 
per does for its readers, on a much larger scale, 
simply what these men do for themselves, at 
much greater expense. It gathers up from a 
thousand sources the details of farm experience 
all over the country, and gives them in a con- 
densed form. These results, surely, are no worse 
for being printed. They are generally stated 
with as much accuracy as the farmer would give 
them in his own language. To most cultivators 
these details of experience are instructive, and 
are most prized by those who know the most. 
They furnish important hints to all. They 
serve to quicken thought, and to make the prac- 
tice of farmers more profitable. A single sug- 
gestion acted upon often makes a difference of 
dollars in the productiveness of every acre un- 
der the plow. Here it guards against loss, there 
it makes large gains. It leads the farmer to 
study his business, and puts him in the way of 
learning much more from his own observation 
and experience. He gets out of the ruts, and 
thinks as he works. He uses his brains and 
grows as a man, and as a consequence, therefore, 
makes everything else grow that he touches. 
Corn Cribs. 
"Whatever temporary expedients the grower 
of Indian corn may resort to for storing his crop, 
he at last comes to a crib as a prime necessity. 
The rail pen is a very insecure inclosure, much 
exposed to damage from the storms, and an in- 
vitation for any thief to plunder. Storing in 
the garret is a very laborious business, and un- 
less spread very thin, it is exceedingly liable to 
Tig. 1. — CONNECTICUT COKN CUDJ. 
injure by mould. Spread upon the barn floor, 
it is always in the way, and free plunder to all 
the rats and mice upon the premises. This 
grain is more liable to injury from imperfect 
curing than any other that we raise. Wheat, 
oats, rye, barley, and buckwheat are easily 
cured in the field, so that a few 
days or weeks after cutting they 
can be thrashed there, and im- 
mediately stored in bins or sent to 
market. But Indian corn has a 
much larger kernel, and grows upon 
a thick stout cob from which it 
takes months to expel the moisture after it is 
full}" ripe. Each section has its peculiar con- 
trivances for storing this grain on the cob. In 
the South it is quite common to store husks and 
all in the barn or some other outbuilding. In 
the North they have buildings put up especially 
for storing the husked cars. 
The Connecticut corn crib, (Fi: 
common type at the 
East, and has many 
good qualities. It sets 
upon posts covered with 
inverted tin pans, (Fig. 
2,1 to make it inaccess- 
ible to rats and mice. 
These posts arc a foot or 
more in diameter, and 
two or three feel from 
the surface of the ground to the bottom of the 
building. Sometimes flat stones, two or three 
1,) is the 
Fig. 4. 
feet broad, are substituted for the tin pans, but 
the latter are preferred. The sides of the build- 
i'ig. 5. — TWO CKIB3 ROOFED OVEB. 
ing are made of slats nailed to sills and plates 
at bottom and top, and to one or more girders be- 
tween. The bin upon the inside is made by a 
board partition, three or four feet from the sid- 
ing. The boards are movable, and are put up 
as the crib is filled. The remaining space be- 
tween the bins is used for shelling corn or as a 
receptacle for bags and barrels, and the back 
part is sometimes used for a tool-house, or fitted 
with bins for storing shelled corn or other grain. 
Fig. 3 represents the eud view of the model 
Pennsylvania corn crib, and Fig. 6 the side view 
showing the mode of construction. Fig. 4 shows 
the same thing with a more economical roof. 
Fig. 5 shows two of these cribs with a roof 
thrown over them to form a convenient shed or 
shelter for carts, wag- 
ons, and farming tools 
Sometimes the pas- 
sage is boarded up at 
one end, and furnished 
with doors at the other. 
These cribs are entered 
at one end by a narrow 
door, and the whole Fi S- 6.— side of cmr,. 
space is occupied by the corn. They are front 
three to five feet in width, and give very perfect 
ventilation to the ears. They have usually a 
stone foundation with a sill and board floor 
above. They are not usually rat proof. They 
arc made of any desirable size, and cribs hold- 
ing from five hundred to a thousand bushels are 
common. In ease the farm enlarges, and more 
room is wanted, the roof of Fig. 3 is extended 
downward on one or both sides ; or other cribs 
are added, and more room is made for carts. 
N 
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i 
The American Buffalo. 
The fine picture on our first page introduces 
this magnificent and valuable animal to the no- 
tice of the reader, but the arrangement of our 
pages forbid our writing but very briefly in 
connection. No one can look into the history 
of the Buffalo on this Continent, its rapid 'ex- 
tirpation east of the Mississippi, and wherever 
civilization really sets her foot, without a feeling 
of pain. With the Indians, these splendid herds 
are rapidly approaching extinction. The pres- 
ent range of the Buffalo is the Great Plains be- 
tween the nori hern part of Texas and the Red 
River of the North, and between the Missouri 
River and the Rocky Mountains. Here they 
exist in immense numbers, so great that parties 
crossing the plains have sometimes been a week 
and more in passing through a herd. Mr. IIi\ Cs, 
the artist, writes : "The Buffalo is a timid animal, 
and generally will run from a man; but when 
parties are in the neighborhood of one of these 
herds, the great danger is from a stampede, in 
