JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
58 
mixed with Barley, as quantity then has the advantage. We speak 
from experience, for about the year 1855 we sowed half a field with 
white Canadian Oats and the other half with Barley, the result being 
that we grew eighteen sacks per acre of the white Oats and nine sacks 
per acre of grinding Barley. Both were sold in the same market on 
the same day at 28s. C d. per quarter. This to our mind w T as conclu¬ 
sive, for we grew no more Barley afterwards upon the mixed soils 
after roots fed off with the land in high condition. The straw of the 
Oats was likewise, as regards quantity and quality for the feeding of 
cattle, worth as much again as the straw of the Barley ; besides 
which the white Oats will always be earlier to harvest, and the 
Clover seeds take better in them than in the Barley. In all those 
cases where the fallow ploughing has not been completed the first 
opportunity must be taken to do so. Wheat-sowing may be con¬ 
tinued upon friable loamy soils in good condition until the end of the 
present month, after which we prefer to put in white Canadian Oats 
or some other variety for which the soil and climate is known to be 
congenial. Besides the risk of failure of the late and spring-sown 
Wheat of a dry summer there is the fact, according to our own ex¬ 
perience, that the Oats will produce as many quarters of grain as the 
Wheat crop will yield sacks in ordinary seasons. Whilst we are 
writing the weather is dry and frosty, and should this continue for a 
few days the home farmer will be enabled to lay out the farmyard 
and box dung upon the Clovers, or otherwise have it drawn to a heap 
in readiness to be laid out on the first favourable opportunity for 
the Potato or Mangold crops. When the dung is fresh and moist, 
in the act of making the heap by drawing the loaded carts thereon 
a great deal of liquid manure escapes into the soil beneath unless the 
precaution has been adopted of making a floor of earth upon which 
to build the heap. By this plan the underlying earth will be valu¬ 
able, either to lay out together with the dung or otherwise to be used 
as a dressing for the pastures or parklands, for which it is admirably 
adapted. 
Hand Labour .—The men will now be employed in the usual routine 
labour of the farm at this period, such as dung carting and spreading, 
water-furrowing, trenching in the pastures and parklands, and attend¬ 
ing to the changing and flooding of the watercourses in the irrigated 
meadows, so that all parts may have an equal advantage from the 
deposits left by the flood water ; cutting and making hedges, banking, 
also cutting and converting the underwood in the coppices and hedge¬ 
rows. The women should now be employed in preparing roots for 
the cutter and pulper, working in the fields, preparing food for the 
sheep. In snow or wet weather the preparation and cleaning of 
roots for the cattle in the boxes and feeding courts may be done. 
This is, in fact, women’s work, for they will do as much and often 
more than men, they being frequently more active in such light work. 
Shepherds now in different parts and districts of the kingdom will 
be employed in various ways in the south and south-west districts, 
as well as in some of the home counties where the horned Dorset and 
Somerset ewes are kept. These have now finished lambing, and both 
ewes and lambs are now being aided by generous feeding, the ewes 
being allowed half a pound of decorticated cotton cake each per day, 
with as much good hay in chaff as they can eat without waste, and 
cut roots either of Swedes or Mangold as much but no more than 
they will eat before leaving the troughs. This is the only sure method 
of preventing waste, and when the cake is given as meal and mixed 
with the cut roots it is of still more importance to avoid waste. The 
feeding of the lambs in advance of the ewes should be carried out 
in accordance with the mode of rearing the lambs, whether intended 
for store purposes and be sold as such at the stock fairs, or whether 
they are to be sold as fat lambs at the earliest period. In the former 
case they will do very well by receiving good sweet hay twice a day 
and run in advance of the ewes, eating off the greens of the Swedes 
or Turnips. This will do well for them up to the time of weaning, 
when the wether lambs will require better feeding, such as cake, &c. 
The ewe lambs, however, which will go with the stock ewes will 
require no better feeding than the rest of the flock. In the second 
case, when the lambs are intended for the butcher the highest and 
best-known system of feeding should be adopted both for ewes and 
lambs, for it is a fact that the higher the ewes are fed with artificial 
feeding stuffs the richer will be the milk available for the lambs. 
Again, the more liberal feeding the lambs obtain the less will be the 
call upon the ewes for milk, and the earlier will both ewes and lambs 
be fit for sale ; in fact the best practice is to have the ewes and lambs 
both ready for sale simultaneously. In order, however, to carry out 
this system to the best advantage we give the ewes a full allowance 
of cut roots and cake with bean meal mixed with and strewed over 
the roots in the troughs. One pound of meal per ewe per day, com¬ 
posed of one-third bean meal and two-thirds cake meal, with the best 
Clover or Saintfoin hay ad libitum given as chaff, will bring out the 
ewes fat at the same time as the lambs are sold, or very soon 
afterwards. 
The mode of feeding the lambs we recommend is in advance of the 
ewes, giving a full allowance of Carrots or Cabbage whilst young 
passed twice through the cutter and mixed with the best American 
cake meal and bean meal, or Swedish Turnips mixed and cut in the 
same way. At the same time they should have cracked beans and 
fine broken cake in covered troughs placed with back to the wind 
and under the hurdles. This shelter induces the young lambs to seek 
it, and then they find their food more readily. They should have the 
finest of hay given in chaff by itself twice a day, and any portion not 
[ January 20, 1881. 
eaten to be removed to the ewes. To carry out this system, how¬ 
ever, the lambs must not only be fed in advance of the ewes, but it 
must be in a fold cleared of the roots ; for we never allow fatting 
lambs to run over and eat off the greens of roots, as many lambs will 
be injured or lost from diarrhma by so doing. Besides this, the 
trough food as above stated will be found far more forcing and supe¬ 
rior to root greens. Mangold is well adapted for ewes but not for 
lambs, and when the ewes are fed upon cut Mangolds mixed with 
meal, as before stated, it is our practice, both morning and after¬ 
noon, to feed the lamb3 before the ewes, so that the former may all 
pass through the lamb gate and be shut off whilst the ewes are 
being fed. Our reason for this is simply that many of the best wether 
lambs will often die from stoppage of urine if allowed to eat Man¬ 
gold, hence the necessity of separate feeding. We give the home 
farmer this caution, having suffered considerable loss in our lambs 
before we adopted the mode of separate feeding. 
THE MANGOLD WURTZEL FLY (ANTIIOMYIA 
BETriE). 
The current number of the “Entomologist” contains a care¬ 
fully prepared report upon this pest from the pen of Mr. Fitch. 
We quote a few particulars in further elucidation of its history, 
supplementing what has been stated in a previous number of this 
Journal concerning the insect. 
The observations of 1880 show that it has appeared in many 
places, principally in the north and the midlands. Its attacks 
are not confined to the Mangold Wurtzel, for the leaves of Parsley 
and Celery have also been mined by the maggot, and several 
large-leaved wild plants, such as the Burdock. Two depositions 
of eggs have been noticed, the first occurring in May or June, the 
second in July or August. These are very minute, snowy-white, 
and laid in batches of from four to a dozen. The full-fed larva 
is yellowish white, about a third of an inch in length ; the head 
is furnished with two black hooks with which it scrapes the 
parenchyma of the leaf. Sometimes the larva remains in the leaf 
to become a pupa, but it more frequently descends to the ground. 
The second brood hybernates in the pupal state, the flies appear¬ 
ing on the wing during the spring months. Although only two 
broods were noticed in 1880, it is considered that under favour¬ 
able circumstances there might be three or four in succession. 
The chief damage sustained last season was caused by larvae that 
were hatched about the third week in July. 
VARIETIES. 
Raid against Wood Pigeons and Rooks in Eifeshire.— 
The East of Fife Agricultural Society have commenced a raid 
against Wood Pigeons and rooks with the view of reducing their 
numbers, convinced that these birds do great harm to farm crops. 
Large numbers are being shot. On two days every week the slaughter 
goes on. Varied opinions, however, are entertained regarding the 
rook, which it is believed by many does much good in destroying 
insect pests. 
-The Birmingham Dairy Show.— The vexed question of 
poultry or no poultry at the Dairy Show to be held in Bingley Hall 
in June next, has at length been settled in the affirmative. It was 
suggested some time ago that an exhibition of cross-bred poultry 
would form a useful adjunct to the Exhibition, and might do some 
good in showing the farmers what kinds were most profitable for 
them to keep. This idea, however, was very far from finding favour 
with a considerable number of the Cattle Show Council, some of 
whom were altogether against the exhibition of poultry at all, while 
others were equally convinced that a collection of what they termed 
“mongrels” would considerably damage the prospects of the annual 
Christmas Show. The real question, therefore, to be decided was, 
whether there should be a regular poultry show, including classes 
for “ barn-door fowls,” or whether the poultry should be dispensed 
with. At a recent meeting of the Cattle Show Council Mr. E. W. 
Badger (one of the Hon. Secretaries of the Dairy Show Committee) 
formally applied for permission to hold a Poultry Show in connection 
with the Dairy Show. A special meeting was called to consider the 
subject, and it was held on Thursday last, the Mayor (Alderman 
Chamberlain) presiding. After considerable discussion it was unani¬ 
mously decided that the experiment should be tried for one year. 
We may add that the question has been warmly taken up by the Lord 
Lieutenant and Lady Leigh and other influential ladies and gentle¬ 
men, and that several prizes are already offered, for the sake of 
