1881 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
477 
inches above the ground by means of a short 
block driven down beside the fence post. 
This method of bracing should be repeated 
once in forty rods. A faulty construction 
would be to cut the notch in the starting 
post four feet from the ground, make the 
brace shorter, and allow the lower end to 
rest upon the ground; for the moment the 
wire is tightened upon the fence, the short 
brace acts as a fulcrum to lift the initial post. 
When the posts are set a wire is wrapped 
firmly around the first post, four feet and two 
inches from the ground ; then the coil is un¬ 
rolled forty rods and the wire drawn tight 
.by means of a set of small pulleys with 
grapples. After this wire has been securely 
stapled, a second is similarly fastened one 
foot below it, and a third and fourth below 
this, leaving a foot space between the respec¬ 
tive wires; the ground space is fourteen 
inches. Four wires thus arranged make a 
perfect cattle fence. For horses the lower 
wire should be without barbs to prevent cut¬ 
ting the knee, and a fifth wire should be placed 
upon the posts five feet from the ground. 
The upper wire prevents accident by at¬ 
tempting to reach over the fence. Instead of 
the upper wire a galvanized steel-barbed 
ribbon, is used as more sightly for horses. 
For swine, the fourth -wire of a cattle fence 
is raised four inches, and two barbed wires 
placed at equal distances below it. For sheep, 
the three lower wires, as in a fence for swine, 
are smooth. Thus constructed, barbed wire, 
while uniting all the conditions of a perfect 
fence, is comparatively harmless. Upon the 
Iowa Agricultural College farm there are 
nine miles of barbed-wire fence, inclosing 
pastures upon which graze one hundred and 
seventy horses and cattle ; during the season 
of 1881 not an animal has been scratched to 
draw blood, except in one instance, and that 
was slight and due to a faulty construction 
of the fence. Barbed wire will not answer 
for fencing in narrow lanes and yards, or any 
place where animals are liable to be crowded 
against it. Yards and lots for sheep can be 
made practically dog-proof by placing one 
barded wire near the ground, three fence 
boards above, and three wires above the 
boards; the lower wire prevents digging, and 
the upper wires suggest that the dog better 
not climb. Within such an inclosure the 
grateful sheep rest in perfect security. 
Common Sense in the Poultry Yard. 
BT MASON C. WELD. 
Common Sense is too often uncommon 
sense, and there is more truth than novelty 
in this sentiment in its application to poultry 
keeping. It is not my intention to criticise 
nonsensical way3, but to show ways sensible. 
The “poultry” that everybody keeps are 
technically designated “Fowls,” or “Barn¬ 
door Fowls.” As a rule they are kept in 
small flocks, fed chiefly upon what no farm¬ 
er misses. On most farms a flock of 1.2 to 
40 hens will pick up a living without receiv¬ 
ing a particle of grain from May to October, 
including both months. Their food consists 
of insects, seeds, and grass or weeds; they 
need fresh water besides. What wonder is it 
that fowls thus kept are demonstrably more 
profitable than any class of stock, or any 
orop on the farm. 
This is the best way to keep fowls, provid¬ 
ed they can be induced to lay where their 
eggs can be found while fresh. To accom¬ 
plish this a house of some kind is needed 
where the fowls may be shut in occasionally 
for a few days at a time, so as to make them 
roost and lay in convenient places. If fowls 
can roost in the trees, lay all over the farm, 
and “ dust ” themselves in the road, they will 
almost surely be healthy, lay a great many 
eggs, and keep in good condition. Besides, 
every now and then a hen will unexpectedly 
appear with a brood of ten or a dozen chicks, 
hatched under some bush where she had 
“stolen” her nest and done her hatching. 
That is all very well, so far as the hen is con¬ 
cerned, but no one wants it to happen. We 
wish the hens to lay and sit where we can 
put what eggs we please under them for 
hatching—and what is still more important, 
we wish to be able to collect the eggs for use 
or for sale daily. A fresh egg is a joy, a de¬ 
light, a good gift of Heaven—a “perfectly 
good ” egg is an abomination. An egg, to be 
fit to eat, or for sale, must be fresh beyond a 
peradventure, and utterly untainted with a 
suspicion of having been brooded or weath¬ 
ered. For this reason it is a most untidy 
thing to use natural nest-eggs. The nest-egg, 
after a while, is almost surely gathered, and 
of course is not “ right.” 
The trouble about fowl-houses, even with 
liberal yards, is that fowls do not do well 
constantly confined. The number of eggs 
falls off, and the fowls become subject to dis¬ 
ease, and especially to vermin—lice. All poul¬ 
try-houses are liable to become thus infested, 
and the only cure and preventive is dust, and 
dustiness. It is best to provide extensive 
dusting boxes—not out-of-doors somewhere, 
or under a cow-shed, where the fresh winds 
will carry off the stifling dust rendered dis¬ 
gusting by its “lienny” smell; but in the 
house itself, so that the atmosphere of the 
entire establishment will become thus dust¬ 
laden and oppressive. Dust will settle every¬ 
where, and one, entering, will need a white 
coat as much as does a miller. The hens 
will revel in the dust, however, and it will 
keep the lice down, if not exterminate them. 
As for the hens, they not only enjoy it, but 
dust is a necessity and a luxury to them, just 
as a morning bath is to civilized man. The 
dusting-box is their toilet-table—in fact, bath¬ 
tub, wash-bowl and pitcher, sponge and 
brushes and soap, and it gives health and 
long life as surely as the free use of water 
does to human beings. 
As to feed—if fowls are confined they lose 
a great variety of food which must be, in 
some way, made up to them. When we de¬ 
part from a close following after nature, we 
begin to complicate matters. Watch a hen 
as she trips picking about: now she takes a 
bit of grass or other greens; now she strips 
the seeds out of the seed-pod of some weed ; 
now she makes a vigorous dive after an in¬ 
sect, and so on all day, she scratches and for¬ 
ages. So a variety is essential to the health 
of fowls in confinement. They need grain, 
and soft food, chopped scraps, or other flesh 
diet, and some grass, or other greens, which 
they like—such as lettuce or cabbages. They 
must have plastering, oyster shells pounded 
fine, or some other source of lime, besides 
fresh water constantly. 
Better than all, they need an afternoon run, 
and a chance to scratch and pick in the door- 
yard, road, and barn-yard, if there be one. 
Here let me protest against hens being made 
use of as scavengers for picking up and 
cleaning up filth about the back-door. There 
is no better habit for farmer-folks to cultivate 
in regard to poultry, than on every occasion 
to drive them away from the kitchen door, 
and never to throw out anything that they 
can eat anywhere near the house. The prac¬ 
tice of having a slop hole—or spot near the 
back door — where dish-water and other 
“slops,” containing more or less that hens 
will eat—are thrown, is a filthy one at best. 
All such water should be thrown upon the 
dung-hill or compost heap. Here the hens 
may pick up many a crumb, and the manure 
will be greatly benefited. 
In the matter of varieties, the fancy breeds 
are best let alone by any one who does not 
make a business or a pastime of poultry 
keeping. It is very pleasant for a person 
who keeps but a dozen or twenty hens to 
have them of some choice breed, and to take 
great pains with them ; studying into their 
habits, their “ points,” and all that. But few 
persons have either the taste or inclination to 
be successful breeders, so, as a rule, it is best 
to keep common or mixed hens, but a full- 
blooded cock of one of the best breeds. 
For general use, I think most persons who 
have had experience will agree with me, that 
the Plymouth Rock fowls are excellent, and 
either these or the Dominiques, or one of the 
Asiatic birds are to be recommended if a pure 
breed of fowls is desired for eggs, broilers, 
capons, and fat cockerels and pullets. For 
eggs alone, the White Leghorns are prefer¬ 
able, but they are neither economical for the 
table, nor are they to be depended upon as 
sitters and mothers. For several years I have 
kept only cross-bred, or “ grade” hens. Tak¬ 
ing a stock of Light Brahmas, they were bred 
with a Dorking cock, two years, then with 
Plymouth Rock cocks, and now I shall prob¬ 
ably take a Brahma cross, in the hope of ef¬ 
fectually eradicating the tendency to throw 
pink-legged chicks, a relic of the Dorking 
cross, and black ones, which come from the 
Plymouth Rocks. After that I shall recur to 
the last named variety, as I find it gives me 
earlier and better broilers, plenty of eggs, 
and fowls always fit for the table. 
A Handy Door Weight. 
The accompanying engraving, made from 
a sketch sent us by Mr. W. A. Hister, Clark 
Co., Ind., shows a 
convenient meth¬ 
od of keeping a 
door closed. The 
contrivance con¬ 
sists of a pulley 
made from a sec¬ 
tion of a small 
log, with the flat¬ 
tened halves of 
a blacking box 
tacked on its 
edges to make it 
run more smooth¬ 
ly. An old worn- 
out axe is used as 
the weight, it be¬ 
ing fastened at 
one end, while 
the other, pass¬ 
ing through the 
A HANDY BOOK WEIGHT. puUeyj j g secured 
to the door near the top. The pulley 
should work easily in the frame; the latter 
is fastened to the inside of the door casing by 
