292 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
Look after the young Colts, Calves 
and Lambs- 
These young animals, being weaned, and get¬ 
ting a good, healthy growth on the fresh grass of 
the Summer pastures, are apt to get pinched by 
the sharp frosts o-f October and November, if ex¬ 
posed to them, and the occasional cold rains of 
the season. With plenty of food, a frosty night, 
in dry weather, does not hurt them. But, if pos¬ 
sible, we would prefer to bring all the young 
things to the shed at night, where they can rest 
under a warm, dry covering, and go out when 
the sun is well up in the morning. No animal, 
particularly a young one, likes frosted grass, 
while frozen ; therefore, they do not eat it until 
the frost melts away, and they are quite as well 
in the stable, with a little sweet hay before 
them, which they will readily eat at this time of 
the year—and all the better, as a change of diet. 
We haye seen a fine lot of calves, lambs, and 
colts, in nice condition, from being left out through 
a series of frosty nights, and October and No¬ 
vember storms, wi'h plenty of grass about them, 
run down their tie 1 -h wretchedly, from exposure 
alone; and when it is so easy to prevent it, care 
should be taken to do so. A well Summered ani¬ 
mal, young or old, should go into Winter quarters 
thriving ; then if well fed on Winter fodder, it will 
keep thriving. Otherwise, it stunts, and it takes ex¬ 
tra food to start it again ; and, perhaps, loses half 
a season's growth, just for the want of a little 
painstaking at the proper season. 
Now is a capital time, too, to domesticate the 
young things, if they have been any way shy be¬ 
fore. Carry them good little odds and ends of 
vour garden stuff, vegetable tops—such as beets, 
carrots, turnips, parsneps, cabbage leaves and 
pumpkins. Feed them from the hand ; give them 
a trifle of salt; let them become familiar with, 
and love you. A tame animal will Winter twice 
as easy as a wild one, and the pleasure and profit 
of your stock is increased wonderfully over the 
kick and cuff, “get out of the way,” and “stu- 
boy ” fashion of some barbarians that we could 
mention. 
The Poultry Yard. 
Now is the time to push along the poultry. 
Don't wait till a week or two before Thanksgiv¬ 
ing or Christmas to begin to feed the turkeys, 
geese, ducks and chickens, but treat them gen¬ 
erously now, when they are making growth, and 
they will double their weight by the holidays. 
Grasshoppers, of which the North-American world 
has been full the past season, are now about done 
with. The turkies and chickens have had a good 
time with them, and grasshopper bone and mus¬ 
cle have been turned into those of the poultry 
with decided advantage to them, and saving to 
the grain bins. If there be no hurry to eat the 
fowls, or take them to market, boiled potatoes, 
beets and carrots, may be given to them with any 
sort of grain meal you happen to have, or can 
make—the mere bran of any grain, is good for 
nothing, only scouring them. This gives them 
growth, but not so much fat as if the grain, or meal 
be given them mostly. 
We do not believe in confining poultry at this 
season of the year. When Winter sets in, and 
heavy storms come on, it will do, provided they 
be kept clean, and have plenty of good air, and 
wholesome food. If they have the habit of roost¬ 
ing on trees—which they oftentimes get in warm 
weather, ant; which is very wholesome for them— 
they should now come under shelter. It does no 
good, but positive injury for a turkey, or chicken 
to get wet in a cold rain, and they should not be 
exposed to it. In addition to generous feeding 
now promoting their growth, it shoots out their 
second growth of feathers to maturity—for no, 
old bird is good to eat while moulting, or a young 
one palatable while pushing out its second growth 
of feathers, which all young ones do in the Fall 
of the year. The young cock turkeys gobble and 
strut, and the pullets pipe plaintively, and walk 
by themselves with their mothers. The chicken 
cocks get their full plumage, crow lustily, and 
show their virility, while the pullets sing away 
their cheerful notes with the old hens, and take 
a turn at an occasional cackle. 
The geese and ducks, if you have not picked 
them to death, through the Summer, are now in 
full feather, plump, noisy and quarrelsome. Give 
them boiled vegetables of any kind you have to 
spare, and some meal mixed with it. Occasion¬ 
ally a little grain, and with their accustomed 
water exercise, they will go on rejoicing. Keep 
the dirty, waddling ducks out of filth, if possible— 
they are filthy things, if they can get at filthy 
food—for it is sure to make filthy flesh. A clean 
fed duck is delicious food—otherwise it is little 
better than carrion. A goose is usually a clean 
feeder, and no flesh is better, or more nutritious 
than a fat gosling. “ Roast-goose and apple¬ 
sauce,” is a gourmand’s dish, the world over ; but 
it must be clean fed goose and a good variety of 
apples to make them of, or they are worthless. 
-- am & SB* -- 
Hollow Brick for Draining. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist: 
This past exceedingly wet Spring, has led me 
to ask your advice about constructing underdrains, 
with brick, made with one side hollow, like the 
inclosed drawing. We have no stones here, and 
can not get tiles at any price, and I have, for 
some time past, thought of constructing drains 
with bricks, by cutting the ditch just the size of 
the bricks, then laying a tier of bricks, hollow 
side up in the bottom of the ditch, and covering 
with the bricks, hollow side down, taking care to 
break joints ; then fill in with straw on the bricks, 
say a foot, and put back the earth on top of all. 
If this plan will not do, we must surface drain ; 
what you think of the plan 1 It is simple, and 
may be of some account, if not too expensive 
Can bricks be made sufficiently durable to wall 
cellars under kitchen and barn. If so a lesson on 
making and burning the same will be of service 
to one reader at least. D. J. Banta. 
Dubois County, Indiana. 
Remark.— The bricks made and placed as de¬ 
scribed by Mr. Banta, form what is really a tile- 
drain, and if bricks of this form can be obtained 
at a price which can be afforded, they will answer 
the purpose very well. The only doubt with us 
is in regard to the expense. Calling these bricks 
8 inches in length, three will be required to the 
foot, if laid double, or say fifty to the rod. At $5 
per 1000 for such bricks, which is perhaps as low 
as they would average, the cost would be 25 cts. 
per rod. The round drain-tiles, 14 inches long, 
are sold at $8 to $12 per 1000. Taking the high¬ 
est p ice, $12 per 1000, the cost is 15 cents per 
rod for the tiles. Still, where the regular drain- 
tile, can not be yet obtained, it will doubtless pay 
to use the hollow brick on a great number of soils 
There is no danger that the water will not find 
its way into them. The covering of straw is not 
needed; it is if anything objectionable as more 
likely to clog them. Lay them down firmly on a 
smooth bottom, and fill in the earth, the more 
gravelly portion first, if there be any difference in 
the soil in this respect. Small stones, if at hand, 
make a good first layer over the bricks ; but this 
is not essential. 'The water will find any open 
passage way, even if surrounded with earth. 
Bricks are very often used for cellar walls, and 
with entire success we believe. The harder they 
are burned the better for such purposes. We 
can not here enter into the details of brick-mak¬ 
ing — Ed. 
■-— *- —» 8 —-- -- 
For the American Agriculturist. 
The Commercial Value of Muck. 
It is but a few years, since farmers have con¬ 
ceded that this article was worth using at all. 
Swamps, with their inexhaustible supplies of peat 
and muck, were looked upon as wastes. Some of 
them would grow poor bog hay and w'eeds, and 
others, brush, maple, and other swamp wood. 
Beyond these products, they yielded nothing valu¬ 
able to the farm. A change has so far been 
wrought in public sentiment, that perhaps one 
half of the tillers of the soil would concede, that 
muck will pay for carting, and one in four actu¬ 
ally uses it. Ip the large circle of our acquaint¬ 
ance, in a district where fairs and agricultural 
papers abound,though swamp muck is by no means 
scarce, yet not more than one in four ever carts 
a load of muck into his barn yard. It is surpris¬ 
ing to see how long men will admit the value of 
an improvement, before they will adopt it, even if 
it costs nothing but their own labor. 
Of those who use muck, few have any definite 
conception of its value as a fertilizer. The idea 
which has been made most prominent in our ag¬ 
ricultural journals is its quality as an absorbent of 
the liquids and gases of stable manure. Atten¬ 
tion has not been so much directed to the fertiliz¬ 
ing qualities of the muck itself. Professor John¬ 
son, the chemist of the Connecticut State Agri¬ 
cultural Society, has been investigating this mat¬ 
ter, the past year, and has brought out very valu¬ 
able results. He has found and demonstrated, 
that the muck beds of that State are mines of in¬ 
calculable value. He made analyses of sixteen 
peats, from different localities, and found some of 
them to contain from three, to three and-a-half 
per cent of potential ammonia, in their air-dry 
state. It is estimated by the same authority, 
that average samples of Peruvian guano contain 
sixteen per cent of ammonia, and that three quar¬ 
ters of its value is found in the ammonia. If a 
ton ol guano is worth 60 dollars, the ammonia in 
it, upon this basis of calculation, would be worth 
forty-five dollars. Admitting muck to contain 
one fifth as much potential ammonia, five tons of 
it will yield, in time, the same amount of this val¬ 
uable ingredient as a ton of guano. It would be 
worth nine dollars, were it as easily handled, and 
if it would yield its ammonia to the growing crops 
as quickly as the guano. Its bulk, and the fact- 
that its ammonia is chiefly potential, are impor¬ 
tant draw backs to its value. But all farmers* 
have the means at hand of putting peat into active 
fermentation, and thus of availing themselves at 
once of its riches. If mixed -frith stable manure, 
it is soon decomposed, and fitted for plant food. 
It has been stated by Lord Meadowbank, Mr. 
Dickson, and other English agriculturists, of high 
reputation, that one load of dung, by judicious 
mixture with peat and other matters, will make 
six loads of manure possessing equal fertilizing 
power, with the same quantity of stable manure. 
If by “the other matters” in their experi 
