290 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[Augtjs't, 
all of the butter that the milk contains—leaving 
the question of merit to be decided according to 
the amount pf labor required, and the uniformity 
of the result produced. Essentially, Hardin’s sys¬ 
tem is the same as that which I have advocated, 
save that I produce a uniform temperature by 
swimming my cans in cold spring water, and he by 
shutting them in a refrigerator with ice. Mr. Reeder 
experimented with two portions of 450 lbs. of milk 
each. The product was, from the shallow pans, 78 
lbs. of cream, and 27 lbs. of butter; from the deep 
cans, 128 lbs. of cream, and 27 lbs. 21 ozs. of butter. 
The extra amount of cream in the deep setting 
comes from the lack of evaporation, because of the 
small exposure of cream, and the low temperature 
of the surrounding air. The amount of butter is 
practically the same. Mr. Reeder explains the 
error of his former experiments, by saying that he 
had skimmed only two inches deep, “ obtaining 31- 
lbs. of butter; and increasing the depth of skim¬ 
ming in subsequent trials, to 3, 4, and 5 inches, 
and obtaining as a result 4, 5, and 6 pounds of but¬ 
ter from 100 lbs. of milk.” It had been our custom 
to remove all of the cream until we came to blue 
milk, without reference to the number of inches 
taken off. He recommends the Hardin system for 
general adoption, and I have no question that it has 
the advantages that are claimed for it. It comes 
within the reach of a large number of dairymen, 
who can obtain a sufficient supply of ice, and who 
are not so situated that they can procure the neces¬ 
sary cold water. Many of those situated as I am, 
where ice is an expensive luxury, and difficult to 
obtain in large quantities, will find my method, of 
pumping cold well-water by wind power, a perfect¬ 
ly good substitute. Indeed, I am still satisfied that 
the plan for a dairy, which I described with an 
illustration in the American Agriculturist some years 
ago, where the water is taken from the bottom of 
a deep cistern, pumped by wind-power into the 
tank, the overflow going hack to be cooled in the 
cistern, is, in all respects as good as it is simple. 
Were I to construct a new dairy, where there was any 
question as to the constancy of my well, I should 
adopt this deep cistern plan with entire confidence. 
The Maine Farmer, in answering an inquiry as to 
the best method of setting milk, gives a summary 
of all of the different processes, saying, “ Col. 
Waring has aimed for the top round, and he can 
claim a fair degree of success, but with all his fac¬ 
ulty for advertising his wares, he has too much 
good sense to claim that his method would be the 
best for all, or that it is beyond the point of im¬ 
provement.” This is essentially true, save that I 
have no wares to advertise, (Ogden Farm butter 
advertises itself), and the method I have adopted 
is not at all my own. It is the method of all the 
large creameries that have a good control of spring 
water, and is merely an adaptation of the Swedish 
system of setting milk in deep cans in ice water— 
the very little that I claim concerning it, is that I 
have been able to demonstrate its success, and that 
it has been my good fortune to have such a wide- 
reaching mouth-piece as the American Agriculturist 
in which to make its success known. 
It has frequently been suggested that some means 
should be adopted, by which perfectly authentic 
tests may be made of the butter producing capacity 
of the much vaunted Jersey cattle, and that the 
well known differences existing between individu¬ 
als of the breed, should be demonstrated—with ab¬ 
solute certainty as to the carefulness of the trial— 
that intending purchasers may know, not only how- 
good a Jersey cow mag be, but how good the indi¬ 
vidual cow is. Any plan that would compass these 
objects, would have in addition to this obvious ad¬ 
vantage, the very great one of giving an added 
value to the question of pedigree. Could we know 
that such and such families, or such and such indi¬ 
viduals, might be depended upon to produce a cer¬ 
tain yield of butter—at the flush, and throughout 
the year—pedigrees tracing to these, would be 
a very good indication of value ; and could the 
system be carried on until a certain pedigree should 
be confined entirely to animals of the largest pro¬ 
duction, the value that would be added to the ani¬ 
mals having this family tree, would, of course, be 
very great. Still further, were such trials to inspire 
universal confidence, we should attain the far 
most important object of checking the production 
of inferior animals, and forcing the selection into 
the range of the very best—a course that would re¬ 
sult in the greatest possible improvement of the 
stock of the dairy animals of the whole country. 
The American Jersey Cattle Club has established 
a system for recording pedigrees and for dissemi¬ 
nating information which accomplishes all that 
seems to be within the scope of its official action, 
but a project is now on foot among some of the 
individual members of the club to establish a breed¬ 
ing and cow-testing farm, where carefully con¬ 
ducted trials may be made and recorded. Should 
this project be carried out, the character of the 
gentlemen interested in it will be a sufficient guar¬ 
anty of absolute honesty and thoroughness, and 
honesty and thoroughness are the two chief essen¬ 
tials in the conducting of all such trials. It would 
be the purpose of this association not only to breed 
on its own account a class of animals whose excel¬ 
lence should be based on absolute performance at 
the pail and churn, but to furnish facilities for pri¬ 
vate breeders in all parts of the country, who might 
choose to send their best cows to take their degree 
at its examinations. Something of this sort would 
be valuable under any circumstances, and it is es¬ 
pecially necessary in view of the fact that Jersey 
breeders are very largely wealthy men who have a 
passionate fondness for, and implicit confidence in, 
their own herds ; and who honestly believe—at 
least a dozen of them whom I know—that they 
have the very best butter producers that have ever 
been bred. These gentlemen are very much influ¬ 
enced iu forming their opinions by the statements 
of their herdsmen, and herdsmen, as we all know, 
are not always reliable. Some of these consider it 
a slight crime to tell their employers little “ whop¬ 
pers,” which can have no other practical effect than 
that of making their employers happy. Then, too, 
the disposition of mankind to encourage its own 
pleasant deception is very great. What we want, 
and what, I hope we are to have, is a strictly con¬ 
scientious and impartial test by weight and measure 
of every drop of milk drawn, of all the cream 
raised, and of all the butter made, each cow’s pro¬ 
duct being kept by itself, and a systematic record 
kept year after year. Some of the practical ques¬ 
tions that would be incidentally decided by such a 
system are these : 1. Will a cow produce more but¬ 
ter within the year if she comes in in the fall than 
if in the spring ? 2. Will a cow produce most, year 
after year, if fed only on grass and hay, or if fed 
largely with grain ? 3. Is that cow the most prof¬ 
itable which gives the largest flow of milk, or does 
the extra richness of the moderate flow more than 
compensate for the loss of quantity, butter being 
the object ? 4. Does the great milker, or the 
steady milker, produce the most milk during the 
whole year ? 5. Does the quantity of cream or its 
richness have the greatest influence on the total 
product of butter ? 
A continued interest is evinced by the tone of 
the agricultural press in the question as to the in¬ 
tention of the Jersey Cattle Club to modify its 
rules. For the present it can only be said that a 
very sweeping change was proposed at the last an¬ 
nual meeting, and has been voted down by a large 
majority. At the same time the discussion of the 
question has shown a decided disposition to make 
some modifications concerning the evidence re¬ 
quired of the purity and quality of animals import¬ 
ed from the Island of Jersey, and it is not unlikely 
that some such change will be made. On the other 
hand, it may be considered as tolerably settled that 
the club will not consent to any material relaxing 
of the requirements in the case of animals bred in 
this country. Among the older members of the 
club there is hardly one who has not made a serious 
pecuniary sacrifice in order to secure a rigid exclu¬ 
sion of questionable pedigree, and so far as I know, 
none of them are disposed uow to offer to the gen¬ 
eral public any more favorable terms than those 
which they have themselves willingly accepted for 
the sake of the general good. (While on this sub¬ 
ject, I desire to say to such of my readers as have 
seen the discussion I was rash enough to undertake 
with the Live Stock Journal , that I have withdrawn 
from that discussion, because I think I have fully 
answered all that its editor has said concerning the 
club, and because it became obvious that he—being 
in power—meant to have the last word at any rate). 
Referring to the suggestion made in the last num¬ 
ber of these papers, 1 have to say that a careful ex¬ 
amination of the agricultural exhibit at Philadel¬ 
phia, makes it seem almost impossible to give any 
account of it which would not be absurdly inade¬ 
quate. On the one hand I found no single thing 
that seemed to promise a striking revolution in the 
processes of American farming ; but on the other 
hand, there is a wealth of display in every depart¬ 
ment of machinery, products, fertilizers, and pro¬ 
cesses, which cannot fail to impress the farmer 
with the magnitude and importance of his industry. 
At the State Fairs, with which we are all familiar, 
there is always a great and interesting exhibition 
in all of these directions, but the Centennial has 
gathered together the advantages of all these State 
Fairs, and has added to them a good exhibit of the 
agriculture of almost the whole world. 
It is not, after all, purely as an agricultural show 
that the International Exhibition appeals to the 
American farmer, but as a wonderful illustration 
of what it implies to be an inhabitant of this insig¬ 
nificant planet. A week spent by a farmer and his 
family in wandering thoughtfully through the enor¬ 
mous aggregation of the products of art and indus¬ 
try and nature, exhibited at Philadelphia, would 
result in a nearer approach to a liberal education 
than they are likely under their circumstances ever 
again to acquire. I have passed some time in the 
more important museums of Europe without find¬ 
ing in them all anything like the display of inter¬ 
esting and instructive objects that is now offered to 
the American people. 
Science Applied to Farming.—XX. 
BY PROF. W. O. ATWATER. 
Economy in Manuring. 
In several of the previous articles we have been 
trying to get at some of the more important prin¬ 
ciples upon which the right use of fertilizers is 
based. The letters that come from many directions, 
the questions asked by farmers who visit our labor¬ 
atory, and whom I meet elsewhere, all show how 
deep and wide-spread is the interest in these sub¬ 
jects among intelligent and thoughtful cultivators 
of the soil. Let me, then, offer a few more sug¬ 
gestions, and ask those who read them to ponder 
the subject well, while they are watching the 
growth and harvesting this season’s crops. 
In saying that no plant can grow and flourish 
without an available supply in the soil, of each of 
a certain list of substances needful for its food, and 
that the chief use of fertilizers is to supply food 
which plants need and soils fail to furnish, we are 
simply repeating now universally admitted facts. It 
is perfectly plain, then, that those fertilizers will be 
most economical, which, iu one way or another, 
supply these lacking materials in the needed pro¬ 
portions, in the best forms, and at the lowest cost. 
We have, then, two very important problems to 
solve : First, what ingredients of plant-food do our 
soils lack ? Second, by what applications of fer¬ 
tilizers, or other means, will this need be best sup¬ 
plied ? To answer either of these questions fully and 
definitely, is very difficult; the first, because of the 
difference in soils ; the second, because we do not 
know, and do find it slow work to discover definite¬ 
ly, the ways in which atmosphere and soils aud 
fertilizers, supply food, and plants use it. 
Table 31, in the June No., showed what mate¬ 
rials are removed from the soil by different crops. 
The list included, besides water, the chemical in¬ 
gredients, Nitrogen, Potash, Soda, Lime, Magnesia, 
Phosphoric Acid, Sulphuric Acid, and Silica. Very 
small quantities of Iron aud Chlorine might have 
been included also. The amounts and proportions 
vary with different crops, but the list is the same for 
all. Every crop takes more or less of each of these 
materials from the soil, but are they all necessary ? 
