AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[March, 
9-i 
throng the halls during four days in the week usu¬ 
ally devoted to the show. The winning birds in 
the popular breeds command fabulous prices ; from 
fifty to a hundred dollars being not infrequently 
paid for a single bird, that has only a single point 
of excellence, and three ounces of flesh more than 
his competitor. These exhibitions have a very 
great influence upon the breeding of the finer vari¬ 
eties of fowls, and the effect is visible in the egg 
and poultry markets. Chickens that are exposed 
for sale are at least a third larger than formerly, 
and the average weight of flocks of turkeys dressed 
at Thanksgiving and Christmas is steadily gaining. 
Fourteen pounds weight is as common for lots of 
fifty to a hundred as ten pounds was twenty years 
ago. But the benefit is by no means confined to 
the markets and the farmer’s purse. There is 
something refining iu the cultivation of the finer 
breeds of poultry and turning out finished products. 
The man who has raised a forty-pound bronze gob- 
ler, and seen his plumage in its glory, will not be 
satisfied with inferior stock in his herd or his fold. 
There is a feast for the eyes in the rich coloring and 
beautiful forms of our domestic fowls, and their 
presence about the farm-yard, or upon the lawn, 
cultivates the esthetic sense, and ennobles the 
farmer’s art. Children grow up with a greater 
fondness for rural pursuits and for their homes. 
This is one of the things to redeem labor from its 
coarseness and drudgery, and to make our boys and 
girls content with farm life. 
Walks and Talks on the Farm—Ho. 135. 
[COPYRIGHT SECURED.] 
I have frequently recommended the practice of 
letting pigs have the run of a good clover-pasture 
in summer. Mr. J. C. C., of Indiana, writes that 
his land would produce a great crop of clover, but 
he would like to know if it would pay to raise 
clover for hogs, when he could raise corn for 10 
cents per bushel. In reply, I asked if this could be 
done. Mr. C. has been kind enough to send the 
following statement. “ In the first place,” he 
writes, “I have very good soil, and it is pretty new. 
As to rotation, I plow down just after harvest a 
clover sod. It is afterward cultivated and pulver¬ 
ized, and then about the first week in September 
sown to wheat. After the wheat is off, the land is 
allowed to lie until the next spring, when it is 
plowed for corn as early as possible. Then 1 leave 
it until immediately before planting. It is then 
harrowed, and cross-harrowed, and marked oil four 
feet each way, and two or three inches deep, with 
a common single shovel-plow, with a cutter slant¬ 
ing, so that the lower end is nearer the shovel than 
the upper end. Then I have a small boy or girl 
drop four grains in each cross or hill. A man fol¬ 
lows and covers with a hoe. Last spring five drop¬ 
pers, and five to cover, put in 13 acres in one day, 
costing me $7.50—men $1 per day, and droppers 
50 cents, not counting the board. After it is plant¬ 
ed, I am not too much in a hurry about tending it. 
When the plants get three or four inches high, I 
take a double shovel-plow, with a fender, and one 
horse, and run right up to the corn, and cut and 
cover everything except the corn. When I am 
through, I turn immediately, and cross-plow, be¬ 
fore leaving the field. Here, I think, lies a secret, 
because you can not see a weed, and the soil is 
loosened all around the roots of your small com. 
Take each field in succession this way, as it was 
planted, and weeds will not trouble you. I aim to 
plow this way twice over, and then last only one 
way, making five times in all. This season (1874) I 
only got through four times, and there was hardly 
a weed to be seen at husking time. This year I 
raised from 27 acres lacking only a few bushels of 
1,800 bushels.” 
This is about 66 bushels per acre. “ Stop a 
moment,” said the Deacon. “I do not see any¬ 
thing wonderful in this method of raising corn. 
We plant in the same way here, only instead of 
having a boy to drop the four kernels in a hill, and 
a man to follow with a hoe, each man or boy drops 
the kernels, and then covers. There is nothing in 
the method of cultivating the com that differs es¬ 
sentially from our plan.”—Mr. C. continues: “ You 
can not understand, why I can raise corn, and crib 
it, for 10 cents a bushel.”—“Yes,’’said the Dea- 
can, “that is what I want to know.”—“In the first 
place,” says Mr. C., “board and wages are not as 
high, as with you. My men cost me $30 per month 
in summer, say for eight months. In husking time 
I get men for $1.00 per day. And in the next place, 
I do not count full wages all the time, for the 
teams, because I have to keep so many anyhow 
part of the year, and if 1 hire an extra hand, the 
team costs me but very little more than if it stood 
in the stable. I will give you the cost, if I had to 
hire teams and everything, as near as I can, taking 
a field of ten acres. A team here [with man] will 
cost $2.50 per day, and board themselves, and plow 
two acres per day. The account will thus stand as 
follows : 
“ Plowing, ten acres.$12.50 
Harrowing twice, 2% days. 6.25 
Marking oat, one horse and man, 2% days.. 5.37 
Planting. 8.00 
Tending. 17.37 
Husking and cribbing 600 bn., ® 5 cts. 30.00 
Total. .$79.49 
“ This is 131 cents per bushel. But then, as I 
said, I hire my help for less than that, and the cost 
of the team would often be the same, work or no 
work.” 
“I have seen men figure in that way before,” 
said the Deacon. “ If the teams are lying idle in 
the stable, their cost must be charged to the farm. 
If you do not charge it to the corn crop, it must be 
charged to some other crop. What does he raise 
after corn?”—“He sows oats or flax, and follows 
with wheat, seeded down with clover.”—“ Then,” 
said the Deacon, “ I would like to see him carry 
out his statement, and tell us what these crops 
cost. There is interest on the land and taxes. 
There is cost of teams, and their death and depre¬ 
ciation. There is harness, blacksmith’s bill, sad¬ 
dler’s bill, cost of wagons, plows, harrows, culti¬ 
vators, and other implements and machines, re¬ 
pairs, interest, and depreciation. There is the 
board of the men, and the washing, and the entire 
expenses of the farm. All these things have to be 
charged to the farm, and the corn crop should be 
assigned its due proportion.” 
The Deacon is right. Suppose Mr. C. raised 
nothing but corn, and that he kept six horses, three 
plows, two sets of harrows, three cultivators, one 
roller, three wagons, and the necessary spades, 
shovels, forks, hoes, corn-cutters, grindstone, ax, 
hammer, chisels, nails, bolts, screws, and the thou¬ 
sand and one little things necessary to carry on a 
well-managed farm. Now, in figuring up his corn 
costs, would he say, “ I have got to keep six horses 
anyhow, and if I hire an extra hand, the team costs 
me but little more than if it stood in the stable. I 
have got the farm, and must pay interest and taxes, 
whether I plant corn or not. I must feed the 
horses, and keep them shod, and buy harness, and 
keep it oiled and repaired, whether the horses work 
or stand idle in the steble. ” If he argues in this 
way, and charges nothing for board, I presume he 
could figure down the cost of raising corn in a favor¬ 
able season, and on good land, to something near 
10 cents a bushel. 
The truth is, farming is a very complex business, 
and it is not an easy matter to tell just how much 
any particular crop costs us. We have to take into 
consideration the condition and fertility of the land 
before the crop is raised, and after its removal. If 
any crop leaves the land in a foul condition, the 
cost of cleaning the field and restoring it to its 
original condition must be charged to the cost of 
that crop—not carried forward to the next crop. 
One thing seems clear. The whole cost of car¬ 
rying on the business should be charged to the 
farm before we begin to figure profits. When this 
is done, the arguments of Mr. C. are correct and to 
the point. For instance, he may say “my total 
expenses on the farm last year for interest, taxes, 
insurance, and repairs on barns, cost of teams, 
labor, seed, etc., were $2,000, and my" total receipts 
were $2,500. They will probably be about the same 
this year. My corn cost me 35 cents a bushel,, 
wheat 75 cents, oats 25 cents, potatoes 40 cents, 
and hay $8 per ton. My cheese cost me 12 cents a 
lb., and butter 20 cents. If 1 farm as hitherto, the 
cost of these products will be about the same. But 
I made some bad calculations. My horses cost me 
$750 a year, and I find they were not all at work 
more than half the time. This year I will try and 
do better. Instead of letting, a team lie idle, I will, 
hire an extra man for $1.00 a day, and set him to 
give the wheat fallow an extra plowing, or the corn 
field an extra cultivating. Last year a man and 
team, on an average, reckoning everything, cost me 
$4 a day ; but this extra work will only cost me 
$1 per day, ‘because I have got to keep the team 
and tools anyhow,’ and if this extra plowing for 
wheat, costing say 75 cents an acre, should give me 
an increase of 3 bushels of wheat per acre, then 
this extra wheat will only cost me 25 cents a bushel, 
and the land will be in far better condition for 
clover and subsequent crops. And so, too, if I 
cultivate the corn an extra time, both ways, 
finishing 4 acres per day at a cost of 25 cents an 
acre, and I get an increase of 5 bushels per acre, 
then, after deducting 5 cents a bushel for husking 
and cribbing, this extra five bushels of com per 
acre will only cost me 10 cents a bushel, and the 
land will be cleaner, mellower, and in better con¬ 
dition for oats and wheat.” 
Taking this view of the matter, Mr. C. is right. 
And the same remarks will apply to every operation 
of the farm. But you must first deduct from the 
total receipts the total expenses of the farm—and 
then the extra crops produced by extra cultivation, 
or the extra yield of milk, wool, beef, or pork, ob-. 
tained from extra care and feed, can be charged 
merely what the extra labor or feed actually costs. 
I am not sure but what we could sometimes 
adopt the plan of planting corn after wheat to ad¬ 
vantage. It would enable us to clean the land. 
But I should not, on my farm, let the wheat stubble 
lie until spring before plowing. I would plow the 
land shallow immediately after harvest, and at in¬ 
tervals of a week or ten days harrow and cultivate 
it to reduce it to the finest tilth. This would cause 
the weed-seeds to germinate as soon as we had rain. 
The young plants could easily be killed by the cul¬ 
tivator, and the stirring of the soil would start 
more weeds. In November cross-plow six or eight 
inches deep, and let the land lie rough for the win¬ 
ter. The plowing in spring would bring the clean 
mellow soil again to the surface, and if the corn is 
thoroughly cultivated and the land is fall-plowed 
after the corn is harvested, we should have a field 
in admirable condition for sowing to barley and 
seeding down with clover. - 
We have just been killing our hogs. We weigh¬ 
ed each hog alive, and again the next morning, 
after dressing. The following are the live and dead 
weights, with the per cent of shrinkage : 
Live 
Weight. 
Lbs. 
Dressed 
Weight. 
Lbs. 
Actual 
Shrinkage. 
Lbs. 
Percentage , 
Shrinkage. 
No. 1. 
492 
424 
68 
13.8 
No. 2 . 
414 
352 
62 
14.9 
No. 3. 
407 
354 
53 
13.0 
No. 4. 
394 
331 
63 
15.9 
No. 5 . 
376 
322 
54 
14.3 
No. 6. 
382 
321 
61 
15.9 
No. 7. 
370 
314 
56 
15.1 
No. 8. 
36G 
313 
53 
14.4 
No. 9. 
345 
291 
54 
15.6 
No. 10. 
323 
275 
48 
14.8 
Average. 
387 
330 
57 
14.7 
In Lawes’ and Gilbert’s pig experiments the aver¬ 
age live weight of the 59 pigs was 212$ lbs., and the 
dressed weight 1761 lbs., or an average shrinkage 
of 17® per cent. 
I have killed hogs a great many years, but am 
ashamed to acknowledge that I never knew the 
proper temperature of the water for scalding, and 
I never met with the man that could tell me. The 
Deacon says he puts one pail of cold water to four 
pails of boiling water. If the water really boils, and 
if the water from the well was at a temperature, as 
