488 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ November 12, 1885. 
Surely common sense should tell us that every calf, ■whether 
healthy or sickly, strong or delicate, requires three or four 
meals daily. The reason given for keeping calf and cow 
apart is to save the milk, and it is easily understood how 
valuable the rich milk of a Jersey or Guernsey cow is. If it 
must be had for the dairy, then why not let the calf be taken 
altogether away from it, and let it have a foster mother ? 
One of the most pleasant and instructive sights we have met 
with of late was that of two fine polled Suffolk cows, each 
with a pair of calves constantly with them, cows and calves 
all being m high condition. This is an admirable method 
of rearing calves for the dairy herd. 
Upon most large home farms two distinct herds of cows 
are now kept—the dairy herd and the stock herd. For the 
latter purpose we select either pure-bred Sussex, polled 
Suffolks, Herefords, Devons, or Shorthorns—big square-built 
yet compact fleshy animals that ripen early for the butcher. 
In this herd there are no milk pails, no dairy, the calves 
always running with the cows and sucking till the cows are 
dried for the next calving. In Mr. Henry Evershed’s valu¬ 
able little work on “ The Early Maturity of Live Stock ” we 
are told how this treatment “ Made a grand job of the calves. 
At the age of eleven or twelve months they were not only 
big stocks, but very fat—not veal, but the firmest of beef. 
The calves shared with their dams the summer keep of good 
grass and the winter fare of meadow hay, roots, straw, cake, and 
grain. To make way for the newly dropped calves the year¬ 
lings were sold to the butcher at from £20 to £24 a head, 
representing nearly £2 per head per month’s keep.” The 
articles of diet enumerated as winter fare are by no means 
despicable. We would give some of the fodder as chaff, 
adding to it a moderate quantity of crushed linseed and lin¬ 
seed meal at the rate of 1 lb. to a gallon of water and boiled 
to a jelly. This mixture is wholesome both for cows and 
calves. It tends to check any tendency to scouring in calves, 
and it is also fattening. The home ground or crushed lin¬ 
seed contains 17 per cent, of digestible albuminoids 
and 32 per cent, of fat, while the linseed meal of 
commerce from which the oil has been extracted contains 
28 per cent, of digestible albuminoids and only 2 per cent, 
of fats, for which reason it is considered preferable for young 
animals. Oilcake should be selected with care, and always 
subject to analysis, quite two thirds of cake in the market 
being adulterated. Very hard dry cake may be genuine, but 
it is indigestible unless it is ground, crushing in the ordinary 
way being insufficient, We can strongly recommend Water¬ 
loo round cake as genuine cake, and quite the best we have 
tried. Small quantities of cake may be tested at home in 
this way—Grate a piece of cake with a kitchen grater, which 
leaves bran and extraneous seed unaltered ; or mix half an 
ounce of cake with 5 ozs. of water. If good it forms a stiff 
jelly, agreeable to smell and taste; if bad, it has a disagree¬ 
able odour, and it contains a large mixture of seeds of Oom- 
melina sativa, which are much too acrid for cattle. If bran 
and sand have been mixed with the crushed linseed the water 
test will set free both, the bran floating upon the surface and 
the sand sinking to the bottom. 
Under the present strained conditions of farming a large 
outlay on oilcake is a questionable step. We ought certainly 
to turn home-grown corn to account for the stock herd, and 
by judicious mixing impart a wholesome variety to the food. 
Far better is it to do this than to sell the corn at a loss and 
buy cake also at a loss. Rather avoid cake ; use mixed corn 
and linseed jelly mixed with chaff. But beware of pressing 
on young stock too fast; there is a safe mean at which we 
ought to aim. Setons in the dewlap, a rather large propor¬ 
tion of roots and Cabbage in the mixed diet, are our safe¬ 
guards, and our use of such cool, wholesome, juicy foods 
must be persistent if we would not run the risk of a heavy 
loss of our young best stock. Where silage can be had it 
ought certainly to enter largely into the mixed diet of our 
stock herd, for here we have no trouble about flavour of 
milk; rather do we aim at the promotion of a full strong 
flow that is quite certain to prove nourishing for the calves. 
Certainly, if any profit is now to be derived from rearing 
and fattening live stock it must be done in the manner we 
indicate. There must be both quick lusty growth and quick 
returns for our expenditure. 
(To be continued.) 
WORK ON THE HOME FARM. 
The pulling, cleaning, and storage of root crop? is being done as 
briskly as weather admits, so much rain having fallen recently a9 to 
hinder work in the open fields, and to quite stop carting on heavy land. 
Swedes will now be cleared off most of the fields and put in heaps at con¬ 
venient points easy of access, if possible near a gate or alongside a hard 
road. We intend holding part of our stock of Swedes in reserve for the 
breeding flock, and as the roots will not be required for that purpose till 
March we decided to take them off the land both to preserve the roots 
and to clear the way for ploughing. Hoggets will be folded upon 
Turnips ; but this must be done with judgment, and not by line and 
rule. We find our habit of driving out to inspect off farms when conve¬ 
nient, without paying much heed to the weather, proves useful in many 
ways. A few days ago we did so on a wet day, and upon going out with 
the bailiff to the old sheep being fattened for market we found them in a 
fold upon Turnips, standing about in a mud puddle almost over our boot 
tops. We at once helped to drive those sheep into a spare yard with 
plenty of open sheds, and orders were given for the sheep to be put in 
the yard or out in the fold or upon grass, according to the state of the 
weather. All this involves more work, hut it is quite worth while, even 
from a money-making point of view ; and we cannot too often repeat 
that exposure to cold and wet makes demands upon the health and con¬ 
dition of animals which can only be met by the consumption of an extra 
quantity of food. The storing of Cabbages in winter is a matter of con¬ 
siderable importance, which, if successful, enables us to keep cattle in 
yards supplied with this wholesome article of diet till the Thousand¬ 
headed Kale is ready. In a recent number of the Agricultural Gazette 
we saw the following simple and what was termed successful plan of 
doing this :—“ Throw up a sort of land or ridge with the plough, and 
make it pretty level on top. Upon this land lay some straw, then take 
the Cabbages, turn them upside down, and, after taking off all decayed 
leaves, place them about six abreast upon the straw ; then cover them, 
not very thickly, with straw or leaves raked up in the woods, throwing 
here and there a spadeful of earth on the top to keep the covering from 
being blown off by the wind. Only put on enough of straw or leaves to 
hide all the green, leaving the Cabbage roots sticking up through it. 
“ Stored in this way Cabbages of all sorts will be found to keep per¬ 
fectly good and fresh until April and May, or even later. Not only do 
the Cabbages keep better in this than in any other way, but they are at 
all times ready for use. They are never locked up by frost, as often 
happens with those pitted in the earth ; and they are never found rotting, 
as is often the case with those which are laid with heads upwards and 
their roots in the ground. Savoys, which are at once the best in quality 
to keep of all winter Cabbages, may be stored in the same way.” 
The Cost op Burning Ballast. —My statement that it costs a 
shilling a yard to burn ballast was made on the hypothesis that draining 
operations were going on, in which case the clay would be provided ready 
dug as a matter of necessity by the drainers. Most working men are very 
wasteful and ignorant ; they use thrice as much coal as there is any 
necessity for. With proper management a ton of small coal will burn at 
least ten yards of ballast. A working man will want two tons, but in 
this case the eye of the master will be worth the other ton. I shall be 
glad to give further information on this subject in answer to any inquiries 
that may be addressed to the Editor.—W. M. 
METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
Camden Square, London. 
Lat. 51° 32'40" N.; Long. 0° 8' 0” W.; Altitude, 111 feet. 
DATE. 
a a.m. 
IN THE DAY. 
3 
cS 
(4 
1885. 
November. 
Barome¬ 
ter at 328 
and Sea 
Level 
Hygrome¬ 
ter. 
Direction 
of Wind. 
| Temp, of 
1 Soil at 
1 1 foot. 
Shade Tem¬ 
perature. 
Radiation 
Temperature. 
Dry. 
Wet. 
Max. 
Min 
In 
sun. 
On 
grass 
Inches. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
d«*B 
detr. 
deg. 
In. 
Sunday . 1 
29.894 
43.0 
40.8 
N. 
44.4 
50 1 
39.8 
82.8 
35.8 
— 
Monday.2 
30.163 
44.7 
43.6 
E. 
43.8 
54.2 
37.3 
74.7 
2 .8 
0.092 
Tuesday.3 
80.089 
50.3 
48.6 
S. 
44 9 
52 7 
44.3 
55.2 
39.8 
0.220 
Wednesday .. 4 
29.865 
52.3 
51.5 
S. 
46.6 
52.8 
49.7 
53.8 
48.4 
0.21ft 
Thursday .... 5 
29.68G 
45.3 
43.2 
s. 
46.2 
47.7 
39.2 
65 2 
31.6 
0.047 
Friday.6 
30.221 
37.9 
36.2 
E. 
44.2 
49.2 
31 3 
66.4 
24.5 
— 
Saturday .... 7 
30.378 
44.8 
43.7 
S.W. 
43.8 
50.8 
37.5 
53.2 
32.4 
— 
30.042 
45.5 
43.9 
44.8 
51.1 
S9.9 
64.4 
34.3 
6.577 
REMARKS. 
1st.— Very fine day ; misty evening. 
2nd.—Fine bright day. 
3rd.—Hull morning; wet afternoon ; fair night. 
4th.—Continuous rain till 4 P.M., then cleared up, cloirdless night. 
5th.—Fine till lu.30 AM., then showery till 1 P.M.; line and bright after. 
6th.—Fine bright day ; hazy evening. 
7th.—Thick morning and cloudy day. 
A rather changeable week, but on the whole of about the average temneratur 
G. J. STMONS. 
