i89i 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
831 
to lrcrpa.ee the vital vigor of the wood that remains. 
That Is the reason for cnttlng out and keeping out all 
suckers. They devitalize the larger limbs. 
Late Strawberry Planting.— Did you ever plant 
strawberries as late as November? Well, I have just 
transferred some fine plants and immediately covered 
them with leaves and fastened them in place with poles; 
and I am confident they will be in admirable condition to 
make a quick spring start. I would not do this with 
plants that must be shipped; but with plants taken 
directly from home beds it will work well. E. p. p. 
“ Deadening ” Timber.— I am not certain if those who 
adversely criticise the practice of “deadening out” tim¬ 
ber understand the subject in all its bearings. South 
of the Ohio River, if wood land is cleared any time between 
April and September, and the sun 
is thereby let suddenly on to a sur¬ 
face before shaded and cold, the life 
of the land is forfeited for two or 
three years thereafter. Cnttlng ont 
a portion of the growth and leaving 
another portion standing, arrests In ^gji 
a measure the evaporation of nitro¬ 
gen. and the new land retains most. 
of its original fertility. Fnrther, in 
the cotton belt certain cool-climate N! 
crops, like Trish potatoes, with 
Live Stock Matters . 
the erroneous conclusion. The 
writer has tested this matter of 
^t**^** Improving the richness of milk bv 
— feeding, upon a large number of 
cows, and although some will im- 
prove more rapidly than others, yet 
he never had a cow that by persistent 
feeding of six months was not de¬ 
cidedly improved by the quality of 
Barefooted Horses. — In The 
Rural New-Yorker for November 
7, page 785, I notice the inqniry of 
T. H. ,T. of Charles River Village 
Mass., about working horses with¬ 
out shoeing them. He asks: “ Are 
there any farmers who do not shoe 
their horses at all, and with what 
results?” I am a farmer, and have 
followed the business solely for 60 
years for myself and, besides, my 
boyhood days were mostly spent on the farm before I 
began to work for myself, and having had some experi¬ 
ence in working horses unshod, I here give some of it. 
The soil of my farm is gravelly with some small stones 
and the roads are sharp and somewhat stony, and there are 
some cobble stone pavements in town, all of which the farm 
team must travel over in the course of farm business. Of 
a good many horses, mostly of my own breeding, which I 
have used, only three could stand the wear of the hoofs 
without being shod; one was a Hambletonian which I think 
never need to have been shod to protect his hoofs ; they 
seemed as hard as iron, and I never knew him to flinch on 
any road or pavement; but no horse can stand and draw a 
load as well unshod as well shod, especially on slippery 
places. I have now a four year-old colt that has worked 
on the farm the entire season harrowing, cultivating, 
mowing, or on the road; in fact, he has done full duty be¬ 
side his mate which was shod. He is a good Percheron ; 
the other one mentioned was a descendant of George M. 
Patchen and the dam of the Hambletonian,and the Patcben 
horse was a Morgan mare, a descendant of Black Hawk. 
From my experience with the soil of my farm, and the 
roads in this vicinity, I judge that not every horse has 
hoofs hard and tough enough to do unshod the farm and 
road work required of farm teams. I have had colts that 
had to be shod to do even farm work. Unshod they 
would get so tender-footed that it would have been cruelty 
to work them. I do not think any rule that would be 
suitable in all cases of this 
kind can be formulated. 
--—-- If a colt’s feet are brittle 
and tender he must be 
shod; if they are tough 
and hard and will stand 
the wear without any ten¬ 
derness he may work un- 
shod. The only safe way 
is for each farmer to test 
■, the case for himself on the 
farm and roads over which 
his team is required to 
; yjk , work, and then act as his 
y jR k,* own judgment shall dic- 
f**£*^, fate ln deciding whether 
ij^|jlprflff l fi*rYir l> ' his team shall be shod or 
' work unshod, j. TALCOTT. 
Oneida County, N. Y. 
other common vegetables, together 
with wheat and oats, succeed better 
in the half shade than in the full sun, 
and the deadened timber furnishes 
shade without, as in the case of live jffi 
trees, absorbing moisture and fertil¬ 
ity from the land. In regard to grow- rasjjjS PgKMflBIH 
ing crops in the shade, in hot cli¬ 
mates the coffee tree is protected by 
large trees shading' 1 it,'and [even in 
Florida the most fruitful groves, 
like the celebrated one on' Orange Lake, have gigantic 
forest trees partially overshadowing them. B. F. JOHNSON. 
Substitutes for Fences.—I n older communities, es¬ 
pecially in suburban towns, which are quite a feature of all 
our large centers of population, the fences should go, and 
go at once. In some sections, possibly in localities where 
either the law or its enforcement is not a sufficient protec¬ 
tion against the encroachments from animals, etc,, 
from the public roads, there is quite sufficient reason 
for protection of some kind, as also for dividing lines 
between farms or subdivisions of large tracts; but the 
hideous, unsightly constructions so frequently seen 
aloDg the public roadways everywhere, especially in vil¬ 
lages and smaller cities where they are of no earthly nse 
or object, should be abolished, and the public taste be edu¬ 
cated to appreciate their banishment, like the removal of 
any other worse than needless thing of the past. With a 
proper arrangement of hardy material (not necessarily a 
formal hedge), all the divisional lines between residences 
or different properties can be easily and inexpensively es¬ 
tablished. And as to the proverbial “ front fence,” the 
sooner that nuisance is cleared out of the way and out of 
sight, the better. 
In the matter of something “ decorative and ornamental ” 
to take the place of the objectionable fence, that of course 
depends very largely upon the taste of the individual and 
his immediate environment. As a rule, I think stiff, 
formal hedges should be avoided. Where permissible 
nothing is more effective 
than the Japan Quince 
and, next in order and Wjjhf ' -- 
point of desirability, I 
should place the California KM 
Privet, or the corrmon 
privet Alt! mas and lilacs 
may also be used in some | §K jf 
sections, but the former 
are not always hardy in <r 
all localities, and the latter » ** 
their growth and habit. fljte 
Of evergreens, where a 3 k ^ 
screen or large growing 'ffs 
hedge is desired, the Nor- L • . 
way Spruce is altogether 
preferable, although the 
hemlock is more graceful 
in localities where it is not 
likely to be killed in win- 
ter. The Osage Orange 
Bov 
MEAT OF BOY. A "Beef-Type” Hereford 
DISHORNING CATTLE. 
and Honey Locust grow 
so coarse that they are 
better adapted for fences or 
divisions on farm lands where It Is requisite or necessary to 
form divisional lines. In villages and whore houses are more 
frequent, nothing is more effective than a suitable selec¬ 
tion of the inexpensive, hardy shrubs and herbaceous 
plants arranged in a border. Such a border need not be of 
a uniform width or more then a few feet at the widest 
point; but with a simple, natural arrangement of the 
many different hardy varieties suitable for this purpose, a 
very agreeable effect can be obtained and one full of Inter¬ 
est during the entire season. F. w. kelsey. 
New York. _ 
Stock Warning Signs.— Some curious sentences some¬ 
times get into the signs put up to warn off unruly stock. 
Here is one from Connecticut: “ By notice elsewhere it 
will be seen that any person owning a dog in the town are 
notified that they must be properly muzzled.” Here is 
another from Georgia: “ If any man’s or woman’s cow or 
bull gits in this yere pa&tur, bis or her tail will he cut off, 
as.tbe.case may be,” 
MEAT OF MILTON. A ‘\M Ilk-Type:”lHereford. 
tells me that he feeds the pomace to his hogs with good 
results and that he will store away enough of it to last for 
a considerable time. Another cider manufacturer claims 
that the pomace retains most of the sugar and is a valu¬ 
able food stuff for cattle. It is dried, pulverized and ground 
in a mill and some other feed stuff is added, and then the 
whole is fed to cattle in winter. s. R, F. 
Kutztown, Pa. 
Feeding Quality Into Milk.— Prof. E. W. Stewart in 
the Country Gentleman adds this testimony to the feeding 
for fat question : “Some 25 years since I purchased a young 
scrub cow of apparently good form, that gave a small 
quantity of very common milk. The first season, when 
fresh, she gave only 20 pounds of milk per day that re¬ 
quired 28 pounds to make a pound of butter. During her 
first season 20 pounds per day was her highest limit. 
During the following winter she was fed for the purpose 
of developing her milking capacity and the quality of her 
milk. After calving the next season, she gave 30 pounds 
of mil£ per day, 22 of which made a pound of butter, 
1 Judge[,T. C. Jones Is too 
sensible to repeat the 
cruelty argument against 
dishorning cattle. He knows that removing the horns 
is not a more cruel operation than castration, or spay¬ 
ing, which mankind believe they have a right to per¬ 
form on the animals over which the Creator gave 
them “dominion.” In a late Rural he opposes the 
practice because he thinks it mars the animal’s beauty. 
Considerations of utility and safety should always go be¬ 
fore those for beauty ; but beauty Itself is in a great 
measure a matter of fashion, taste or education of the eye. 
In China the perfection of a lady’s beauty consists in a 
small foot, in England in a small hand, and in America, 
(too often in a small waist, In the South Sea Islands in a 
tattooed face, black teeth, and a ring in the nose. Speak¬ 
ing of the horns of cattle the judge says: “These orna¬ 
mental appendages of nature seem essential to perfection 
in the head, which is the most Important characteristic 
feature in high-bred animals.” There seems to be a differ¬ 
ence of opinion about that. Mr. McCombie of Tillyfour, 
Scotland, who exhibited a beautiful group of “dcddies” 
or Aberdepn-Angua or hoxplesB cattle at the great ipter- 
