1893 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
5 
scientifically simple and the result is beatific and 
causes many a dimple to appear upon the face instead 
of a wrinkle, which time will not erase, but will very 
soon crinkle into an ugly scowl, and you’ll hear a howl 
from that owner of cows who to squeamishness bows 
and removes the “filthy mess” because he gives a guess 
that man is much wiser than Nature. 
Don’t dose your cows. Some men seem to think that 
when a cow is due to calve, she should be dosed with 
some kind of medicine so that she will “ clean ” all 
right and her “bag won’t cake.” I let my cows dose 
themselves, as Nature directs, by eating the placenta. 
Does any one suppose that the good Lord put that 
almost insane craving to eat the placenta into the cows 
for no good purpose ? I think it one of the greatest 
safeguards we have. If a cow won’t eat the placenta, 
there is something wrong with her. The only cow 
that I ever had that refused it died. 
For a case of garget, the first thing to do is to see 
that the cow’s bowels are all right; if she is consti¬ 
pated, there is danger of worse than garget—I mean 
in the just-calved cow. If her bowels are all right— 
and they ought to be if she has been rightly fed—then 
rub the udder with vaseline, lard or anything of that 
nature. The proper way to rub is not always under¬ 
stood : commence gently, very gently if the udder is 
very tender, and increase the pressure slowly. Don’t 
rub up and down or back and forth, but manipulate the 
udder with both hands the same as if it were a ball 
of putty you were trying to soften, and it is astonish¬ 
ing how much you can soften a hard udder if you go 
about it the right way. In severe cases, when sup¬ 
puration takes place, I don’t know what is best to be 
done, as I have never had such a case to practice on. 
A great many cow diseases are inherited—through 
the owner. He inherits lack of capacity to understand 
cow nature, and the cows are afflicted with many ills 
in consequence. But there is an improvement notice¬ 
able. Not many years ago you would see holes bored 
in the horns of a big percentage of the cows you saw ; 
now it is only the very old cows that bear the mark 
of the gimlet hollow-horn cure ; and the worm in the 
tail is becoming an entomological rarity. A. L. crosby. 
We have had very few cases of garget in our herd. 
We think the trouble may be caused by exposure, 
cold blows and injuries to the udder, and sometimes it 
arises from over-feeding before calving. A remedy 
that has proved successful with us is a mixture com¬ 
posed of two ounces of fluid extract of belladonna and 
four ounces of glycerine. Apply thoroughly three 
times a day, after milking, having first washed the 
affected part with hot water. A thorough rubbing is 
an essential part of the prescription. Strip the teat 
carefully. Sometimes during the course of treatment 
we give a laxative, namely, half a pound of Epsom 
salts in the morning and the same amount in the even¬ 
ing, each dissolved in half a pint of warm water, with 
a tablespoonful of ginger. miller * sibley. 
Lots of Garget In a Corn Field. 
Garget has not troubled my herd of Jerseys which 
have always been under my personal care and super¬ 
vision, kindly handled and moderately fed. I have 
never crowded them for a big record, nor had one of 
them “ off her feed.” I have had three cases of bloody 
milk caused by external injury to the udder from feed¬ 
ing amongst the bushes and stumps (I suppose) while 
they were kept in the woods pasture. Some inflamma¬ 
tion was present and more or less “stringy milk;” but 
by the use of a milking tube and gentle rubbing with 
vaseline after the udders had been emptied, a cure was 
effected in three or four days. When I kept grade 
Short-horns—of which our herd was composed before 
I tried the Jerseys—some trouble was caused with 
garget on account, I believe, of over-feeding or rather 
careless feeding. For instance, when a field of corn 
was husked it was customary to turn the cows into it 
to glean the nubbins and ears left lying on the ground 
by careless huskers, and to eat what they would of the 
standing stalks. No other food was thought necessary 
for the first 10 days when a dozen cows were given the 
range of a 40-acre field of stalks. An increased flow of 
milk always followed this change, invariably accom¬ 
panied by more or less garget, and this is still the case 
with the cows of some neighbors who continue this 
practice. I was never compelled to call a veterinarian 
in these cases, the use of a milking tube and rubbing 
with vaseline, keeping the patient in her stall on short 
rations until the inflammation disappeared being suf¬ 
ficient ; but care must be used for some time after, in 
feeding, as the trouble is liable to again appear on 
slight provocation. p. h. munroe. 
A Terrible Udder Disease. 
I am afraid I do not know what the disease is. I 
have read much about garget, and from what I have 
read I infer that it consists of caked udders and in¬ 
flamed teats, which cause lumpy or stringy milk. 
Whether there are other and more aggravated con¬ 
ditions, and what shape the disease may assume I am 
not able to state. I have often had in my herd cases 
of caked udders and inflamed teats, from which came 
lumpy milk for a few milkings, but this would usually 
correct itself without any special medical treatment. 
I have, however, h d two cases of some disease of 
the udder in my herd during the past summer that 
were the most terrible I have ever witnessed, and 
proved disastrous to the cows. 
The teat was first noticed hard and somewhat cold, 
the milk coming with much difficulty. The next milk¬ 
ing the whole quarter had become caked hard, the 
teat seemed more inflamed and harder, and had turned 
purple and felt quite cold—milk ceased to come, and a 
bloody watery substance came with great difficulty. 
The teat and quarter of udder became hard, and the 
entire quarter turned black and was as cold as though 
it were dead—and the whole case assumed this con¬ 
dition in thirty-six hours from the first symptoms. 
The cow seemed stiff and unwilling to move about for 
nearly a week and suffered the most intense agony, 
and the whole quarter rotted out of the udder and 
dropped on the ground in three weeks. Two of my 
finest cows were entirely ruined in this way the past 
summer. p. d. goss. 
R. N.-Y.—The cows evidently suffered from inflam¬ 
mation of the udder or simple mammitis. On page 255 
of the book on Cattle Disease, just issued by the De¬ 
partment of Agriculture, Dr. James Law describes 
just such a case as yours. By all means send to Wash¬ 
ington for the work which is sent free of charge. Dr. 
Law says that these gangrenous cases are probably 
always the result of infection. The disease is carried 
from one cow to another by the hands of milkers who 
first milk a diseased cow and then, without washing 
their hands, milk another. The first may get well while 
the other, through constipation or over-feeding, a sudden 
cold or injury, may have the disease so aggravated that 
it will destroy the udder as in your cases. As to treat¬ 
ment in the early part of the disease, Dr. Law says if 
the cow has a shivering fit, copious drinks of warm 
water and copious warm injections should be given at 
once. Apply heat to back and loins by applying bags 
of hot bran, sand or chaff, or rubbing with a hot flat 
iron. Give a pint of liquor or an ounce of ground 
ginger; after half an hour’s sweat rub dry and cover 
with a blanket. If the inflammation is more advanced 
give 1)4 pound of Epsom salts and one ounce ginger. 
Keep the udder well soaked and heated with hot 
water. After an hour or two of this, dry the udder 
and rub well with soap, leaving a soapy covering. If 
the pain is great add extract of belladonna and strong 
mercurial ointment to the soap. In serious cases, how¬ 
ever, we should call in a good veterinarian at once. 
In light cases where there is little or no fever, rubbing 
the udder with vaseline or camphorated ointment four 
times a day will usually cure if the milking is gently 
done—squeezing rather than pulling the teat. 
A New Mammoth Oat. 
E., Seneca Castle, N. Y. —What does The Rural 
know about the Mammoth White Cluster oat ? I was 
called upon a few days ago by an agent who said : 
“ Our firm is the only firm in the United States that 
has them.” 
Ans.— We do not know of the variety and would 
advise our friend to sow only a trial plot or none at 
all if a high price is asked for the seed. 
Ashes and Hen Manure. 
C. Af. B., Charlottevllle, Va. —Is it true that ashes 
and chicken manure lose their strength as fertilizers 
when kept together in barrels ? If so why do they 
not do so when mixed in the ground ? I wish to use 
fresh wood ashes on the floor of the chicken house, 
and in boxes for the hens to dust themselves, as loose 
dry earth is very hard to find here, especially in 
winter. 
Ans.— By mixing fresh wood ashes with hen manure 
you lose a large part of the ammonia in the latter. 
When plaster is used this ammonia will be retained as 
a sulphate, but with ashes the ammonia will escape as 
a gas. We would mix the ashes and hen manure in 
the ground for the very reason that we want the latter 
made available for the plants. Setting free ammonia 
in the soil where the plant roots are is a very different 
matter from setting it free in the open air. Sifted 
coal ashes are much better to mix with the hen manure, 
but plaster is best of all. Fresh wood ashes are about 
the worst you can find for a dust bath for hens. They 
will make the hens’ feet sore and take all the polish 
from their feathers—leaving them faded and dingy. 
Use coal ashes or take pains to dry out some sand or 
dust. 
How Much Potash With Bone? 
J. T. 1., Buffalo, N. Y. —How much muriate of pot¬ 
ash should I use with ground bone for a complete 
fertilizer, or won’t unleached ashes at $12 per ton be 
cheaper? 
Ans. —Potash as muriate is worth about four cents a 
pound. It contains about 80 per cent of muriate of 
potash equivalent to 50 per cent of actual potash. 
It contains also about 15 per cent of common salt, 
the value of which is scarcely worth considering. 
The quantity to use must depend upon whether your 
land needs potash more or less. In the absence of 
such information or what crop you propose to raise 
we would suggest that you use 200 pounds of muriate 
to 800 pounds of bone flour. We can not say whether 
the wood ashes at $12 per ton would be cheaper or 
dearer, since no analysis is given. The muriate would 
be worth $40 a ton. If the ashes contain five per cent 
of potash at say five cents per pound (the price of sul¬ 
phate), it would be worth $5 a ton. To this we may 
add 1 14 per cent phosphoric acid at eight cents a 
pound, equaling $2.40 a ton. The lime would be worth 
about $2; total $9.40. This is for unleached ashes of 
average quality. We would, therefore, choose the 
muriate of potash and bone. 
Getting: Water to the Barn. 
J. J. M., Yorktown Heights, N. Y .—How shall I get 
water to my barn situated about 300 feet from, and 40 
or 50 feet above a flowing stream with not much fall— 
say one foot in a hundred. I have a cistern, but not 
enough water for my stock. The soil is, I think, sandy. 
Shall I dig a well ? 
Ans.—U nder ordinary conditions a windmill would 
be the easiest and cheapest means of procuring the 
desired water supply. The cost would not be more 
than $100, using the Well’s rustless iron pipe and one 
of the common windmills of the smallest size, or of 
one-tenth horse power. This would force about 15 
gallons a minute through a three-quarter inch pipe by 
an ordinary force pump. The small fall in the stream 
precludes the use of a hydraulic ram which is the 
cheapest and most convenient method of raising water 
when a head of six or seven feet in a hundred or less 
can be used. In this case as a provision to meet 
times when the wind might fail, the cistern should be 
connected with the pipe so as to afford a supply if 
needed. The pipe may connect with the cistern and 
be turned off by a cock when this is filled, and the 
flow then run into a trough. The convenience of a 
constant supply of water is cheaply purchased at this 
small cost. h. stewart. 
MISCELLANEOUS. 
Ridge for Sweet Potatoes. —T. S. Loveland, Ohio.— 
The Rural’s trench system would not do so well 
for sweet potatoes as the ridge method of growing 
them. 
E. H. M ., Stony Point, N. Y .—No; Pecan nuts and 
hard-shelled almonds cannot be successfully grown in 
Rockland County, N. Y. They are not quite hardy 
enough. 
The Fitzwater Pear .—F. N. G., Baldwinsville, N. Y. 
—We have young trees of the Fitzwater pear growing 
at the Rural Grounds. We know nothing of it from 
experience. It is much like the Lawrence, but not the 
same. We cannot advise our friend further. 
Tobacco Stems. —J. A. N., Edgemont, Md.— A ton of 
tobacco stems of fair quality should contain \% per 
cent nitrogen, eight per cent potash and one-half of 
one per cent phosphoric acid. The potash and phos¬ 
phoric acid are about as soluble as those in stable 
manure. 
II. Marsh, Monte Vesta, Col. —Can the Rosa rugosa 
hybrids be propagated from cuttings ? We do not know 
as yet. Different methods are being tried. It may be 
said that as a rule our Rugosa hybrids strike roots 
with difficulty and budding is employed. They are 
not yet for sale. 
Immigrant Bureaus —M. H. H., Doylestown, Ohio.— 
There is no immigrant station for any nationality 
separate from any other, but there is a “ Swedish Im¬ 
migrant Home ” at 14 Greenwich street, with which 
you can communicate, stating what you want and 
giving references. 
Unfermented Wine. — F. M. M., Halsey, Oregon.—To 
keep wine from fermenting, as soon as the juice is 
squeezed from the grapes, heat it to boiling, and seal 
it up air-tight, either in fruit jars or in bottles with 
sealed corks. This is the whole thing in a nutshell. 
Some like sugar added, but this increases the tendency 
to fermentation. 
Strawberries. —F. E. M., Pocomoke City, Md.—We 
have been pleased with the behavior of these new 
strawberries in our trials : Shuster, Gen. Putnam, 
Beder Wood, Southard, Clark’s Early, Wentzell, Farns¬ 
worth, Iowa Beauty, Wolverton. Of M. Crawford, 
Cuyahoga Falls, O.; Hale Bros , South Glastonbury t 
Conn.; J. T. Lovett, Little Silver, N. J. 
Alfalfa. —L. S. T., Abilene, Kans.—Alfalfa should 
be sown about the middle of April in your section— 
not less than 20 pounds to the acre. It should be har¬ 
rowed in lightly and rolled, if possible. It is better 
to sow it by itself rather than with any grain crop 
although it can be sown in spring wheat like Red 
clover, and should be treated to a great extent in the 
same way as the latter, 
