1893 
243 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
cabbage the year before was covered with the hen 
house sweepings which contained ichaff, coal ashes, 
road dust and the droppings of the hens. These were 
well worked into the soil before the onions were set. 
Some weighed 1% pound and from a 15-cent package 
of Prizetakers I grew four bushels of superb onions. 
I take American Gardening and cannot under¬ 
stand why all farmers do not. Its suggestions are 
valuable.” 
The specimens shown by Mr. Harris were beautiful, 
and the railroad man put the farmers to rout. c. e. c. 
SHORT AGRICULTURAL COURSE AT CORNELL. 
The R. N.-Y. is very glad to receive a letter like the 
following. We have done our best to help inaugurate 
this short winter agricultural course and it gives us 
pleasure to feel that we have been of some service: 
“ I am attending the short course in agriculture here 
at Cornell, the announcement of which I first saw in 
the columns of The Rural. This is indeed a wonder¬ 
ful chance for young farmers to get an education 
directly in the line of their business, and I hope 
another winter will find a much larger number here. 
Cayuga County, N. Y. rotden e. paul.” 
Pioneers in the Short Course. 
It may be of interest to readers of The Rural New- 
Yorker to see the names of those attending the short 
course in agriculture at Cornell University. Ten 
in the list are post-graduates, and of course the 
faculty are justly proud of it, as the per cent of 
post-graduate students in a course is an indication 
of its value and the quality of the instruction. 
I am informed that the percentage of post-gra¬ 
duates in the agricultural course is next to the 
largest if not the largest in any department in 
the University : 109 students are registered in all 
the agricultural courses, showing that agriculture 
is attracting some attention and that all the boys 
have not given up the farm, and why should 
they, for doesn’t the farm call for the best of our 
sons ? Once it seemed as if any one could be a farmer, 
and by some the same notion is entertained at the 
present time; but let Tom, Dick and Harry try, and 
they will find out that a little scientific knowledge 
comes very handy. I often think that the low prices 
of farm produce are among the greatest blessings that 
have ever befallen the American people; for their con¬ 
dition in spite of them shows the world what they are 
made of. Never has a call for anything been made on 
them but that an ever-ready Yankee “got there,” and 
I feel sure that they will solve this agricultural prob¬ 
lem by giving their sons and daughters that knowl¬ 
edge that will help them to overcome every difficulty 
as soon as it presents itself. Cayuga County was the 
first to apply for instruction under the short course in 
agriculture, and she has sent a larger number than 
any other in the Empire State, and she should send 
twice as many more, and I am sure more would have 
come if we old boys could be spared from the farm; 
but hereafter we'll do the chores and mind the dairy 
while the boys get the instruction and bring it home. 
Now just one word to the fathers : Give the boys a 
chance to use the knowledge they have obtained, and 
perhaps they may brush the cobwebs out of the old 
people s eyes. I am advised that every professor who 
has a class in the short course is exerting himself to 
the utmost to make it a success ; and it will be a suc¬ 
cess, for is not Prof. Roberts at its head, and is not his 
motto “Never fail?” Where there’s a will there’s a way. 
Cayuga County, N. Y. B 
R. N.-Y.—Here are the names of those in the first 
class. They will be marked men in after years when 
the class numbers 500 instead of 50. 
SHORT COURSE. 
NAME. COUNTY. 
Baird, J. C....Wayne 
Baker, L. A................. Cayuga 
Barger, W. J.Schoharie 
Blakeman, W. S.Wayne 
Bloomlngaale, J M.... Rensselaer 
Bugbee, W.Niagara 
Bull, H..Orange 
Bush, H. C.Cayuga 
Cole, B. J..Erie 
Cooper, H. M.Steuben 
Corwin, E. C...Cayuga 
Devendorf, W. E.Onondaga 
Foulks, C. J.Dutchess 
Glddlngs, F. N.Onondaga 
Hall, W. J.Niagara 
Hopkins, W. F.Niagara 
Hungerford, S.Tompkins 
Hutton, F. A.Washington 
k.Niagara 
McClure, J. H.Pennsylvania 
McEwen, E. C.St. Lawrence 
McLallen, H. C.Tompkins 
McNamara, J. J.Ontario 
Moore, C. H.Broome 
Myers, M. 8.Schoharie 
Palmer, S.Canada 
Paul, R. E.Cayuga 
NAME. COUNTY. 
Perry, C. E.8t. Lawrence 
I ettys, J. 8.Washington 
A ' ®.Delaware 
Richardson, W. D. 
Fredericksburg, Va 
Rowland, E. R.Cayuga 
Rowland, J. B.......,., Uavuira 
Smith, C. E.Saratoga 
Spurr, C. J.Chenango 
SchuBter, J. J — Egg Harbor, N. J 
Shephard, L. M.Onondaga 
Wager, W. J .Cayuga 
Welch, M. W.Wayne 
Q.Westchester 
Wright, C. W.Broome 
Wyman, C. W. 
Manchester Center, Vt 
Nichols, Wm.Sullivan 
Truman, G. S.Tioga 
Wood, J. J. .Steuben 
Burns, F.F .Kings 
Hatch, F.Tompkins 
Dewey, C. W.Monroe 
SPECIAL. 
March, Allen.Pennsylvania 
Henry, L. H .Ontario 
Notes on the Short Course. 
The following- extracts from a personal letter from 
a New York State farmer may be interesting: 
“ In the Cornell dairy some of the students were re¬ 
ceiving instructions in churning and the use of the 
Babcock tester, showing that they were being taught 
from actual experience. Sheep feeding was explained 
by„Prof. Watson, but little of novel value could be 
said, as sufficient data had not been accumulated, but 
the subject will be explained more at large on future 
occasions. Prof. Rice was caponizing a young cock¬ 
erel in the way of instructing some of his class. After 
he had performed the operation, one of the students 
was given a chance to do likewise. The cows were 
found in the covered barnyard, where they were out 
for water and exercise. I could not examine them 
very closely, for I did not have my rubber boots on. 
It was thought by most of the visitors that more ab¬ 
sorbents could be profitably used here for the comfort 
of the cows as well as for that of the sight-seers. The 
former were all dishorned and ran together like a lot 
of sheep, showing the advisability of the process 
where a large number of animals occupy small quarters. 
The horses of the station were being looked over by 
the agricultural students, who had to take notes of 
each animal, preparatory to a sham auction at which 
they were to bid on them, and records of the highest 
bid and the man who made it were kept to be com¬ 
pared with the judgment of some experts who had 
passed upon the merits and price of each animal. 
This was thought to be the best way of instructing 
the students as to how to j-udge a horse, by Prof. 
Roberts, who acted as auctioneer. 
“ All the students questioned spoke in the highest 
terms of the ‘ short course in agriculture,’ some say¬ 
ing they wished they could take a two years’ course, 
Improved Caponizing Canula. Fig. 96. 
while almost every one said, ‘ I want to come back 
next winter,’ and it is hoped that every one who has 
attended the course the past winter will have an 
opportunity to improve on what he has already 
learned. Give the boy a chance, for, ‘ as the twig is 
bent the tree is inclined.’ ” 
CAPONIZING, HUMANE vs. CRUEL. 
It was with much interest that I noted the article 
in The Rural New-Yorker of March 11, entitled 
“French Caponizing With Fingers.” That such a 
method is still in vogue proves conclusively that there 
are some operators who have yet to learn the lesson 
of common humanity. If the operator were to work 
on a horse, bull or pig, I would not wonder at the free 
introduction and use of the fingers, but when this 
method is persisted in and the frail structure of a 
cockerel two or three months old is wrecked by the 
introduction of large and clumsy fingers, humanity 
calls a halt—and justly so. Why subject the bird to 
such unnecessarily cruel treatment—treatment that 
not one shade of an excuse can justify ? In the earlier 
centuries of the Christian era when “ good fat capon 
lined” the inner-man to such a gratifying degree, and 
when in the old countries this inestimable bird was 
included in the renting of estates as an important 
factor, the fingers were the only known instruments 
in caponizing, together with any edged tool wherewith 
an incision could be made. If one capon resulted 
from 10 operations the operator was content. The 
“failures” graced the tables of the servants while the 
noble capon was fattened as higher fare. 
In later years caponizing has become a business con¬ 
ducted on business principles and as a source of great 
revenue. The method now used simplifies the opera¬ 
tion, makes it almost painless for the bird, and, (a 
preeminently important point) guards against all 
danger from “ slips.” The location of the testicles, 
together with their very close connection with one of 
the principal arteries of the bird, demands the utmost 
care in their extraction : 1. The least rupture kills 
the bird. 2. Any small particle of the testicle remain- 
ing in the bird causes that organ to grow again, mak¬ 
ing a “ slip’” rendering the bird useless as to the object 
desired, and his latter state is worse than the first. 
It is not necessary to pluck the bird; the removal 
of a few feathers from the upper part of the last two 
ribs and just in front of the thigh joint is all the pluck¬ 
ing required. The incision (one inch long) is made 
between these two ribs while drawing'the skin tightly. 
After the operation, the skin slips back to its place, 
the wound heals naturally, and no sewing is required. 
The bird is its own surgeon and an able one. While 
the spreaders are holding the cut open, the canula, 
Jig. 96 (with its loop of fine steel wire), is inserted, the 
testicle is inclosed within the loop, the wire drawn 
up tightly from the threading end. and the testicles 
thus brought away wholly, securely and almost pain¬ 
lessly. 
In this way the operator has a full view of the bird’s 
interior, and every point is before his eye, thus ren¬ 
dering the operation successful in every respect. What 
a contrast to cutting open the bird’s belly, and then 
going on a “ blind hunt ” armed with a forefinger to at¬ 
tack one of the most delicate organs of the fowl. There 
is but one commendable point in the latter method : it 
has been given a foreign title. geo. p. pilling. 
[Hyary query must be acoompanled by the name and address of the 
writer to Insure attention. Before asking a question please see If It Is 
not answered In our advertlslntt columns. Ask only a few questions 
at one time. Put questions on a separate piece of paper.] 
A SHEEP TALK. 
FEEDING CROPS TO THE WOOLY MIDDLEMAN. 
O. H. jU., Yellow Creek, Pa .—Can I keep sheep with 
profit by buying late in the fall and feeding corn 
fodder, hay, straw and corn and selling directly after 
shearing ; if so, what breed should I keep and how 
should I proceed ? I have no pasture. My main object 
would be to feed on the farm the roughage and grain 
feed raised there. 
Ans. —It will hardly pay a man to go into the winter 
feeding of sheep for a single year. It may, and it 
may not. Some years it will. The trouble with 
itinerant feeding is that it costs considerably to 
fit up one’s folds and then there are years when, 
even with the best of care in buying and selling 
and the skill in even feeding, one will scarcely 
more than get out whole, having only the manure 
for pay for labor and profit in the operation. But 
any man who will go into the business to stay, 
and who will properly fit up his quarters and put 
in the right kinds of stock, provide the proper foods 
and give adequate care, will make a good profit 
and will find his farm very rapidly improving. On 
the above conditions hang the law and the “ profits .” 
“ Corn fodder, hay, straw and corn ” are hardly 
proper foods to insure the best returns. More 
emphatically would this be the case if the hay 
was Timothy hay and late cut at that. With the above 
foods it would not be safe to keep the stock until 
shearing time; fed only on dry foods 90 days is the 
outside limit of safety in feeding sheep. And again, 
all the foods named are highly carbonaceous and fed 
most lavishly would only enable the sheep to put on 
fat—making it imperative that old, full-grown sheep 
should be put in to fatten, and with these a gain of 
not more than from 12 to 18 pounds could be expected. 
It is very commendable to feed “ the fodder and grain 
feed raised on the farm,” but no farmer should be 
afraid to purchase food from off the farm, if the right 
kinds only are bought and they be fed to the right 
kinds of stock and so as to make the gain of stock pay 
for them. 
The course I would recommeDd to the inquirer and 
others situated as he is would be to fit up sheep folds 
warm so that the temperature shall never fall below 
40 degrees in the coldest nights. He should make them 
so by using paper or extra boarding or by stone walls 
or any other means he should only make them warm ; 
he should provide plenty of pure water in the pens 
where the sheep can have access to it always. Then 
late in fall let him put in the lambs of the previous 
spring, weighing from 50 to 70 pounds. The smaller 
the better if only healthy and not stunted. Let him 
feed them liberally, commencing of course, with a 
very moderate allowance and gradually increasing 
until on full feed, with a variety of foods. Corn 
fodder may be fed, but it would be 100 per cent better 
• if put into silos. The hay should be clover if possible, 
but if Timothy, it should by all means be cut very 
early, say when only in full bloom—never beyond. 
Straw may and should be fed, but it would pay to 
have it housed even if the barn had to be built on 
purpose, and for grain they may have the corn, but it 
should be mixed with an equal weight of bran, winter 
or spring wheat, and linseed meal, new-process, if 
ensilage or roots be fed; old-process if neither. Oats 
are a good food, but at present prices they are too 
expensive; they had better be sold and the money put 
into linseed meal and bran. For years I have made it 
a practice to feed succulent food for fattening my 
sheep ; in fact, for all sheep. Nothing is better than 
good ensilage, although I prefer both that and roots, 
and I feed both every day, one feed each. I have 
found that any sheep will make a gain of upwards of 
20 per cent more with succulent food than without, 
even on the same grain ration, and, further, with the 
succulent food they may be fed any length of time 
with perfect safety. 
I advise the feeding of lambs in preference to full- 
grown sheep, because a greater gain can be made on 
them in the same time and with the same food, because 
