298 
April 29 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
profitable to sell them? This seems important.” 
“ When they have reached 200 to 250 pounds I 
usually find it most profitable to let them go, and get 
more without putting much grain into them.” 
“ From the whiprow you have started you probably 
get a handsome daily income ; do you not ?” 
“ Yes. It looks large, though it is not all profit. 
Returns average $12 or $13 per day.” 
“ Did you buy out the business, or has your trade 
grown to its present proportions from small begin¬ 
nings ?” 
“Oh, I started small and got customers a few at a 
time, as others have to do. Little by little I have 
added more cows and fuller facilities for making 
butter, until I have my arrangements nearly perfect.” 
“ Could you make as good profits by selling cream 
to a cooperative creamery ?” 
“ That would not be profitable at all, particularly 
since I have got all the machinery for turning out the 
perfect product.” 
Cows Treated Like Ladies. 
“ You evidently approve of giving the cows warm 
water ? ” 
“ Oh ! I take off the chill.” 
“ How are they watered ? ” 
“ Twice a day ; at 9 a. m. and 3 p. m. They are let 
out each time for a few minutes. If it were not for 
the steam pipe the trough would freeze over; as it is 
it does so nights.” 
Mr. Potter showed by his treatment of the cows 
that he is fond of them, and here is another secret of 
his success. Every cow in the row invariably gets a 
kind word or caress as he passes. 
“ Here,” said he, “ is a cow that has been in milk 
nearly a year, but she is doing nobly now. This 
one is nearly dry, but is good. This little scrubby one 
gives 18 quarts when fresh. Now she gives 10, but 
has been giving milk since last May. Well, well, 
Peggy, you don’t look very slick to-day. All my cows 
get the currycomb and brush as regularly as their 
feed.” 
When a man talks like that to his cows one may be 
sure that they will do their best, for cows love the 
kind oversight of a master. 
“ You have good warm barns I see ? ” 
“ Cows cannot do anything unless well taken care 
of. The man who puts his cows in a cold, open barn, 
and gives them cold water and corn stalks, isn’t reason¬ 
able when he expects paying results. Warm stables, 
warm water and sunny, comfortable quarters are none 
“You have proved yourself a devotee to the dis¬ 
horning saw ? ” 
“Yes. We took off all their horns a year ago and 
have found it a great advantage.” 
“ Your ensilage is fragrant and tells its quality. 
How much of a silo have you ?” 
“ It holds 125 tons. I have had phenomenal success 
with ensilage, and find it a cheap and indispensable 
stock food. I do not believe a man can afford to be 
without a silo. When I built this, I laid the founda¬ 
tion for another of the same size beside it, and shall 
build it the coming summer.” 
“ What is your practice in feeding ? ” 
“ At 4 A. m. each cow is given two quarts of dry feed. 
This is composed of equal parts of corn and oats, wheat- 
middlings and gluten meal. After milking, half a bushel 
of ensilage is fed, at 8 o’clock a small feed of dry hay, 
and at 2 o’clock all the dry hay they will eat clean. At 
10 o’clock steamed hay, with two quarts of the grain 
mixture previously mentioned, is given. At 4:30 the 
cows again receive two quarts of grain, and at 6:30 
half a bushel of ensilage. Each gets a tablespoonful 
of salt on her steamed food daily. 
“ Well! your cows are attended to faithfully. You 
don’t neglect them for an hour.” 
“ I believe it pays to feed them as regularly as pos¬ 
sible. Seldom or never has garget appeared in the 
herd, and rarely does a cow miss a meal. With an in¬ 
crease of ensilage, I expect to keep 40 cows and do all 
my work with my present help. I have no trouble in 
selling all the produce from my cows.” 
“ Do you raise your cows, or buy them ? ” 
“ So far it has been necessary to buy them ; but it is 
a difficult matter to find good, young animals. If they 
were common, I could buy them cheaper than I could 
raise them, but as soon as I am able to do well with 
young stock, I shall certainly raise my own. There is 
an abundance of inferior cows on the market, but it 
does not pay to bother with them.” 
Mr. Potter’s cows are held by the old-style stanchions 
as well as if their horns were still in place. He has 
found no appliances that will keep cows cleaner than 
the regulation stanchions and plank floor and drop. 
The manure is wheeled from the stable and heaped in 
the yard until wanted in the field. 
Mr. Potter does his farm work with a yoke of Devon 
steers and a pair of bulls ; his peddling with a large, 
handsome pair of horses. The steers, shown at Fig. 
Ill, are a very essential part of the working force of 
the farm. Indirectly they are great butter producers, 
as they do much of the work of raising the crops 
from which the butter is made. They are, perhaps, 
the most clever Devons that ever wore a yoke. “What 
will they weigh ? ” I asked. 
“About 3,200 pounds; but notwithstanding this, 
they are as spry as cats. I consider the breed the 
best in the world for general farm work.” 
“ They walk off like horses.” 
“You are right; and that is why I think so much 
of them. Their motions are the same all day, and 
quite in contrast to those of the average ox team. 
They are five years old. Being mature, they seem 
able to do almost any amount of work without injury, 
and save a good pair of horses lots of hard work haul¬ 
ing manure, working on new land or stone work.” 
“ Is not the team almost too fat ? ” 
“ It doesn’t seem to be, and is always just the same. 
These steers stand hot weather better than any cattle 
I know of, and are extra easy keepers.” 
In connection with the sale of good butter and 
skim-milk, Mr. Potter disposes of a large quantity 
of vegetables in summer, and has set out a field of 
small fruits for market purposes. His farm contains 
140 acres, 60 of which are entirely free from obstruct¬ 
ions, and can be cultivated like prairie. When he 
started, in 1887, he had but six cows, a pair of good 
horses, a big mortgage and a heart as great as 
the combination. Now, thanks to the butter cows, 
his heart is no smaller, the mortgage has been lifted 
and his bank account is a solid one. He has shown 
what can be done on a run-down New England farm 
heavily weighted by debt. He has not achieved suc¬ 
cess by the use of large capital, but by intelligence, 
thrift and enterprise. hoi.i.ister sage. 
TAMING A WILD PLANT. 
A VALUABLE CROP FOR ARIZONA. 
Shortly after the organization of the Arizona Ex¬ 
periment Station, the attention of its staff was called 
to a wild plant , “ Canaigre ” (Rumex hymenosepalus) 
as a product well worthy of investigation. Bulletin 
No. 9 of that station gives the results of investigations 
made up to date, by Messrs Collingwood, Gulley and 
Tourney : 
“ Canaigre, ” sometimes spoken of as wild pie-plant, 
grows along the river bottoms and plains of southern 
Arizona and New Mexico—its habitat extending south 
into Mexico. It is well suited to hot and arid regions, 
the growth above ground being limited to a few 
months, while its deep-seated, tuberous roots retain 
their vitality through the hot, dry summers. It 
thrives best in loose, sandy soils which are flooded at 
times by heavy rains. A picture of the plant is shown 
at Fig. 113. 
The Mexicans and Indians are said to have used it 
for medicine and even as food, but it promises to add 
nothing to the world’s supply of food. Its value to 
commercial industry lies in the fact that it promises 
to become the cheapest source of tannic acid for use 
in preparing leather. The roots contain an average 
of about 30 per cent of tannic acid. It has long been 
known that this plant was useful for tanning hides, 
and specimens have been sent to tanners in this coun¬ 
try and abroad—the result always being satisfactory. 
In fact, quite a trade has already been developed, as 
in 1892 the Southern Pacific Railroad alone handled 
370 carloads of the sliced and dried roots consigned to 
Europe. These roots were all wild-growing—col¬ 
lected here and there as a patch was found growing 
within reasonable hauling distance of a railroad. 
The roots were simply dug, sliced and air-dried, and 
when the patch was exhausted the outfit went on in 
search of another. This plan of digging the wild 
“ Canaigre, ” while profitable enough for the diggers, 
promised to exhaust the supply. It was evident that 
here was a crop of great possibilities. Could it be 
successfully cultivated, and would the tamed wild 
plant lose its proportion of tannic acid ? 
These were questions that the Arizona Station peo¬ 
ple set themselves to answer, and it seems to us that 
few more important questions connected with the 
agriculture of that Territory could be asked. As stated 
in this bulletin : 
Most of the leather In this country Is at present tanned with oak and 
hemlock barks, and the supply is rapidly being used up, as, In addi¬ 
tion to home use, considerable quantities are exported. We also im¬ 
port tanning material for certain kinds of leather, and this demand Is 
rapidly growing One of the largest Imports at present Is “ gambler,’’ 
an extract derived from the leaves and young shoots of a tree be¬ 
longing to the family Hubiacea, genus nauclea, a native of the East 
Indian archipelago, largely cultivated for this purpose. During 1891, 
15,000 tons were brought Into the United States, valued at 11,500,000, 
and containing approximately 50 per cent of tannic acid. The amount 
used abroad is much larger, because European countries depend more 
on extracts than do the tanners of this country. Six tons of green 
Canaigre will make about one ton of extract, containing approximately 
the same amount of tannic acid as gambler. Ninety thousand tons of 
green Canaigre would be necessary to supply the gambler Imported Into 
this country alone. From the high opinion which practical tanners 
have formed of Canaigre, It Is not Impossible that it will not only sup¬ 
plant gambler, but will gradually take the place of many other tan¬ 
ning materials. 
“ Canaigre ” then is a crop of which southern Arizona 
would have a monopoly. Sugar beets, fruit or wheat 
might be grown, but almost every State in the Union 
would appear as a competitor in growing these prod¬ 
ucts. The culture of “ Canaigre ” is as simple as that 
of potatoes, the crop as large and the price double, 
while the apparatus required for extracting the 
tannin for shipment is simple and far less costly than 
that used in making beet sugar. In fact, it seems as 
though Nature had specially provided this plant as a 
means of profit for the Arizona farmer. 
We have no space here for the many interesting 
details found in the bulletin. It has been practically 
shown that “Canaigre” responds to cultivation like 
other plants, that the cultivated root is just as strong 
in tannic acid and that the extract is easily and cheaply 
made. The purpose of this article is simply to call 
attention to a new and very important work which 
promises to pay to the people of Arizona the cost of 
their experiment station a thousand times over. The 
growing of a new vegetable product is doubly interest¬ 
ing' wLon it does not interfere in the least with the 
food products of other sections and yet promises to 
cheapen an article of absolute necessity. 
OVERHEARD AMONG JERSEYMEN. 
Oleomargarine Cleaner Than Brewers' Grains' Milk. 
Farmer A.—“ I claim that I feed my cows cheaper 
than anybody I know of. Clover hay and corn are 
my chief crops. I keep my cows tied up all the time— 
summer and winter. No fertilizers for me—I don’t 
need any.” 
Farmer B.—“ I guess you buy your fertilizers in 
grain bags.” 
A. —“ No, I don’t. I haven’t bought a bag of grain 
for years.” 
B. —“ What do you feed then ? ” 
A. —“ Brewers’ grains.” 
B. —“ You couldn’t hire me to feed those wet, stink¬ 
ing grains.” 
A. —“ Why not ? ” 
B. —“ I believe more children have been killed by 
milk made from feeding these grains than from any 
other single cause.” 
A. —“ There seem to be plenty of children left 
alive ! ” 
B. —“ That may be and lots more would be alive 
but for these wet grains. I wouldn’t use milk in my 
family made from such grains. Oleomargarine is a 
good deal more healthful and honest than brewers’ 
grains milk. I know a man that ruined his whole 
milk trade by feeding these rotton grains. Several 
babies died and the doctors traced the disease right 
straight to that milk. Dried, sweet grains are all 
right, but there ought to be a law prohibiting farmers 
from using the wet and filthy mess many cows get.” 
Putting Color into Holstein Milk. 
Farmer C.—“ The milk business pays us very well. 
We ship to Philadelphia, the Farmers’ Creamery Com¬ 
pany handling our milk. That company is doing good 
work and I think will, sooner or later, drive out all 
the middlemen.” 
R. N.-Y.—“ What cows do you keep ?” 
C. —“ Holsteins and Jerseys, mostly thoroughbreds 
and some grades. We keep 50 cows in milk all the 
time.” 
R. N.-Y.—“ Which is the better of the two breeds ?” 
C.—“ It is hard to say. The Holsteins will give 
