^try hoJA 
PHOTO El 
\ Price Five Cents 
) $2.00 Per Year. 
Vol, XL. No. 5, 
Whole No. 1618. 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1881, by the Rural New-Yorker, In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
what are considered " favorable times” as 
well as at unlucky ones. Last season I went 
to a neighbor's to trim his lambs, and was told 
that they would all die—the sign was in the 
heart, and so they were fated. So it was ; but 
I don't go by signs, so the job was done. My 
neighbor says that he never had any lambs 
that did better. R. Grbenbank. 
Stark Co,, Ohio. 
give a boom to foreign cattle. The cablegrams 
that come to the daily newspapers are even en¬ 
listed in the work. There lately appeared 
among the items of important news a state¬ 
ment that some Jerseys had recently been 
bought in the island for an American breeder 
at unprecedented prices—$1,500 each was 
named. But there are cows here that could 
not be bought for twice that sum. 
breeders have paid us larger prices for our 
animals than were ever paid in England ; we 
have the best Merinos in the world; our horses 
have beaten the English racers on their own 
turf; no other trotting horses can approach 
the American-bred horses. England has 5,913.- 
000 horned cattle in all, and 36,010,000 sheep, 
while we have more than 13,000,000 milch cows 
and over 31,000,000 of beeves, and nearly 41,- 
000,000 sheep; not to mention 34.000,000 hogs, 
11,300,000 horses and nearly 2,000,000 mules. 
There are nearly as mauy horned cattle in 
TexaB as in all Great Britain—England, Scot¬ 
land, Ireland and Wales united. 
OUR ANIMAL PORTRAITS 
We present to our readers this week an 
accurate copy of a photograph, taken for the 
Rural at the Albany Fair Grounds, of Messrs. 
Smiths & Powell’s superb two-year-old bull 
<• Ebbo," which won for them the first prize in 
his class. 
“ Ebbo” is a black and-white bull, two years 
old in April, 1878, of excellent form and ma¬ 
jestic size, a fine handler, and in every way a 
most attractive and promising animal. 
He was imported from North Holland by 
George C. Brown in his dam, which proved a 
superior milker. He is fine in bone, with a 
remarkably small head, excellent escutcheon, 
and will prove, we have no doubt, very valua¬ 
ble as a getter of milch stock, and in this class he 
most creditably upheld the credit of the herd, 
of which we gave a somewhat extended notice 
on page 816 of last year's volume. 
Is the money value, then, the measure of the 
real value ? If it is in one case as in the other, 
then I was right, and we have better cattle 
here than in Jersey, for I think I could lay my 
hand on a dozen cows that could not be pur¬ 
chased for $1,500 each, aud this ium is by no 
means an unprecedented price here. By-and- 
by we shall be exporting Jerseys. I prognosti¬ 
cate that, although that respected journal, the 
Agricultural Gazette, may be “ amused ” by it. 
AN EXPERIMENT TO CHEAPEN THE PRC 
DUCTION OF PORK, 
With all this raw material, and as good, 
pure animals as exist anywhere and as skillful 
aud intelligent breeders, why should not Amer¬ 
ica become the first iu fegard to excellence of 
type and quality of live stock; and why should 
it be continually neglecting its own oppor¬ 
tunities and employing other breeders to do 
the work which can be done at home as well, 
or better ? 
There is always a good reason for “ the 
milk in the eocoanut.” I quote from the Ag¬ 
ricultural Gazette in another place: “ Nobody 
opens his purse so freely as Brothe - Jonathan 
when he has a mind to buy.” This is a fact, 
and Americans are too good customers to 
foreign breeders to be lost; and so they are 
" amused” to hear an American say that as 
good animals can be bred in America as in the 
Island of Jersey or elsewhere. 
England has been the mother of nations. 
But when a man sets up for himself he cuts 
loose from his mother. We have cut loose 
from our mother country and set up in busi¬ 
ness for ourselves. We have even gone into 
competition with the old lady, who shakes her 
curls and her frills at us as we take her cus¬ 
tomers from her. Nay, the old lady is forced 
to come to our shop to buy her bread and 
cheese and bacon and beef, or a good portion 
COL. E. D. CURTIS. 
During the past year we tried an experi¬ 
ment to determine whether pork could be pro¬ 
duced on a considerable scale at cheaper rates 
than those at which we had been in the habit 
of making it. Pigs are in this section of the 
country usually wintered on corn and summer¬ 
ed on milk, kitchen slops and corn. Sometimes 
they are allowed to run in the pasture and this 
feed is supplemented with corn. Corn is the 
great 3taple food of pigs. 
We have heeu satisfied for years that on the 
above basis there was noprofitfor usin making 
pork ; hence we have given the subject con¬ 
siderable study with a view to devise some 
plan to cheapen production. The foundation 
of our plan is a warm pig-house—so warm 
that when the pigs areiu it, it does not freeze. 
Here the breeding sows are wintered on raw 
roots, which are the cheapest feed we have 
any knowledge of. The roots are stored in 
the cellar underneath, where they are handy, 
as labor is an important item and must be re¬ 
duced as much as possible. The &ows are al¬ 
lowed to have their young the last of April or 
the first of May, as we calculate that as soon 
as the pigs are old enough to be tumed with 
the herd they and the mother 
may be put out in the pasture. 
Last Summer we had a 
HI W clover pasture for our pigs 
into which they were turued, 
young and old, the former 
when from three to four weeks 
of age, or as Boon as the clover 
was up large enough for a 
good bite. In this field there 
was a sprii g of water where 
the pigs could drink and a 
shed into which they could go 
during the warm part of the 
day for shelter, or at night. 
The old hogs were not fed 
anything, but the pigs were 
taught to come into an incloe- 
4 ure iu which corn was given 
E/jlfjf* to them three times a day. At 
first they ate but a few kernels 
each, but the quantity was 
AA f -3 J increased as they grew older, 
1 until they consumed a quart a 
'0-iit day. By this time—the middle 
Q f August—a patch of sweet 
corn, planted for the purpose, 
was ready to be cut up for 
r feeding. A quantity was cut 
twice a day, as much as the 
herd would eat up clean, and 
strewn about the fields. A 
severe drought had diminished 
Large Importation of Thoroughbred Horses and 
Jersey Cattle. 
On the 9th the steamship France arrived at 
this port having on board 40 thoroughbred 
horses, mares and colts, and 13 head of Jersey 
cattle. The horses, we understand, were all on 
consignment. 15 having been shipped for sale 
here by M.'. Cowie, three of which died of dis¬ 
ease, not accident, during the voyage; while 
the remaining 28 were Bent out by Mr. E. Tat- 
tersall. The Jerseys were also bred by him 
near London and sent hither for sale. The fol¬ 
lowing is a list of them: 
Name. Hire. Datu. 
Mrs. Elmer, heifer. .Highfield.Busy Body. 
Young Bridesmaid, „ ,, _ 
heifer....... ....... High field...Bridesmaid. 
Moleoule, heifer.Hinhfield.Mole. 
Quadrille, heifer... .Metadore. .Old Cow. 
Chrysalis, heifer..HigUfteld.Moth. 
Eutreuie, heifer.Metadore.Napp 2d. 
Darkle, heifer.Metadore.....Black faced 
NOTES BY A STOCKMAN 
appears to himself, is nettled when his lawyer 
quietly says to him:—"But, my dear Bir, the 
other side feels and talks just as you do. The 
Court is just as likely to take his views of the 
facts and the law as to take yours." And this is 
the delightful uncertainty of both law and 
facts. 
And this applies very pertinently to those 
persons who so fiercely decry close breeding 
and who declare that it ruins 
the stock. The same charge 
has been made against Mr. 
Booth as against Mr. Bates, 
and the system practiced by 
the former waB precisely the 
same as that of the latter. But 
the whole force of the objec¬ 
tion seems to be throwu upon 
the Duchesses. Well, they can 
stand it. __ 
A neighbor who was reading 
these notes iu the Rural of 
Jauuary 8lh (ignorant, how¬ 
ever, of the authorship), in 
discussing it with me takes a 
peculiar view of it. I reuiai ked 
to him that from the accepted 
belief in the origin of the 
human race we must admit 
that even this was closely bred 
at the start. “ Well, yes, I 
suppose it was; Cain aud Abel 
married their Bisters, I expect.” 
But, with a joyous twinkle in 
his eye, he remarked:—"But 
the breediug was bad, for Cain 
killed his brother, and even ^ 
now Bee whal a bad lot we 
are, and how the bad blood 
breaks out." 1 commend this 
reasoning to my adversaries. 
Iocliua, heifer. 
Paul Pry, bull_ 
Basingstoke. 
Molehill, bull— 
Bitter Beer, bull 
IMPORTED HOLSTEIN BULL 
The Agricultural Gazette, of London, is of them , and is glad to get even by selling us her 
amused at a note of mine in regard to the pos- high bred cattle and sheep. As long as the de- 
Bibllity of American breeders producing as lusion exists that we have not as good of our 
good Jerseys as can be imported. It quotes own and cannot produce more than we need, 
the note with evident relish as a specimen of and may not even sell some that we can spare, 
what may appear to an Englishman as Ameri- we shall go on throwing away onr money 
can brag. Well, we have something to fall which we could just as well put iuto the pock- 
back on. We have more good Jerseys hare ets of our own breeders. 
than are in the Island of Jersey; we have more -— 
Short-horns than are in England, and English There has been an evident effort of late to 
Sx GNS in the Ohio Farmer of December the growth of the clover, so that the sweet corn 
4th, Mr. Stephen Powers, referring to “ signs," did not add to their growth as much as we had 
asks whether lambs castrated at certain phases intended. We expected it to serve as extra 
of the moon do not bleed more than if the feed over and above a good supply of clover; 
operation is performed at other times in the hut, instead of this, it was comparatively all 
month. I answer, " No." I have castrated hun- the teed which they had for a month. This 
dreds, and done so at all times, and I have corn had been planted in drills and sufficiently 
never found any difference in the amount they scattered so that most of the stalks contained 
bleed at any of the various phases of the moon. small ears. The crop averaged seven feet iu 
Some bleed more than others at all times, at hight, and, notwithstanding its rankness, it 
