DEC. 47 
THE RURAL «EW-¥C>1«ER, 
will notice that I have made no allowance for 
hauling and thrashing, for I think the straw 
worth enough to balance this. The account 
with this field the next year, if pastured, 
would show no charge but the $40 interest on 
capital, unless it might be for repairs on 
fences. It should be credited with the usual 
price per month for pasturing stock. If it 
was cut twice—once for hay, and once for 
seed—the cost should be charged, and the 
field credited with the hay and seed. Sup¬ 
pose our account to stand as follows: 
In terest on cap! tal. $40.00 
Cutting, curing and hauling clover 20.00 
Cutting clover seed At we, P acre. fi.00 
Hauling to machine. 6.00 
Thrashing 20 bush, seed at 75c. V bush.. 15.00 
Hands and board. 5.00 
Total expense.. $92.00 
By 12 tons of hay at $7 V ton... .$ 84.00 
20 bush, seed at $5.25 p bush. 105.00 
Total.$189.00 
Deduct expense. 92.00 
Net profit. $97.00 
The next year of our rotation brings this 
field into corn and the account stands. 
Interest on capital . $10.00 
Breaking, at $1.5(1 ? acre. 15.00 
Harrowing and rolling. 10.00 
Marking out and planting. 7.50 
Seed. 1.00 
Plowing 4 times at 50c. ¥ acre each 
time. 20.00 
Cutting up at $1.25 V acre. 12.50 
Husking, $1.50 V acre. 15.00 
Total... $121.00 
By 450 bushels of corn at 35 cents.$157.90 
*' 10 tons coru fodder at $4 $ ton. 40.00 
Total.. ..,...$197.50 - 
Deduct expense . . 121.00 
Profit on field. $76.50 
In the back part of the book I set apart a 
page for each field, where I simply put down 
results, as I want this page to show the 
profit or loss for a number of years. The 
entry on that page for these three crops would 
be as follows: 
Field No. 5,10 acres, value $500. 
1878. Cop wheat sold at $1.10 fn Aug. Profit $188.50 
1879 Crop Clover cut for liav and seed. “ 97.00 
1880. Crop corn, yield 45 bushels v acre. “ 76.50 
Each of these entries should give the 
page on which the itemized account is kept 
so that it could be referred to. I have written 
enough to show that keeping accounts with 
the fields is an easy matter requiring but little 
time or space aud I hope if any of my read- 
el’s can suggest a better plan they will do so. 
fidii Crops. 
EXPERIMENTS WITH POTATOES AND 
OATS IN KANSAS. 
The seeds sent all grew. 1 regard the po¬ 
tatoes and oats as having great value. Hav¬ 
ing tried experiments with small amounts 
of seed before and generally not having had 
good success, I procured a bushel of tip* White 
Elephant Potatoes and two bushels of Wash¬ 
ington Oats. This was a poor year in one 
sense, and also a good one in another, to try 
experiments. It showed the ability to with¬ 
stand drought, but productiveness could not 
be properly judged. 
The potatoes had large vines and grew vig¬ 
orously until the drought got to the severest 
point, when they perished. I planted them 
the second week in May, which was a mistake; 
they should not be planted here until the last 
of May or the first of June. The yield was 
10 bushels; none were as large as the seed. 
They were badly rotted at the stem ends 
caused by drought. I may be mistaken, but 
I think they are not very valuable. They are 
too rough and deficient in quality—at least 
mine were. I had 10 acres of potatoes and 
experimented with most of the new varieties. 
I think you are wrong about the Burbank and 
Saint Patrick being identical. 1 planted the 
Burbank last year and this year I planted the 
two varieties side by side; no difference could 
be observed in the growth of the vines or 
time of ripening, hut the Saint Patricks yield¬ 
ed better, grew larger, are somewhat closer 
in the hill, smoother and of a little better 
quality. [The Rural has never tested the 
Saint Patrick.— Eds.] The Beauty of Hebron 
yielded best—150 bushels per ere, tubers 
large, but many rotted at the stem ends. The 
Early Rose, Early Vermont anil Alpha had 
the same fault. The Orange Co. White is a 
great yielder und is of good qua lity, but it is 
the hardest potato to dig I ever had; it re¬ 
fuses to grow in hills like others. The Early 
Ohio is a great yielder and second to the 
Alpha in ripening;quality good; grows close 
in the hill, but w'us scarcely salable here this 
year or last; its fault is it has hard, black 
■pots iu it; these spots are not next to the skin 
but often all through, so as to make it worth¬ 
less. On being cooked aud mashed the spots 
drop out. Would like to know the cause of 
this. [The Early Ohio is uot thus affected at 
the Rural Farm.— Eds.] The Mammoth 
Pearl is a great yielder and so far has not been 
subject to any disease; the vines do not grow 
so vigorously as is claimed by some seedsmen, 
and it is of second quality. Dunmore resem¬ 
bles the Pearl, is of the same quality, fully as 
productive; but uot quite so large. Queen of 
the Valley has the largest aud thriftiest vines 
of any tried; tubers very large; quality good; 
but it is not a heavy yielder; there are apt to 
be one or two very large potatoes to the hill. 
American Magnum Bonum was not as large 
this year as represented; the yield was poor; 
the tubers were rough and only of second 
quality. Watson’s Seedling had the same 
fault as the White Elephant, but was of better 
quality. It resembles the White Elephant in 
growth of both vines and tubers and is about 
a week later thau the Early Rose. The Gen¬ 
esee Co. King resemblesthePeachblow, but is 
earlier, more productive and of as good a 
quality. Perfection I regard as one of the 
best grown—good first, last and all the time; 
a vigorous grower, productive and three 
weeks later than the Early Rose. North Riv¬ 
er Beauty is not worth cultivation. Victor is 
a seedling of the Peachblow; color blue, 
which hurts its sale; of third quality here. A 
grower can’t fool a consumer the second time 
on it. 
The two bushels of Washington Oats pro¬ 
duced 65 bushels which weighed 43 pounds 
per bushel. It smutted badly, but stood up 
well, and was remarkable for its dark green 
color while growing. Four bushels of Mold’s 
Ennobled Oats produced 162 bushels; weight, 
33 pounds per bushel. This is a black side oat 
and ripened a week later than the Washington 
or any other sown. It l usted a little and went 
down in a few spots; straw a foot longer than 
that of any other variety. The White Bel¬ 
gian produced from two bushels of seed 35 
bushels; weight, 45 pounds per bushel. Stood 
up well: no smut or rust. Of the White Can¬ 
adian two bushels produced 40; weight, 42 
pounds per bushel; some smut and rust; 
lodged in places. Of Red Rust-Proof two 
bushels were sown; yield, 52 bushels; weight 
32 pounds per bushel; the grain has a heavy 
husk and a long beard at the end; stools out 
more than any other variety sown, but the 
straw is entirely too short. The oats were 
raised on a field which had been sown with 
wheat in the Fall of 1880, but the wheat was 
winter killed. 
Long live the Rural for it doetli a good 
work. I. O. Miller. 
Johnson Co., Kansas. 
TOBACCO-GROWING NOTES. 
Parties building or repairing tobacco-cur¬ 
ing barns should by all means provide top and 
bottom ventilation, which is probably best se¬ 
cured by means of a continuous ventilator ex¬ 
tending lengthwise of the roof, and doors at 
least one foot wide hinged beneath the sills. 
The roof ventilator should extend the greater 
length of the building and should be provided 
on either side with horizontal doors, which 
should be carefully fitted and arranged to be 
opened or closed from below by means of 
ropes and pulleys. 
During the leisure of Winter tobacco grow ¬ 
ers should, as far as possible, prepare for next 
year’s plant growing. Sash for covering the 
plant-beds, w hich is considered a necessity for 
the production of early plants in most of the 
seed-leaf producing sections, should be made 
or repaired, and everything be made ready, as 
far as practicable, for the sowing of the seed, 
so that no valuable time may be unnecessarily 
spent when Spring opens. 
Glass is the only reliable material for cov¬ 
ering the “cold-frames,” although canvas, 
while not a substitute for glass, is preferable 
to no covering when the seeds and plants are 
starting. The sarii should be made of conven¬ 
ient size for handling: three 8x10 inch lights 
wide und seven lights in length being about 
right. The plans-beds should have wind¬ 
breaks on the north side; a strong, high, 
tight board fence answers for a good protec¬ 
tion. _ 
In preparing frames and sash for plant- 
beds growers should bear in mind that an 
abundance of plant-bed room is a point of 
great importance iu tobacco growing. I 
have found it an excellent plan to endeavor 
to raise twice as many plants as will be 
needed for my own setting. With this man¬ 
agement a grower obtains strong, early 
plants for his own use, which allow's him to 
have his own tobacco early and even, and if 
when the work of planting is finished there 
is a surplus of plants, they can usually be sold 
for enough to cover a large part of the cost 
of raising the whole. G. a. g., jr. 
Iona Grafted on Isabella. 
I have a grape and peach farm on the banks 
of Keulca Lake, and during the past season I 
have had u little experiment which may in¬ 
terest some of the Rural's army of readers. 
The man living on my place is an expert 
grafter of fruit trees, and in the Spring I re¬ 
quested him to set some cuttings from Iona 
grape-vines in some old Isabella stocks as an 
experiment. He did so, and the result was 
to me quite surprising. They all lived and 
flourished, making from six to ten feet of 
strong, ripe wood, and on nearly all of them 
there w’ere bunches of ripe fruit. From one 
cane my boy picked and weighed tw T o pounds 
of ripe Iona, grapes. n. w, 
Penn Yan, N. Y. 
Painj ijusbanirry. 
THE DAIRY COW. 
HENRY STEWART. 
Catarrh (Hollow-Horn. 
Many writers and other persons have 
“made merry” and have used sarcastic re¬ 
marks in regard to the popular belief in “hol¬ 
low-horn.” A man needs to live aud keep 
his wits about him and observe and study 
for half a century sometimes, before be 
comes to learn that nearly all popular beliefs 
have some basis of truth for their foundation. 
And so “hollow-horn” or “ horn-ail” is really 
and truly a matter of fact. The only mistake 
about it is that the popular name indicates 
the effect of the disease and not its original 
source. This is, in fact, catarrh of the liuing 
mucous membranes of the nasal and frontal 
sinuses of the head. This disease is so frequent 
aud so often serious that it is worthy of par¬ 
ticular notice for its own sake, and more es¬ 
pecially to help to remove the popular igno¬ 
rance about it by which the troubles arising 
from it are left without remedy because they 
are ignored. A description of the head of an 
ox or cow’ may be useful for this purpose. 
At Fig. 555 is an outline of the skull of a cow 
upon which the letters a, b, r, d, show the 
positions of the sinuses or interior cavities of 
the skull, which serve to greatly strengthen 
the frontal bones and enable the skull to resist 
the concussions which are common with 
horned animals. The line down the center is 
the median suture of the frontal bones. At 
a, a, are the bony plates which cover the 
nasal sinuses ; at b, b, c, c, and d, d, are the 
localities of the divisions of the frontal sinus¬ 
es. In the ox the frontal bone, which in 
fact forms the foundation of the face, is 
largely developed, and is of great thickness. 
From this bone proceeds at each side of the 
upper extremity the bony cores which sup¬ 
port the horns, which, however are not the 
horns but important portions of the skull. 
These horn cores are filled with small vascu¬ 
lar channels and canals, to such an extent as 
to render their substance extremely spongy 
in appearance. The frontal sinuses are pro¬ 
longed into these horn cores. The horns 
themselves are attached to the skin only, and 
are merely the protecting covers of the cores 
which are extremely sensitive und extensively 
supplied with veins, arteries mid nerves. The 
horn itself is wholly insensible, as is the hair, 
being, in fact, in structure nothing more nor 
less than hair compressed into a solid form, 
so to speak. 
This explanation of the structure of the 
horn and its immediate connection with the 
interior of the skull, should be sufficient to 
show how easy it is for the horn cores to be 
affected by any disease which involves the 
membranes lining the cavities of the skull. 
Exposure to cold or to sudden changes of the 
weather almost invariably produces inflam¬ 
mation or outurrh of these membranes ; and, 
of course, the horn cores are affected at the 
some time because the membranes reach in¬ 
to and entirely through their substance, 
which being extremely cellular on account 
of the numerous canals and passages, {$ cov¬ 
ered by a very large surface of the sensitive 
membranes. 
Inflammation soon leads to suppuration, and 
the passages which lead from one sinus to 
another may soon be partly or wholly closed 
by the swollen condition of the membranes and 
the accumulation of the secreted mucus with 
whatever pus may have formed. Here then 
are sufficient causes for the extreme uneasi¬ 
ness and distress which mark this disease and 
produce the weakness and emaciation com¬ 
mon to it. The appetite is lost; the whole 
system is feverish and disturbed ; the circula¬ 
tion is disorganized ; the patient suffers the 
most violent pains in the head from the com¬ 
pression of the mucus and the pus in the cavi¬ 
ties as well as from the congestion of the 
blood vessels. The owner, under the advice of 
some neighbor, bores into the horns with a 
gimlet and the pus is discharged, giving in¬ 
stant but temporary relief. Perhaps under 
the continuous effect of the disease the bony 
cores have entirely sloughed away aud have 
passed through the nostrils in the shape of a 
fetid, purulent discharge, and w hen the horns 
are bored they are found completely hollow. 
We may thus see how the popular idea of 
hollow-horn has originated, and that it is 
justified to a great extent by the facts. 
The treatment of this disease is somewhat 
difficult from its deep-seated locality. Pre¬ 
vention, by careful attention to the warm, 
dry, comfortable lodging of the stock, w'ill 
avoid it. When it occurs, and the inflamma¬ 
tion has spread to the horns, the case may 
be treated by blisters or other counter-irritants 
upon the poll, mnl even by boring the horns 
and injecting soothing and antiseptic liquids, 
which may wash out the affected cavities and 
restore the condition of the membranes. 
Warm water with. 10 or 13 drops of carbolic 
acid to the pint would be employed benefi¬ 
cially. But medicines should also be used. 
A strong cooling purgative, for instance, one 
pound of Epsom salts, with an ounce of ni¬ 
trate of potash (saltpeter) added might be 
given and repeated the third day. After that, 
a daily dose of one ounce of hyposulphite of 
soda should be given until recovery is assured. 
Warm mashes and gruels would be very 
beneficial ; warm clothing ; steaming the nos¬ 
trils, and washing them with the carbolated 
wmrm water would also tend greatly towards 
a recovery. By neglect, the disease may be¬ 
come chronic, when the distress suffered 
would greatly lessen the value and profit of 
the animal, and it is very probable that the 
disease would prove infectious or contagious 
in a herd, and i§ therefore all the more se¬ 
rious on that account. 
NOTES BY A STOCKMAN. 
Somebody, I think a correspondent of the 
Rural, stated recently that in regard to 
sheep, in England mutton was considered first 
aud wool last. This is not correct, although 
mutton is there an important consideration in 
the business of keeping sheep. An English 
writer on this subject recently said: “The 
high price of wool changed my views.” . . 
“An Oxford Down should have the poll well 
covered with wool, adorned with a top-knot 
on the forehead, a good fleece of wool, not too 
curly, a well-formed barrel on short, dark 
legs, with good firm mutton.” Now, if wo 
take this writer, who is a prominent sheep 
breeder, as an example, wool is first and mut¬ 
ton last; and this is the case every time. 
Sheep are classed in England by their wool 
and not their mutton, and as long-wools, 
mediuru-wools and short-wools; and the mut¬ 
ton is entirely a secondary consideration. 
A large sale of Short-horns from the Bow 
Park herd (Canada) was held on the 10th ult. 
at Waukegan, 111. Some high prices were 
obtained. Grand Duchess of Oxford 20th 
brought $4,025; Duchess of Horton, $3,030; 
Waterloo 33th. 31,700; Kirklevingtou Duchess 
17th, 31,370. Six bulls aud bull calves aver¬ 
aged $384 each and 32 cows and heifers aver- 
__ 
The annual meeting of the American 
Clydesdale Association was held at Chicago 
the 10th of the last month. A scale of 
points was submitted and some preliminary 
measures taken to establish a stud book. This 
is a necessary precaution, considering the in¬ 
creasing favor with which those horses are 
received here and the fact that in Scotland 
and England a stud book is kept for the record 
of pure-bred animals, [The above notes have 
been left over for some time.—E ds.] 
An extraordinary comparison of the in¬ 
crease in our export trade of live stock and 
its products during a dozen years past is given 
in the following figures. 
1868. 18HI. Increase. 
Export of live stock. $788,895 $16,112,398 $15,670,008 
“ cattle pro- „„„ 
ducts.14,8:i8.291 70,169,011 55,336,820 
“ ho« products. 18,502,060 105,794.281 89.291,591 
Too much mutton is said to have been the 
cause of the death of 17 shearers during the 
shearing of a flock of nearly 100,600 sheep in 
New Mexico, the men not having been used 
to eating this kind of meat. Perhaps this 
mutton may have been of the “ lantern ” kind 
and not easily digestible even to a New Mexi- 
cuu ranebero, who can sometimes digest a 
piece of broiled rawhide. 
The State Veterinarian of Illinois has had 
a hard time of it recently in attending to calls 
from different ports of the State to investi¬ 
gate cases of supposed pleuro-pneumonia. He 
has found nearly every case to have been 
Texan fever, and the others to have been due 
to inflammation caused by the presence of 
parasitic worms, Strongylus filuria, in the 
lungs aud air passages. As this parasitic dis¬ 
ease is very frequent in calves there is little 
