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i 
£ Yol XLI. No. 1693. 
NEW YORK, JULY 8, 1882. 
PRICE FIVE CENTS, 
£2,00 FEE YEAR, 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882, by the Rural New Yorker, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
tLiaitmri}. 
PREVENTION OF ANTHRAX DISEASES 
The most fatal and destructive diseases 
which affect domestic animals are those known 
under the general term of anthrax or anthra- 
coid fevers. Splenic or Texan fever and car- 
buncular erysipelas known by the too com¬ 
mon name of bloody murrain, black leg and 
charbou in cattle; braxy or enteric fever in 
sheep and cholera or intestinal fever in swine; 
a similar type of disease in horses and the 
cholera of poultry are ail of this kind and it 
needs no saying to inform our readers that these 
diseases are the cause of niue-tentbs of the 
enormous loss which farmers and stockmen 
suffer. It has been very conclusively shown 
that these diseases are produced by infection 
of the blood by a vegetable organism which 
is sown in the blood by means ot germs taken 
into the system, just as small pox, cholera- 
morbus and yellow fever in man are produced 
and spread from victim to victim either by 
direct infection or by the entrance into the 
blood of the infecting germs from the pro¬ 
ducts of the diseased subjects, which are car¬ 
ried in the air, in water or in food. The re¬ 
searches of M. Pasteur and other investigators 
have proved all this, But M. Pasteur has 
turned his attention ia a groat measure to the 
study of methods of prevention. This he 
effects by moans of inoculation, by virus of a 
milder type of the same form of disease, just 
as the virulent small pox of man is 
averted or greatly lessened in its 
force by inoculation by the virus of 
the milder form which prevails in 
cattle and is known as cow pox or 
vaccine; hence the term vaccina¬ 
tion, We give herewith an engrav¬ 
ing from La Nature which illus¬ 
trates this operation as performed 
by M. Pasteur upon sheep. 
Europeun stieep are much troub¬ 
led by a form of anthrax known 
by the name of charbou in France, 
and braxy or blood striking in Eng¬ 
land, This is a true intestinal fe¬ 
ver, as bog cholera, and black leg 
in calves or the splenic fever of 
cattle are, and although it is not so 
destructive in our fresher Helds and 
newer pastures, 3 et it j early carries 
off thousands from our flocks and, 
of course, as these increase the dis 
ease will probably become tenfold 
more destructive thau it was. The 
subject is therefore one of great in¬ 
terest to us. 
Prevention by Inoculation has 
been found easy and effective. The 
virus used in the operation is pro¬ 
duced by means of cultivating the 
germs taken from the blood of an 
origiually diseased animal in solu¬ 
tions of animal matter, through sev¬ 
eral gradations until an attenuated 
virus, so to speak, is made, which 
by inoculation produces a mild form of the 
disease which is not fatal. (Our readers 
may remember the matter was fully ex¬ 
plained iu tha Rural of Feb., 11, p. 93 .) The 
subject is t hen re inoculated after the lapse of 
15 days with a stronger virus, w hich would 
destroy au uuinoeulated animal, but in the 
already prepared subject causes merely a 
slight fever. The peculiir germs which are 
thus conveyed into the b'ood have the effect 
of fortifying it agaiast the malignant germs, 
and so the animals either escape altogether 
from them or are rendered proof against any 
serious effects In tha illustration the sheep 
is shown as held by an attendant w'hile the 
operator with a graduated hypodermic 
syringe injects a certain quantity of the in¬ 
fected fluid into the tissues of the thigh, this 
being found to be the most convenient locality 
for the operation. Sheep have long been inocu. 
lated for the sheep pox iu Europe, as this dis¬ 
ease is exceedingly destructive among the 
large flocks of the Eistern countries, and now 
a new remedy is offered to the shepherds, 
which will add further to their immunity from 
the prevalent scourges which more than de¬ 
cimate their flocks. 
farm (topics, 
-U- 
COLORADO FARMING. 
Irrigation. 
PROFESSOR A. K. BLOUNT. 
Northern, Southern and Eastern people, 
when they see our grain, often exclaim, “How 
is it that your wheat, oats, rye, harley and 
corn are so white and bright and the grain so 
plump and nice-looking? Do you irrigate all 
your crops? Don’t you scour your wheat? 
Don’t you use a tremendous sight of fertili¬ 
zers?” Such questions and many others of 
like import are being continually asked not 
only by visitors but by letter. I shall answer 
these before I am through; but, beginning at 
the foundation of all farming in this State, I 
must continue the subject of irrigation, from 
the Rural of April S. The water we use for 
this purpose is really of more value than the 
land, inasmuch as we have never had rain 
enough on the plains to raise a siugle vegeta¬ 
ble or bushel of grain. 
The water for this irrigation is taken out 
all along the natural streams into canals, 
ditches and laterals. These extend from the 
streams where dams are built for miles out 
upon the plains, carrying their full capacity 
when needed —just as much as the law allows. 
The law regulates the apportionment, giving 
to each canal so many inches—no more—and 
when the water is low it is pro rated. These 
canals are dug with a fall of from two to six 
feet per mile, and as high up under the foot¬ 
hills as the fall of the streams will permit. 
Irrigation from the first step to the last is a 
science quite difficult to be learned. The sur¬ 
veyor in running the canal fines must 
thoroughly understand his business—not 
only surveying but the nature of the soils he 
runs over. If soft, sandy soil, he must give 
less fall; if hard, rocky or clayey soil more 
fall can be given. If too little fall is given 
the canals fill up with mud and silt; if too 
much, the water wears away the banks (dykes) 
and cuts the channel to a ruinous depth. If 
the proper fall is given in all soils and on all 
slopes, the canals remain intact for years 
without additional expense. 
These canals and the large ditches are 
taken out by stock companies, made up of 
farmers—sometimes of speculators, some of 
whom are as heartless and destitute of a con¬ 
science as misers. 
Small ditches or laterals are individual 
concerns. While each farmer is taxed to 
construct the canal and keep it up, he is com¬ 
pelled to dig and keep up his own system of 
laterals. He takes his apportionment of water 
from the canals through gates, boxes or 
weirs—so many measured inches—and con¬ 
ducts it upou the highest points of his several 
fields, from which it spreads evenly and 
rapidly over his growing crops. He is com¬ 
pelled to let it flow’ as nearly on a level as 
possible to prevent washing, and he must so 
arrange his laterals, furrows and checks (made 
of sod or dry dirt, and put here and there to 
turn the currents) that the water will cover 
the whole field. Sometimes farmers have 
such fine land for irrigation that one man can 
irrigate 10 to 20 acres in one day or night. 
Other lands are so rolling that but one or two 
acres can be flooded in a day. The cost of ir¬ 
rigation differs on different farms. Some can 
irrigate their whole farms three times in a 
season for one dollar per acre; it costs others 
sometimes as high as four dollars, including 
both the cost of the water and the labor of 
putting it on. 
The water that fills the streams during the 
Summer mouths comes from the gradually 
melting snow that is stored up in the moun¬ 
tains during the Winter. The snowfall has 
never yet been insufficient to supply the de¬ 
mands of the farming communities below ou 
the plains. With the system of irrigation «’e 
now have, enough water is wasted to irrigate 
as much more land. A perfect system of 
farming and a perfect system of using the 
water we could make available, would enable 
the agricultural sections of this State to double 
the amount of land put in cultivation and 
quantity of products raised. 
Many inquire what constitutes an "inch of 
water," and how much it would take to irri¬ 
gate say, eight acres. An inch of water is no 
more than will run through a hole one inch 
square during the Summer or the irrigating 
season. Twenty-four inches consist, of what 
will run through a gate 24 by one inch, or 
twelve by two or six by four inches with 
pressure by some comoanies and without pres* 
sure by others. Some farmers estimate that 
one inch of water, with a four inch pressure, 
will irrigate eight acres ou condition that 
none is wasted; that is, all the water that can 
run through an inch hole during the Summer 
would be sufficient to irrigate eight acres when 
applied, not by the siugle inch, but all at once 
three times in the season. The water is ap¬ 
plied only when the crops need it. One inch 
one day is the same as 30 inches a month. 
Farmers apply water all the way from the 
first of June to the last of August, about two 
or three times to each crop. If a farmer ia 
entitled to only 30 inches from a ditch on 
which several others live, and if he requires 
more, he agrees with his brother farmers to 
use his own aud their’s to day and let them 
use his to morrow, and so on. The more water 
rushed on and the quicker it is done the 
better. 
The thrifty and intelligent farmer has a 
number of gates to each field through which 
he can force the water iu a hurry over his 
crop. Irrigating large fields through one gate 
is poor policy. It wets Borne portions too 
much and leaves others too dry. 
On the basis that one inch is 
enough for eight acres, suppose we 
take 3U0 acres to figure eusily, with 
a permanent stream of water run¬ 
ning 37Jj inches in midsummer 
with a four-inch pressure; this is 
equivalent to about three fourths 
of a cubic foot per second. 
Dividiug 300 into plots of 10 acres 
each, «t* find that each 10-acre field 
is entitled to the entire streams 24 
hours each for June, July and Au¬ 
gust, or 25 inches 30 hours of every 
mouth. Twenty-five inches are 
equal to oue half cubic foot per 
second, aud a 10 acre lot will get 
64,300 cubic feet iu 30 hours, which 
will cover the entire sun ace a frac¬ 
tion uver one inch in depth. 
Three irrigations a season are 
enough for all cereal crops; but 
strawberries, cabbages, lawns, etc., 
require a good flooding every week. 
Some say that a season's irrigation 
should be ad least 10 inches in 
depth—put ou three times—three 
and one third inches deep on every 
application. Others think much less 
will do. The nature of the soil 
has much to uo with the quantity. 
The great advantage to agricul¬ 
ture in haviug a supply of water 
by irrigation rather than by rainfall 
is that in the former case the supply can be 
let on the fields just when it will do the 
most good, whereas iu the latter case cruel 
experience shows that droughts are often dis¬ 
astrous even in the most fortunate localities. 
■ --- 
THE TRUTH ABOUT IT. 
(The object of articles under this heading is not so 
much to deal with '' humbugs " as with the many un¬ 
conscious err»«-s that creep into tne methods of daily 
country routlue life.— Eds. I 
FARMERS' SONS. 
W. L CHAMBERLAIN. 
This article is intended for the fathers, and 
not the sons. When the fathers have read it, 
I don’t know but what they will hide the 
INOCULATING- SHEEP WITH ATTENUATED ANTHRAX VIRUS.— Fig. 209. 
