686 
THE BUBAL MEW-YORKIR. 
OCT.IS 
Slrborifttltural. 
TREES FOR WIND-BREAKS AND HEDGES. 
These are among; our greatest wants, and 
more particularly on nearly all the wide plains 
stretching eastward from the Rocky Moun¬ 
tains. For wind breaks, and at the same 
time for forming a good hedge against horses, 
cattle, and sheep, there is nothing superior to 
the Norway Spruce. For this purpose it 
should he planted in a double row ten feet 
apart each way. the inner trees opposite the 
central space of the outer ones. This is a 
yery hardy tree which grows rapidly, and. being 
an evergreen, it is much more desirable than 
deciduous trees for winter shelter. The hem¬ 
lock comes next in utility to the Norway 
8pruce, and is of equal hardiness and rapidity 
of growth, except in stiff, clay soils. The best 
deciduous tree for a hedge is the Honey Locust, 
as it does not sucker like the Yellow Locust. Its 
thorns are longer and stronger than those of the 
Yellow Locust, and consequently it makes a 
much more formidable hedge. If properly cut as 
it grows, neither sheep nor swine can get 
through it, nor in fact scarcely a rabbit or ver¬ 
min of equal size. It does not shelter or har¬ 
bor vermin, as most other hedges do, especially 
that of the Osage Orange, which has been so 
much planted at the West. 
For timber, fence posts and railroad ties 
the Catalpa is said now, by many, to be nearly 
as durable as the Red Cedar or Yellow Locust. 
If so, it would be the most desirable tree of 
all toeultivate for these purposes, ns itishardy 
and grows very rapidly even in a poor soil. 
Added to this, it is among the most ornamen¬ 
tal of our trees, as it has long, broad leaves, 
and from the latter part of June into July 7 it 
is covered with a mass of snowy blossoms. 
We understand that one nursery establishment 
alone In Illinois, contracted last Spring to set 
out among its customers, at least 1,500,000 
Catalpa trees. These not only assist to lessen the 
force of the fierce winds which sweep over the 
plains so destructively at times, but also soften 
the climate, help to make it more equable 
and bring in a greater rainfall, or serve to ren¬ 
der that which occurs more beneficial. 
Jatm ®ojiits. 
EXPERIMENTS ON GRAVELED BOG- 
LAND. 
PROFESSOR F. H. STORER. 
The merit of the German method of reclaim¬ 
ing drained bogs by covering the soil with 
gravel, as contrasted with the older method of 
mixing gravel with the soil, has been tested in 
Holland by Carsten, who grew oats upon con¬ 
tiguous plots of moor-land which had been 
reclaimed according to one or the other 
method. As will be seen from the following 
table, inferior crops were obtaiued in every 
instance from the plots where the gravel and 
moor-earth had been admixed than from those 
where the g-avel was simply Bpread upon the 
surface of the soil and left there permanently, 
according to the method explained in detail in 
the Rural of February 14th. 
Each of the experimental plots measured 
one fifth of an acre, and they were manured as 
it is stated in the table. 
Bush, of oats 
harvested 
from one- 
fifth aero. 
Manure on one-fifth of an 
acre. 
Cost of the 
manurefor 
one-fifth 
acre. 
K lbs. rectified guano. 
65 “ steamed bone-meal, 
as " sulphate of potasb 
ana onn8gnMi&. . 
6(1 *’ plain Peru >ruano. 
66 “ steamed bone-meal , 
83 '* sulphate of potash 
ana of magnesia. , 
83 “ nitrate of soda. 1 
96 “ steamed bone-meal [ 
83 “ sulphate of potash I 
and of mwniesia. J 
110 '* rectified tfuano. 
Same money value of) 
plain Peru guano. I 
It was thought that 
6.13 
5 56 
$4.00 
8.61 
6.13 
4.25 
4.26 
1.94 
3.80 
9.37 
6.81 
3.80 
1108 
7.66 
4.00 
most of the nitrate of 
soda was washed away by rains and that 
better results would have been got from this 
material by using a larger quantity of it and 
applying it at intervals as a top-dressing, 
Simultaneously with the foregoing experi¬ 
ments, a couple of plots were manured with 
night-soil from city cess-pools, applied in such 
quantity that the cost of it amounted to $14.87 
for each of the one-fifth acre plots, and there 
were harvested from the one plot 13.14 bushels 
of oats, and from the other 11.35 bushels. It 
is remarkable, both as regards the night-soil 
and the guano, that the largest crops were ob¬ 
tained from the manures moat likely to be 
charged with the ferment which would pro¬ 
mote nitrification of the moor-earth. It is 
noteworthy also that an amount of plain guano 
costing $20 to the acre, gave almost as large a 
crop (55J- bushels to the acre) as the night-soil, 
which was applied at the rate of $74 to the 
acre and gave 5S1 bushels of oats, a6 the mean 
of two trials. 
It has been suggested that the method of re¬ 
claiming bogs by covering them with gravel is 
too costly to be practised here in America, so 
ioug as laud continues to be as cheap as it is 
now: and the remark is doubtless true in gen¬ 
eral aud especially as regards large stretches 
of swamp laud. But there arc numberless 
special instances, particularly in the older 
Statea, where, taking all things into consider¬ 
ation, small patches of bog could best be re¬ 
claimed in this 5 vay—notably in the vicinity of 
houses and where circumstances are specially 
favorable for moving the gravel. In any event 
the. process deserves the attention of all 
thoughtful men, because it enforces 60 me very 
important lessons in respect to moisture, til¬ 
lage, manuring and the action of frosts. 
GLEANINGS. 
Weeds nre Everywhere Present. 
They spring up in a night; they flourish 
like Jonah’s gourd ; they come without plant¬ 
ing, tlourish in spite of neglect and of persist¬ 
ent fighting. The land seems full of their 
seeds ; manures are loaded with their germs, 
ami their number is legion. What is a weed ? 
It is a plant out of place. Beans are a weed in 
a corn patch; corn is a weed in a potato field; 
wheat is a weed in any place but a wheat field. 
But aside from plant out-of-place weeds, we 
have hundreds and hundreds of weeds that are 
weeds everywhere, anywhere, always. They 
a*e never in place; if so, their place has not as 
yet been found. Weeds wantlooking after early 
aud late—all the time. The plow, cultivator, 
hoe, rake and hand must be kept judiciously 
employed in their subjugation and destruction. 
Clean culture is the only culture to le admit¬ 
ted. It is the only culture the good farmer 
knows or practices. Weeds in the field are 
not the only ones to be looked after. They are 
by the wayside, in the yards and pastures, 
scattering their fecund and fertile seeds. They 
are in every by-place and nook. Oae weed 
will propagate evil over a large space. Cropa 
are never beyond the power of injury by 
weeds until they are harvested. The appear¬ 
ance of the roadsides is a good indication of 
the farmer’s practices; the appearance of his 
hoed crops is the same with regard to his 
thrift in all things. Weeds draw heavily on 
the 60 il and particularly on the fertilizers 
used. They are hardy, persistent, vigorous, 
and claim the lion's share if permitted to grow. 
Good Cattle 
are the best investment a farmer can put his 
money into. I never knew a man satisfied 
with himself or his trade, who bought poor 
stock at any price to keep. Good Shorthorns, 
Ilerefords, Jerseys, Ayrshires or Holsteins are 
cheap at high figures. They produce the best 
of beef, work, milk, butter, cheese, leather. It 
is extremely necessary to profit that the farm¬ 
er buy healthy, thrifty, high-bred animals, 
those that produce, or are capable of producing 
the most and best of these products. The next 
thing, after good blood, is good feed aud then 
good care- Breed, feed, care, are three-thirds 
of successful cattle husbandry. Good breeds 
amount to nothing without proper and abun¬ 
dant feed. They amount to but little with 
proper and abundant feed if not properly 
sheltered and cared for. They must have suit¬ 
able pastures and soils, and the surface of the 
country must be adapted to their constitu¬ 
tions. The Short-horn and Hereford are out 
of place on broken pasturage and hilly ranges; 
the Ayrshire, Devon and Jersey are there at 
home. The Holstein delights in rich, alluvial 
meads and succulent bottom grass-lauds. Good 
cattle are a necessary adjunct to good farming 
everywhere and always accompany it. The 
introduction of good stock into any farming 
community always has a good effect by stimu¬ 
lating it to better effort and better feeding. It 
places a higher standard before the farming 
public. It excites a favorable eraulatu n that 
works good to all beneath its influence. Good 
cattle are the highest type of agriculture. 
Disproportionate Premiums 
at our county aud State fairs would seem to 
call for attention from the public, and especial¬ 
ly from the cattle breeders and owners they 
militate against. The horse premiums are very 
disproportionate and much larger, taking the 
class together, than the cattle premiums. I 
fully appreciate that noble, but not noblest, 
animal, the horse. I am alive in every sense 
to his value aud services. The horse interest 
is vast and varied and of immense importance 
to the country. I appreciate his every quality 
from the farm to the turf; his every service, 
civil or military, of draft, conveyance or 
speed; and summing all and all up, I cannot 
but make him second to horned cattle in use 
and benefit. In draft, farm service, aud trans¬ 
portation the patient ox is as useful as the 
horse. In speed and conveyance the horse is 
ahead. But here ends the,comparison. The 
horse furnishes no food or but very little, and 
the leather from his hide is inferior. Beef, 
butter, milk, cheese, tallow, leather, veal, 
horns, glue and a hundred other articles of 
use, comfort and luxury come from the cattle, 
the whole vastly overshadowing and out¬ 
weighing the usefulness of the horse, with all 
his utility, splendor and fascination. Yet the 
agricultural fairs award ten times the attention 
and money to the horse; hold out ten times 
the inducements to horsemen, and direct ten 
timoB the effort and ten times as much pub¬ 
lic attention to the horse as to cattle. It does 
not seem right, and stockmen, farmers and the 
press Bbonld help to adjust a proper balance 
between the two. so that each may be equally 
encouraged as each has intrinsic merits and 
affords benefits to the country. 
Pruning Fruit Tree* 
is a subject with which almost every one who 
owns aud occupies land is more or less inter¬ 
ested. It is a subject upon which a wide vari¬ 
ety of opinion exists as to time, character, 
amouut and style. Some kinds of fruit need, 
or will bear, a great deal more and a great 
deal severer pruning than others. It Is a 
process that calls for a great deal of correct, 
wholesome thought, and a large amount of the 
best common sense in judgment- I am aware 
that experts and experienced nurserymen will 
form, mold, train, guide and direct trees into 
almost any form and shape. This may be 
called the artistic, the scientific side of prun¬ 
ing and training, bat the great mass of our 
orchardists aud farmers never can or will at¬ 
tain to that degree of proficiency, and, in fact, 
it i6 not necessary that they should. What we 
want for the masses is to know how little 
pruning, and when applied, a tree will do or¬ 
dinarily well with uuder average circum¬ 
stances. I have an impression from experi¬ 
ence and observation that too much pruning 
i« done than rather too little. The result is 
the trees have long, unprotected ti links and 
limbs with finebrauches, buds and bearing wood 
at the far extremities. I believe that every 
limit tree should be trained so low as to afford 
self-shade for trunk and large limb*, and a 
partial mulch by its dense shade- The fruit is 
more easily gathered, that which falls less 
bruised, and wiuds and storms have less rake 
upon them. J. W. Lang. 
Sain HitsbantiT]). 
THE DAIRY COW—NO. 11. 
HENRY STEWART. 
Different Methods of Setting Milk for Cream. 
TnE dairyman is a fortunate individual. 
While he sleeps or dreams sweetly or uneasily 
of the high or low prices of cheese or butter or 
milk, scores of immntors are tossing in sleep¬ 
less unrest, all iutent upon discovering some 
new dairy appliances. Thanks to these inven¬ 
tive minds, we have the most effective and 
convenient devices for setting milk for cream. 
To mention all of these would be impossible in 
these limits, but a typical method of each of 
the two systems of setting milk, viz.: that 
with deep pails and that with shallow pans, 
may be described. 
Formerly milk was put in shallow pans and 
only seldom in deep, earthen jars, aud we owe 
the deep pall system to the Swedish dairymen. 
With the deep pails, deep, cold spriug water 
tanks or lee closets are required, aud where 
flowing cold spring water can be secured, there 
this more modern system is very convenient, 
chiefly because of the economy of room. A 20- 
quart, deep pail is ninc.inches in diameter; a 
10 -quart pan is 15 inches, aud a pool to hold 
400 quarts of milk in deep pails may be no 
larger than four feet long by three feet 
wide, while to hold 400 quarts in shallow pans 
would require a trough 00 feet long and 10 
incheB wide. The advantage is obvious, and 
for those who use spring-houses it is a great 
economy. With a deep pall the milk of a fam¬ 
ily cow may be lowered into a well and kept at 
a regular temperature the whole year, aud the 
milk-house becomes a very simple affair. The 
simple deep pool in whieh the pails are im¬ 
mersed to within two inches of the upper edge, 
may be built up of bricks laid in cement, or 
with wailB of cement. This may be construct¬ 
ed above a spring so that the water flows in at 
the bottom and over the top, and escapes by a 
pipe built into the side ; or the pool is supplied 
by water brought in a pipe fron a spring or 
from a well near-by. With a spring there 
may be a constant flow of water and no ice be 
required. With well water a supply of ice will 
be required iu the Summer, and the house will 
need to be warmed in the Winter. 
But great improvements have been recently 
made in both the deep and shallow setting of 
milk. One inventor entirely submerged the 
milk pails under water by means of a peculiar 
arrangement of the covers of the pails. This 
method, known as the Cooley system, effec¬ 
tually seals the pailB and perfectly secures the 
milk from any contamination whatever from 
the air. By regulating the temperature of the 
water with ice, the milk may be kept any¬ 
where—in the stable, the kitchen or the set¬ 
ting-room; and as the water tank is made 
non-conducting, the outside temperature has 
no effect upon that within. This is a very 
popular method aud is in use in mauy of the 
best dairies and creameries. But the use of 
this method is necessarily confined to those 
who have a supply of cold water or ice, or who 
have facilities for disposing of the waste water. 
Many people are prejudiced against deep set¬ 
ting, and iu favor of sliallow pans, from which 
the cream can be skimmed in the usual man¬ 
ner. In fact, mankind differ so much iu opin¬ 
ions and prejudices that it is impossible to fiud 
any one method against which some objection 
may not be raised, whether it be justly or un¬ 
justly. So in setting milk, some will use shallow 
pans. The arguments in favor of this method 
are chiefly cheapness and convenience. Where 
one has a very good milk-house or cellar 
perhaps nothing else can be preferable to 
the common press'd tin pans which have 
rounded corners and are more easily cleaned 
than any other milk pan in use. But there are 
very few such milk-houses and cellars, and to 
adapt the shallow-setting system to every sort 
of condition, the invention of the Ferguson 
Bureau Creamery has been made. This may 
be kept iu a room, or kitchen, or a cellar, as 
the temperature is regulated by ice kept in a 
chamber above the milk. The milk pans are 
inclosed by glazed doors so that dust and other 
impurities are excluded. These two contriv¬ 
ances are typical of the two different methods, 
and although there are several modifications 
of these apparatus I don’t know that any one 
improves upon the original device in any par¬ 
ticular. 
It lias been said that the quantity and qual¬ 
ity of the butter produced differ to some ex¬ 
tent with the deep or shallow setting of the 
milk. Some persona have disputed vigorously 
over these claims, and some have made careful 
tests. But there has beeu nothing proved in 
support of any such claim for either system. 
Alter a whole year’s continuous trial of both 
of the apparatus above described, I am uuable 
to perceive any difference in the production of 
cream or butter either iu quantity or quality, 
and the whole question becomes one of conven¬ 
ience in use. It is very true that one who is 
expert, from long use and experience of dairy 
methods may do as well with one system as 
with another, just as a good workman never 
finds fault with his tools; but there are those 
who need the very beat arrangements because 
they do not perfectly understand the principles 
of their work. Such persous should use the 
very best appliance they can procure, aud 
whichever they may choose, should stick to it 
without changing and with perseverance; for 
one who becomes familiar with a certain way 
of workiug will always do better, even if it is 
nothing more than whittling a stick with the 
left hand. My weekly production of butter 
never changes, and the quality never varies, 
when made in the submerged deep pails or the 
shallow pans iu the Bureau Creamery; the 
only difference is that the cream is more solid 
and is of a deeper yellow in the shallow pans 
than in the covered pails. 
SHEEP AND THEIR PROFITABLE PRO 
DUCTION. 
The judicious breeding aud rearing of sheep 
is undoubtedly the most profitable branch of 
husbandry pursued in America. If any one is 
indoubt as to this, let him considerfirst, 
the value of the fleece ; second, the mutton; 
third, the pelts; fourih. the increase of the 
flock; fifth, the improvement of the soil on 
which they feed, aud, lastly, that they can be 
kept on lands so rough that the herbage must 
necessarily go to waste, unless cropped by 
sheep. 
What breed of sheep would be best to rear 
and keep to insure the greatest profit ? This 
can only be auswered by each flock-master for 
himself, as it depeuds ou a combination of 
climate, soil and situation. On cheap lauds, 
distant from a mutton market, fine-wooled 
breeds, such as the Merino. Silesian and others 
of cognate blood, are generally found to bo 
the most profitable, as the wool, the pelts, 
aud the increase of the flock alone, are of auy 
considerable value. Long-wooled breeds to a 
certain extent may also be kept here, and pay 
well when their fleeces fetch a fair price for 
com! ing for worsted stuff goods. On higher- 
priced lands, convenient to a good meat mar¬ 
ket, or to a port of exportation to ship them 
abroad, choice mutton breeds which bear a 
reasonably good fleece, arc to be preferred. 
Here mutton, as in Great Britain, is the chief 
thing to be depended upon for profit, wool 
being only a secondary consideration. 
Of the various mutton breeds, which are con¬ 
sidered best? In answer to this we may say 
that each one may be the best for a certain 
time, and according to circumstances. If a 
