5 
p 
Vol. XL1Y. No. 1825. 
NEW YORK, JANUARY 17, 1885. 
PRICE FIVB CENTS. 
*2.00 PER YEAR. 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year lSi'j, by the-Rural New-Yorker In the omce of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
3trjcl)itf(tural. 
A CHEAP AND CONVENIENT COUNTRY 
HOUSE. 
HE illustration we give this 
week, at Figure 2,5, is of a resi¬ 
dence owned and built by T, 8. 
sawed; did the hauling with his 
own team, and at odd times 
dressed out much of the lumber, 
making it impossible to give the exact cost, 
but he estimates it at about $1,000, although 
his outlay in money was not one-fourth of that 
amount. Mr. Strohecker is not a carpenter, 
but has ‘'picked up” a good deal of the trade, 
and he says his house, as built by himself, is 
really the result of keeping a workshop on 
the farm, and gradually becoming acquainted 
with the use of tools. The building has a 
balloon frame, is weather-hoarded and paint¬ 
ed French gray, with seal-brown trimmings- 
shutters are green. The mam building is 
26x1 H feet; the wing is 16x10 feet, and there 
is a lean-to kitchen 10x20 feet. The house 
is a story and a-half high. 
At Figure 20 is the plau of the ground floor, 
showing five well-lighted, convenient rooms. 
A chimney of patent east-irou starts at the 
second story; the one in the kitchen is of 
bricks laid flat. The out buildings, seen in 
Figure 28, area springand ice house combined, 
a pig pen and corn-crib, and a smoke-house. 
The trees in the yard are Balsam Fir, Norway 
Spruce, White Pine, Locust, Scotch Pine, 
Larch and Arbor-vitm. In the background 
is an apple orchard. 
THE COW FOR THE DAIRY. 
PROFESSOR J. P. SHELDON. 
I notice in one of the Rural's contempo¬ 
raries that we Englishmen are sharply taken 
to task for preferring the Short-horn cow to 
any other for dairy purposes, and the editor 
plainly intimates that he considers we are 
fools for doing so. 1 have uo concern with 
the manner in which this opinion is expressed; 
but the topic is one to which I may, perhaps, 
do well to direct the attention of Rural read¬ 
ers. The articles which 1 have had the pleas¬ 
ure and privilege of communicating to the 
Rural New- Yorker in the first half of the 
past year, were interrupted by a very pleas¬ 
ant trip made, in the Autumn months, from 
Britain to British Columbia: and, now that I 
am once more settled down at home, iu Eng¬ 
land, aud as the Winter provides opportuni¬ 
ties for writing and reading, i propose to re¬ 
sume the series, and to send the Rural, at in¬ 
tervals, some dairy-farming matter. 
It is true, iu respect of this dairy cow con¬ 
troversy, that, in many parts of England, the 
Short horn is the pi evading dairy stock ut 
the present time. A hundred yours ago the 
Short-horns wore, for the most part, confined 
to the vale of the Tees water, in Durham, 
which indeed is- their original home—the 
hereditary domain of the family, so to speak. 
At that period the prevailing stock iu the 
midluud couuties, and in other counties, too, 
where Short horns now abound, was the 
quaint old Long-born, originally a native of 
the northern corner of Yorkshire, opposite to 
that where the famous valley of the Teeswa- 
ter is found, I may say, indeed, that less than 
a hundred years ago, even in the present cen¬ 
tury in fact, the Long horns were the only 
dairy stock in many parts of the midland 
counties. In the entrance hall of my house 
hangs the portrait, in oil, of the first Short¬ 
horn bull that was brought into this district, 
in the early years of the curreut century; and 
it is within the mark to say that the change 
from that to this—from the Long horn to the 
Short-horn—has been effected in three-quar¬ 
ters of a century, more or less 
So powerful was the prepotency of the 
Short-horn over the Long horn blood, that, 
wiih the exception of a few herds that are 
kept here and there, more as curiosities than 
anything else, all trace of the latter appears 
to have been eliminated from the prevalent 
stock of this portion of England, which is 
now, and as long as I can remember, has been 
essentially Short- horn in character. And all 
this chauge has been brought about by the 
repeated and constant usb of Short-horn bulls 
on the old Long-horn stock, for it was not a 
common practice to briDg down Short-horn 
cows from the north, though no doubt this 
was done sometimes. It is very remarkable, 
in view of the almost complete displacement 
of the Long-horns, that the Short-boms should 
horn cattle are in many cases very good 
milkers indeed. 
I am well aware that, by many American 
farmers, Short- horns are not reckoned to be 
dairy cows at all; they are mere "beef cat¬ 
tle” in the estimation of not a few of your 
people. But why is this; * 1 Au answer can, I 
think, be found—an answer that may proba¬ 
bly be taken to approximate very closely to 
the facts of the case. It is this: the inferior 
reputation for milk, which is borne by Short¬ 
horns in America, is owing to the importation 
into that country, not of good milking stock, 
but of pedigree animals from families whose 
reputation for milk had long ago vanished. 
But, all the same, it is undeniably true that 
Short-horns, both pedigreed and uupedigreed, 
are capable of yielding very 1 irge quantities of 
milk which is of fair quality. Pedigree herds 
belonging to Mi-. Tisdall, Mr. Edwards, and 
others, have shown this by records taken as 
careful'y and accurately,aud for as long a peri 
od, as may have been done in America. These 
records demonstrate the capabilities of the 
breed for milk, and, inferentially, prove that 
it is the misfortune, aud not the fault, of Short¬ 
horns if they‘are not good milkers. 
Country House. Fig. 25 
not have been able to prevail much, if any, 
agaiust the other English creeds of dairy stock 
—against the llerefords, the Devons, theSus 
sex, or the Red Polled Cattle of Norfolk aud 
Suffolk—though they have prevailed a good 
deal against the Welsh and Scotch breeds, 
especially agaiust the former. 
There is reason for all this, of course, 
though at the same time it is not true that the 
typical Englishman regards the Short horn as 
the best cow for the dairy, under all coudi- 
tious and circumstances. The Short-horn 
cows of the old times were famous for a copi¬ 
ous flow of milk, aud it is only in modern 
times that so many of our pedigree tribes 
have lost that reputation. Not all of them, 
though, have lost it, for some pedigree fami¬ 
lies of Short horns are still famous for much 
milk, aud for beef as well, not to mention 
early maturity. It is, however, unfortu¬ 
nately true that in the majority of our pedi¬ 
gree Short-horns the property of copious 
milk-giving has been deliberately sacrificed 
to beef and beauty and early maturity. Of 
this we are perfectly well aware, und the 
course which has led to such a result is re¬ 
gretted by none more than by the pedigree 
breeders themselves. These remarks refer 
only to pedigree herds of Short horn, and not 
to all of them; and our unpedigreed Short¬ 
It must not be understood, from what I have 
already stated, that I wish to stand up as a 
champiou for the m ile yielding capacity of 
Short-horn cows. On the contrary, I have 
frequently said that four British breeds—not 
one of them English. though- surpass the Short¬ 
horns for milk; these are the Jerseys, the 
Guerusejs, the Ayrshires, and the Kerrys. 
Aud when I say this, I take into consideration 
the size of the cow aud the quality of the milk 
she gives, leaving altogether out of sight the 
question of beef. 1 have iu Scotland a friend 
who basa herd of one hundred Ayrshire cows; 
last year these cows yielded him au average 
return, by cheese-making, of $81 per cow; and 
as you cau keep four Ayrshires where you 
would keep three Short-horns, it is tolerably 
certain that the latter would be hopelessly 
beaten iu the milking department. 
It is not for milk only that Englishmen look 
in Short horn cattle, though milk is, or should 
be, the most important item. We want a cow 
that will milk well for three years, and then 
make beef worth $120 to $150. or even more 
in some cases; aud this it is that makes the 
Short-horn so popular a cow for the dairy in 
many parts of England, viz , milk and beef 
combined. Miud, 1 do uot say this is the most 
profitable thing to do iu all eases, aud I freely 
admit the possibility that, milk and cow 
taken together, an Ayrshire, a Jersey, or even 
a Kerry will beat a Short-horn out and out in 
four years’ milking, on a given area of land. 
This, at all events, is true, viz.: that we Eng¬ 
lish have gone too much for beef in our dairy 
stock in days gone by. Is it possible that you 
Americans are running now too much on 
milk: We are going back to milk again, as 
you will probably, though to a less degree, go 
back to beef in the breeding of dairy stock. 
Fashion, after all, has a good deal to do 
with the favorite cow for the dairy, and you 
Americans are more carried away than we 
are by that sort of thing. Wisely or unwise¬ 
ly, we make no particular fuss about a cow 
that yields an abnormal quantity of milk and 
butter in a year. Probably we do not make 
fuss enough. I admit, freely, tnat we are too 
supine in these matters, and that in many 
ways you have set us examples we should do 
well to follow. We are not easily moved to 
emulation, and the easy-going self-satisfaction 
which pervades the rank aud file of English 
farmers, is the most difficult thing that dairy 
reformers in this country have to contend 
with. In respect to these things, however, 
we are improving, though slowly, aud it may 
fairly be hoped that the rising generation 
will go ahead of that which is passiag away. 
There is, in any case, a stir in the domain of 
dairy farming in these islands, aud records 
are being taken, which will enable our farmers 
to ascertain the best cow for the dairy. 
Surrey, England. 
farm Ccownmj. 
FAR.VI FENCES. 
The merits aud the demerits of every kind 
of farm feuoe should be fully discussed, and 
the relative cost of them compared. I will 
speak only of those with which l have had 
experience. Barbed wire is my favorite for 
large stock, and I believe that when its merits 
are more generally known, it will be used 
almost exclusively throughout the country. 
Its value, however, depends entirely on its 
construction: au improperly built fence is 
both worthless and dangerous. 1 will give 
brief directions for constructing wire fences, 
which I have learned from dear experience. 
For a cattle fence, use three barbed and one 
tablet wire, galvauized; uever buy painted 
wire; put the tablet wire second from the top, 
anil it is almost as easily seen as a plank. 
Place the posts from sixteeu to thirty feet 
apart—sixteeu to twenty-four feet is best, but 
thirty feet will do. Set three posts at each 
shown at Figure 30, on page 38. One unac- 
eud, ten feet apart, and brace them, as 
customed to building such fence, is sure to 
think one brace, or even a heavy post, is suf- 
