^try h Oj^ 
PRICE FIVE CENTS. 
$3.00 PER YEAR. 
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 19, 1885 
Vol. XLIV. No. 1873 
Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1835, by the Rural New-Yorker In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, 
We also tried the experiment of scattering 
seed of the same turnip among the beans at 
the last cultivating, and were, agreeably al 
lowed to see them come on after the beans 
were harvested, and produce a very nice crop. 
Indeed, we like the plan so well that hereafter 
we shall sow all the bean ground at the last 
cultivation, or about the last of July, with 
turnips. It will pay if we were to eat them 
off with sheep in the Fall, or, even to allow 
them to stand over to be plowed down for 
barley in the Spring. 
One of the best pieces of barley we ever 
raised was on ground on which turnips bad 
been grown the previous year, which 
being caught by the Winter, were plowed 
under in the Spring. It was a splendid 
keep up the steady strain until it yields, or 
until they are restrained by their driver. We 
have watched with admiration a heavy road 
plow rooting down ten inches at least into a 
hard, gravelly bed, tilled with stones from 
the size of one’s fist to that of a man’s head. 
Twoor three yokes of oxen tugged away in front 
of it, and whan it struck a stone and stopped, 
they would not yield a pound, but kept the 
same steady draft, increasing it perhaps while 
one or two men at the handles and another at 
the beam would slightly vary the direction of 
the plow point, so shat it would go forward 
again. In sloughy ground, where horses 
would flounder hopelessly, oxen will straddle 
over stones, bogs and logs, sink to their 
bellies in mire, and pull all the time, never 
getting excited or unruly, but pulling right 
through. So in the snows; if cattle cannot 
open the road the case is hopeless, unless there 
is an army of shovelers at command. Work 
in the woods they sure well adapted for, and 
if well shod in Winter, the paths can hardly 
be too steep, too rough, or too icy for them; 
they are not nimble, but they are very sure. 
As farm teams for common work, horses 
are probably better on the whole; for that 
seems to be the verdict of the community. 
Still, a well broken pair of oxen will plow as 
much in a day as a common pair of horses, 
and with much less labor to the plowman, and 
they can be used for all slow work quite as 
well. Many will walk as fast as a man, and 
trot for a mile as fast as most farm horses. 
As to breeds, we find the larger and heavier 
beef breeds to produce slow, steady and very 
heavy oxen, while the smaller breeds—Devons, 
Ayrshires and *• Alderneys ”—make quick, 
smart, lively cattle, not so heavy, but having 
ten times the snap and sprightliness.and appar¬ 
ently greater intelligence. Training of steers, 
if it begins when they are yearlings, is easy 
enough. If they are three years old the task 
is more difficult. The good trainer always 
keeps his temper and uses his long whip as a 
wand rather than as the instrument of tor¬ 
ture, which it can easily become. To accus¬ 
tom cattle to work together, they are often 
yoked up and turned into the pasture. They 
sometimes turn and twist themselves almost 
unaccountably, and are found with the yoke 
hanging under their necks. To prevent this, 
a light hickory or ash stick may be fastened 
securely across their foreheads, being bound 
to their horns by light ropes. When released 
from this bondage, they are so gratified that 
they behave themselves very well in the yoke. 
The driver’s position is on the left, because 
in passing another team on the road, he turns 
to the right and must be where he can see 
clearly how close the hubs come. The whip¬ 
stock should be a slender, elastic one of 
| water elm, black birch, beech or hornbeam, 
about seven feet long, with a lash two and a 
half feet long, or thereabouts. With this the 
driver can stand well back on the left or 
‘•nigh” side, and touch the right or “off” ox 
on the head or anywhere, without danger of 
hitting the nigh one at all. This is important 
in turning “haw” or here—while in “gee” or 
off, that is, to the right, the lash Is dropped 
in the face of the off ox, while the nigh one 
is touched up with the butt of the whip in the 
ribs. 
First teach whoa! Raise the whip high in 
the air at the word, and bring it down across 
their faces if they do not stop. They will 
quickly learn both the word and the sign. 
Then teach haw! the driver touching the 
flank or rump of the off ox, and, if necessary, 
the face of the nigh one, the whip being 
swung at the word from right to left as the 
cattle should turn. Then, probably after a 
good rest, for we must give short and easy 
lessons, teach gee! swiugiug the whip in the 
direction they should turn. Thus they will 
learn to mind by the movement of the whip 
THE PRICE PER POUND 
for them depends so much on the locality, the 
grade and condition of the stock and the sup¬ 
ply and demand, that none can be named. 
We have sometimes bought for as low as 
three cents per pound; and at others have 
paid five and-a half or a little more. But it 
is safe to buy at such a price that you are 
quite sure you can sell them, when fattened, 
at an advance of one-and-a-half cent per 
pound. You thus get the larger price on such 
growth as you put on them, and the cent-and- 
a-half per pound on the purchased weight, 
and these two sums, if the animals have been 
properly cared for, cannot fail to give a satis¬ 
factory profit. 
We are pretty badly crowded just now, in 
Itofceu from tltr lUrat'ji W4MII* Jarm 
FEEDING LAMBS. 
WHEN TO PURCHASE, AND WHERE 
so as to get the most carcass for the least 
money, and to get the animals into the pens 
in the most thrifty condition, are questions 
only secondary in Importance to the selection 
of breed and style of lamb. If one is pro¬ 
vided with plenty of good pasture, which it 
is desirable to convert into a marketable 
shape, and if the lambs can be found with¬ 
in easy-driving distance, by far the best 
time to procure them is juBt when they 
should be taken from the ewes, and this should 
be, if they were dropped In April or May, the 
latter part of August, or early in September. 
If brought directly from the ewes, and put 
into good, fresh feed containing more or less 
clover (the more the better), and provided 
with the conveniences, and dally fed a little 
jran or oil meal, or, what would be better, a 
mixture of the two, they will grow right 
along, thriving even better than if left longer 
with the mothers; and, having this nitrogen¬ 
ous food, they will produce a much more 
valuable fleece. But when they are not to be 
found about home, and must bB bought in a 
market so far away as to require more than 
a day, or, at farthest, two, to get them from 
the mother to the pastures; or, if one must 
depend upon hiriug pasture, and be shifting 
them about, so that it is not possible to feed 
or have them feed as before directed, we 
would prefer to purchase later, say in Octo¬ 
ber, so as to have them home ready to put into 
the barns at a suitable time, and so that they 
may be fed grain and oil meal a few days or 
weeks while still In the pastures. We have 
found it a very good practice to contract for 
the lambs quite early, agreeing to take them 
at a stipulated time, and paying an agreed 
price per pound for them when delivered. 
This is a very fair way, and wheu the lambs 
are so bought the raiser (if urged to do so), 
will often provide troughs and feed them as 
before mentioned, because, of course, the 
more he makes them average the more he 
obtains for them. 
ALWAYS BUY ABOUT HOME 
when it cau be done at not more than one- 
fourth of a cent per pound more than they 
would cost if purchased in a distant market 
and shipped or driven homo. A lamb is a 
delieate auimal, and if by harsh treatment or 
a long journey, by cars or ou foot, it begins to 
lose flesh, it is hard to stop the falling off, and 
put the auimal into a thriving condition. 
If not obtainable in one's own vicinity, then 
they must be procured from other places. In 
such a case, if you cau find a place whore such 
lambs are growu as are desired, it is usually 
cheaper to arrange with some local dealer, 
familiar with the raisers and the grade of 
stock, to purchase the desired number, first 
going with him and showing just what ar6 
wanted and stipulating that nothing else will 
be accepted and that he must “bunch” them 
and deliver them on board the cars at the de 
sired 11. R. station; or elsewhere if preferred. 
Wheu accepting the animala, hold the dealer 
to the bargain made and throw out all which 
do not fill the bill, as an undesirable lamb is 
dear at any price, and a half dozen will spoil 
the looks of a car load. 
We usually buy such as we cannot get 
about home, in the Buffalo market. As it is 
only BO imlesawaj and thousands of lambs are 
there weekly, we can secure just what we 
want and usually at u price less tbun the ex¬ 
pense of going where they are grown, and 
having them picked up and shipped to the 
arm, and then we save time and annoyance. 
TAYLOR’S PROLIFIC BLACKBERRY. From Nature, 
(See page 868 of Supplement.) 
our barns. Having decided to hold our apples 
for a better price, we have them stored in the 
new barn basement, and they take up so 
much room that we have had to fill the other 
part of that and the old barn pretty fulL We 
have also been obliged to forego the purchase 
of a part of the lambs which we had intended 
to feed this Winter; but should we sell the 
apples by the first or middle of February, we 
will still fill up, and feed the lambs a little 
later in the Spring. 
We always turn over a few acres of clover 
meadow immediately after mowing and put¬ 
ting it into good order, well enriched, sow it to 
some kind of English turnip; this year we 
sowed the Purple-top Strap leaf, and we had 
a magnificent crop, which will come into good 
play for early feeding to the stock. 
WORKING OXEN, 
Their steadiness and power in pulling: 
breeds; the training of steers; hints about 
driving ; the lash; teaching to back; breech¬ 
ing. _ 
There is a wonderful steadiness and accu¬ 
mulated power in the draft of the ox. Horses 
get nervous, and, when an obstacle is encoun¬ 
tered, are seldom so broken that they will 
k 
