1888 
THE RUM!. 
THE HERKIMER FARMERS’ INSTITUTE. 
(RURAL SPECIAL REPORT.) 
One of the first institutes ; it will be hard for 
subsequent ones to present a more inter¬ 
esting programme ; buying farrow cows; 
a double profit ; silo converts ; apple and 
pear culture ; locating an orchard; varie¬ 
ties, tree planting, selecting and buying ; 
silage a help to the winter dairyman ; the 
silo no longer an experiment; how to build 
a silo; all about the dairy cow ; the evolution 
of an $80 cow", N. Y. farmers as “ dry 
nurses; ” the model bam. 
The meeting was opened on Wednesday- 
morning by a short practical talk on farming 
from Sec. Woodward, in the course of which 
he spoke as follows of his own operations. 
FARROW COWS IN THE DAIRY. 
“ I have, this fall, purchased in the south¬ 
west counties of the State 54 farrow cows at an 
average of 2)4 cents per pound. They are so 
poor that they have barely flesh enough to at¬ 
tach skin to bone and yet they are a fair sam¬ 
ple of the dairy herds of that section. They 
have been placed in the stables where they 
will remain until next spring, when I intend 
that they shall be fat enough to please the 
the most fastidious butcher. The butter made 
from their milk will more than pay me for 
their keep. They will sell for more than they 
cost, and my farm will be improved to the ex¬ 
tent of several hundred dollars by their 
manure. I am a recent convert to the silo. 
It furnisbos one of the cheapest foods on the 
farm. An acre will grow 12 tons of silage. 
4% tons with one-half ton of clover hay 
will provide a maintenance ratiou for a 1,000- 
pound cow during 215 days. I want to urge 
the farmers to think and investigate for them¬ 
selves. I believe that to be the surest way for 
them to add to their profits.” 
Seth Fenner, of Erie Co. then spoke on 
HOW TO GROW FRUIT. 
“Nearly 34 years ago,” he said, “ I moved 
from our good old county of Herkimer to 
Erie. There I found a somewhat different 
system of farming in vogue, though dairying 
was a leading industry; truck farming and 
fruit culture, of which I knew little or noth¬ 
ing, occupied prominent positions. Being a 
Yankee 1 set about learning the latter and 
will now give you the benefit of my study. I 
shall confine my talk to the apple—the king 
of fruits—and a few remarks on the pear. At 
the outset, I want to say that if a man has no 
love for fruit culture he had better keep out 
of th6 business. If there is any one branch 
of farming that needs careful thought and 
brains, it is successful fruit-growing. In se¬ 
lecting ground for an orchard—I speak now 
of Western New York—choose an undulating 
piece of land, of clay loam in which the clay 
predominates. Be sure that it is well-drained, 
either naturally or artificially, and fertile 
enough to produce at least 50 bushels of corn 
per acre. Plow not less than seven inches 
deep and pulverize the top as for an onion bed. 
The one great mistake of American or¬ 
chards is the multiplicity of varieties. My 
advice is to select a few standard varieties, 
especially for market. For summer selling I 
prefer the Red Astrachan and Duchess of 
Oldenburg; for fall the Gravenstein and some 
one of the Pippins, and for winter the Bald¬ 
win, Greening, Hubbardston’s Nonsuch, 
Tompkins County King, Russet and Cooper’s 
Market. I wage no warfare against the tree- 
peddler, but 1 must advise you to go to the 
nursery and select your own trees, and the 
nearer you find that nursery to where you 
want to set the trees the better. Cut off all 
useless and mutilated roots and trim the tops 
to correspond with the root. Set the tree as 
deeply as it grew in the nursery, and be sure 
to have fine dirt packed solidly around the 
roots. Mulch the tree with any available 
material, as manure, straw or leaves. I pre¬ 
fer spring setting. After you have set the 
trees, keep them in good cultivation at least 
six to eight years. What I mean by cultiva¬ 
tion is to keep them entirely free from weeds 
or grass. In the meantime, do not let the 
soil degenerate. If you want to use any 
sowed crops in your orchard, use peas and 
buckwheat; or if hoed crops, use potatoes and 
beans, but do not seed down. 
The next thing is the trimming of the trees. 
You know it is said “As the twig is bent the 
tree is inclined.” If you commence taking 
care of an orchaid when it is young you can 
tiim with a jack-knife and will seldom have 
to use a saw. When you can select your own 
time, choose the month of May or June for 
pruning. If not, prune at any time of the 
year. Never permit a limb to grow from the 
trunk less than five feet above the ground. 
This will allow a horse to pass underneath the 
tree when cultivating the crops. 
The trees should begin to bear in eight or 
nine years. The less you can handle the fruit 
the better it will keep. The only advantage 
to be gained by piling in heaps and carting to 
the barn is that if an apple is bruised a few 
days will disclose the bruise. I have tried 
both ways and I say to you from my experi¬ 
ence, barrel your fruit and head it up as soon 
as it is picked 
In picking the fruit, I have adopted this 
mode: A large vat standing upon legs about 
two feet from the ground is moved to a con¬ 
venient position in the orchard. Into this the 
pickers deposit the fruit as fast as gathered 
and the barrelers, standing at the side, sort 
out and barrel the choice fruit. We do not 
barrel any apples that are less than two and 
one-balf inches in diameter. The second 
grades are sent to the evaporator and the 
remainder ground for cider. Great pains 
should be taken in barreling the fruit. Press 
tight; do not be afraid if a few apples are 
bruised as the result. They should not move 
in the barrel when it is handeled. Mark the 
variety on the head. If the fruit-raiser can 
obtain a dollar a barrel net for his fruit, 
it is better to sell than to run the chances 
in keeping. 
You who raise] hardly enough apples for 
your home consumption can hardly realize 
the immense crops of apples produced in 
Western New York. This one crop was 
worth to Niagara Co. alone, last year, over 
$1,000,000, and they have nearly as many this 
year. In Erie county we had $750,000 worth 
and the small county of Orleans produced 
one-half a million dollars’ worth. 
Pears require a soil similiar to that requir¬ 
ed by apples. The varieties that I cultiv a te 
arranged in the order of their value “re 
Bartlett, Buffum, Duchess and Anjou. he 
fruit should be picked as soon as the stem 
will part on raising the fruit to a horizontal 
position.” 
On being asked why he omitted the North¬ 
ern Spy, Mr. Fenner replied that the skin 
was too tender and it was too long in coming 
into bearing. 
The discussion of the question 
“SILAGE AS A DAIRY FOOD” 
was opened by Mr. George T. Powell, 
fruit-grower of Columbia Co., who has gone 
into dairying in order to produce more 
manure for his fruit trees. 
He said the first question for the eastern 
dairy farmer to solve is where to procure a 
cheap, succulent food for his stock. This pre¬ 
sents no difficulties in June and the ease with 
which cows can be kept on pastures has re¬ 
sulted in the production of nearly the whole 
of our dairy products during the summer 
months. But there is an increasing demand 
for fresh made butter in winter. The intro¬ 
duction of the silo has enabled us to answer 
our question for winter as well as summer 
and allows us to meet this new demand of the 
people. The silo is no longer an experiment; 
the many mistakes that have been made in 
the past have been corrected by experience. 
We have learned that the acid product from 
immature crops was much poorer than sweet 
mature silage and with the assistance of 
chemistry we have incorporated ensilage corn 
into our best balanced rations. With silage 
and warm stables the Eastern farmer can 
produce his butter as cheaply in winter as in 
summer. 
In answer to questions from the audience, 
Mr. Powell stated that his ration was 40 
pounds silage, six pounds cloverjliay, three 
quarts bran and three quarts wheat middlings 
daily. A neighbor who did not feed silage 
was able to produce as good results from his 
cows only by doubling the grain ration. He 
so^s State corn, a single kernel every six or 
seven inches in rows three feet apart. 
Ques. How shall a cheap effective silo be 
constructed* * 
Mr. Powell: In my judgment a wooden 
silo is better than one of concrete or stone; 
the frost will find its way through a concrete 
wall if it is three feet thick. A portion of the 
barn bay may be used for the silo or you may 
construct it alone by itself. Get the greatest 
hight possible. The studding should be 2x6 
inches; board on the outside with any sound 
timber; place tar paper on the inside of the 
studding and line with matched hemlock, 
running up and down and leaving an air 
space between the lining and the paper. The 
two requisites are that the silo shall be air¬ 
tight and that the moisture shall be prevent¬ 
ed from entering. If the ground is perfectly 
dry a clay floor will answer, otherwise make 
it of cement. Such a silo can be built for from 
one dollar to one dollar and a half per ton of 
capacity. 
Ques. Why do you feed so much grain 
with the silage? 
Sec. Woodward: Silage is not a well-bal¬ 
anced food ; it is too carbonaceous and re¬ 
quires the combination with it of some 
strongly albuminous food to make a proper 
and economical ration. I am highly in favor 
of the feeding of silage for the reason that it 
requires us to purchase these rich foods and 
feed them upon our farms. It cannot help 
adding much to their tertility. Corn meal 
should never be fed with corn silage. I sowed 
my fodder corn for silage this year, drop¬ 
ping it one kernel one foot apart in rows three 
feet eight inches apart. The only hand-work 
we did on the field was to cut out thistles and 
extra hills with the hoe. The corn grew 12 to 
13 feet high and produced 36 tons per acre. 
I believe nearly every one grows ensilage corn 
too thickly and I shall sow mine further apart 
next season. 
A gentleman in the audience stated that he 
had ensilaged clover with the best of results, 
and that he was now feeding corn silage two 
years old that was as fresh and good as the 
new silage. 
Prof. Roberts, of Cornell University, gave 
an address on 
“ THE DAIRY COW—HOW TO BREED AND HOW 
TO FEED HER 
which must have carried conviction to the 
minds of his hearers by its thoroughly practi¬ 
cal tone. A few of the points made during 
the 20 minutes allotted him are given below. 
“Thereare 1,534,000 milch cowsin New York 
The dairymen tell me that seven-eights of 
them are dry. We will feed them 150 days 
without any return; the food will not cost less 
than 10 cents a day and 10,000 men must be 
employed in the care of the cows. This makes 
the cost of wintering our dry milch cows 
$20,000,000. Dairymen, can you afford to 
pay $200 apiece for the privilege of acting as 
dry nurses to your dry cows? There is a gen¬ 
tleman in this audience who tells me that his 
cows are milked the year round. A New- 
England paper states that the cows of that 
section pay the farmer only $23.50 per year; 
this man’s cows average him $80.00. It re¬ 
quires thought and much perseverance to 
bring your dairy to an $80 standard, but who 
would not attempt it? Though we do not al¬ 
ways gain what we work hardest for, we 
never fail to acquire by our persevorance a 
force of character that will enable us to over¬ 
come at another time greater obstacles and se¬ 
cure a more prized object. 
The first' thing to do next summer is to 
ascertain the exact amount of milk your cows 
are giving: next fall you will fatten one-third 
of those cows. Then buy a bull from a family 
of cows that are bred up to an $80 standard; 
breed him to your $25 cows and the average 
calf will make a $52 cow: continue this weed¬ 
ing and breeding and you will soon have an 
$80 herd. That is the way my friend secured 
his; that is all there is of breeding. Breed to 
a purpose. Do not ask me which of the well- 
known breeds of cattle you shall keep; I can¬ 
not tell you. That depends on your environ¬ 
ments and is a matter that you should study 
out for yourself. There is no sense in putting 
a good cow into a poor stable, so the next thing 
to do, dairymen, is to remodel the old barn. 
This barn has been upon stones three fpet 
from the ground and the chill wintry air 
comes up tnrough the stable floor as though it 
were a ventilating flue. Bring the horse barn, 
the sheep barn, and the cattle barn together on 
the three sides of a square; knock out the 
floors; take off the roofs and remove the sid¬ 
ing from the inner sides of the barns. Put 
one roof over all and lay the stable floor 
upon the ground. Line the inside of the 
stable with the old siding and fill the space 
in the wall with straw. Don’t paint the 
barn till you pay the mortgage that is on the 
farm. How shall we teed the cows? Well, 
how would you feed a man? Would you put 
indigestible and disgusting food before him? 
Feed cows with the same brains you use in 
the preparation of your own food. Give 
them something that is appetizing which nine 
times out of 10 means digestible food. 
In figuring the cost of a food you should 
never forget its value as a fertilizer. A ton 
of cotton-seed meal is worth $28 as a fertilizer 
to spread broadcast on your fields. I have 
just purchased a car-load at $22.50 per ton; if 
this be fed to milk cows they will take out 
only 20 per cent, of the fertilizing elements 
and their excrement will be worth all the food 
cost. Can you afford to buy commercial fer¬ 
tilizers and neglect to purchase such a cheap 
fertilizing material as this ? 
There is another point left that I want to 
emphasize. The milch cow must have an 
abundance of water, and I hope you will not 
oblige her to drink it from the ice-cold brook. 
It is cheaper to warm the water with coal in 
a heater than with hay in a cow. Heat the 
water to a temperature of 60° to 80° and give 
it to your cows in the barns. 
J. K. Brown , State Dairy Com.: My cows 
last year gave in gross receipts $93 apiece 
and netted us $56. We find that butter can 
bo made]at a profit if sold at 16 cents a pound. 
I would like those men in this audience that 
know how much milk their cows gave last 
year to hold up their hands. (Prof. Roberts 
alone could tell.) Do you suppose any other 
business could be carried on by such methods ? 
Why, the sheriff would sell the proprietor out 
in less than a month. I bought a Jersey cow 
of a neighbor who wanted to send his milk to 
a cheese factory, and though her milk was 
very rich the Jersey did not yield enough to 
suit him. By judicious feeding we made her 
give 7,000 pounds of milk in a year. You see, 
the trouble was with my neighbor, not the 
cow. The subject of 
“sensible rations for cattle feeding” 
was handled very nicely by Prof. E.F. Ladd, 
the chemist of the N. Y. State Experiment 
Station. He illustrated his remarks by a set 
of diagrams showing the chemical composi¬ 
tion, digestibility and quality of various 
foods and rations. Mr. F. O. I ves urged the 
farmers to breed draft horses and F. D. Curtis 
spoke upon “ Profit in Butter—how to in¬ 
crease it.” 
The last session, that on Thursday after¬ 
noon, was devoted to a discussion of full- 
cream cheese manufacture which was opened 
by papers from G. A. Smith and M. F. Mor¬ 
gan, both in the employ of the State Dairy 
Commission. 
The sentiment of the institute workers, one 
and all, was shown to be opposed to skim 
cheese, and to this fraud was credited the 
cause of the starvation prices the cheese men 
are receiving for their product. M. F. w. 
Womans Work. 
CONDUCTED BY EMILY LOUISE TAPLIN. 
CHAT BY THE WAY. 
“A beautiful woman is a jewel; a good 
woman is a treasure.” So said Saadi, the 
Persian poet, some 600 years ago, and though 
we can’t all be jewels, every woman may be a 
treasure in the poet’s sense. Peach-like cheeks 
may become wrinkled, brilliant eyes dim; 
but real goodness never grows old. A good 
heart and a good temper will keep a woman 
lovable and attractive, if not beautiful, to 
the end of her days. 
* * * 
Many of the papers have recently given up 
much space to the discussion of the rather 
useless question “Is Marriage a Failure?” 
Many of the opinions aired on this topic are 
amusing—many of them absurd. But it is 
noticeable that in nearly every case where the 
union discussed is an unhappy one, the causes 
for its failure are very simple. In the major¬ 
ity they are simply selfishness or bad temper, 
often both. And there are few unhappy mar¬ 
riages which could not be rendered more 
bearable if both husoand and wife made more 
effort in self-restraint. “ Only temper ” is re¬ 
sponsible for many unhappy lives. 
* * * 
This is the season when coughs and colds 
prevail, and chapped hands, cold feet, or 
chilblains torment the sons of men. Accord¬ 
ing to a clever doctor there is no real cure 
for chilblains; all one can do is to try to pre¬ 
vent them. They are usually caused in the 
first place by getting the feet very cold, and 
then toasting them at the fire. One preven¬ 
tive highly recommended is camphorated lard, 
made by melting together slowly one ounce of 
camphor and one pound of lard. Pour it into 
tin cans or boxes—we use baking powder cans 
—and let it get cold. As soon as ever frost be¬ 
gins, victims of chilblains should rub their 
feet well with this every night before retir¬ 
ing, drawing on an old pair of stockings to 
sleep in. The treatment should be begun be¬ 
fore there is any sign of chilblains, and 
though it may not entirely prevent them, it 
will certainly mitigate their severity. It also 
gives relief in bad cases, and will be found a 
very useful salve. 
* * N= 
Camphorated lard and cold cream, de¬ 
scribed in a recent Rural, are two essentials 
for comfort during the winter, when one is 
exposed to cold in the daily work. Another 
thing one should keep in the house is a lini¬ 
ment composed of turpentine and sweet oil 
—one-third of spirits of turpentine to two- 
thirds of sweet oil. It is an excellent remedy 
for colds on the chest, applied on flannel in 
the form of a plaster. It is much safer than 
a mustard plaster; the irritant qualities of the 
turpentine are softened by the oil. It may 
be left on for days, until the cold is relieved. 
If sharp pains in the chest or side suggest the 
approach of pleurisy or pneumonia it will be 
advisable to apply such a plaster at once; it is 
the first thing our doctor orders in such cases. 
This liniment will relieve many aches or 
rheumatic pains, and it has the advantage of 
being inexpensive. 
