1900 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
55 
HOPE FARM NOTES. 
Water Systems.— We have many letters 
from farmers who have studied hard at the 
water problem. I realize the Importance 
of the cold-water problem, both politically 
and agriculturally. It Is pretty hard when 
tank, mill or pipes go on a spree. That 
upsets the water system, and your own, 
too. Our waterworks are about as faith¬ 
ful as any of the human members of the 
family, but they need constant watching. 
A friend in New York State sends us the 
following note: 
"I have to rely on wind power to get all 
my water for stock. In 1896 I built a 30- 
barrel tank in the barn. It never proved 
satisfactory with me, as I could not en¬ 
tirely shut off the flow into the trough 
during severe weather, and during the cold 
week in January, 1899, the tank became 
useless, so that as soon as the weather 
would allow in the Spring I erected an ar¬ 
tificial mound, and built a cistern on it, and 
the water is drawn from that back to the 
trough. The tank in the barn cost nearly 
380, while the cistern was built and com¬ 
pleted in good snape, capacity 100 hogs¬ 
heads, for $63.19.” 
Our tank holds about 1,300 gallons. It is 
too small. If I were building again I 
would have a 5,000-gallon tank anyway. 
Our windmill is idle half the time. I must 
say that I hate to see it standing still when 
it might be at work. There is a little rise 
of ground about 500 feet from it, where I 
think we could build up a stone pond or 
reservoir, from which five or six acres 
could be irrigated. What would be the 
objection of having Brother Windmill put 
in his idle hours filling such a pond? I 
can’t see any, except the lack of the needed 
dollars just now. 
Leading the Water.—I have tried to ex¬ 
plain our water system, but some friends 
evidently do not understand it. The water 
comes from a drilled well 140 feet deep. It 
is pumped by a windmill through a l*4-inch 
pipe to a tank in the barn. On the barn 
floor, below the tank, is a hydrant from 
which the horses are watered at a tub. 
About three feet out from the pump a one- 
inch pipe leaves the main pipe, and runs 
to the house—entering in the cellar. These 
pipes are three feet under ground. Just 
back of the house is another hydrant. On 
entering the cellar the pipes are carried 
along the wall and up through the floor 
into the kitchen. One enters a boiler which 
stands beside the Madame’s new range. 
This range has a water-back attachment, 
so that the water in the boiler is kept hot. 
It is piped on to the sink, where another 
pipe carries the cold water as it enters the 
house. When the fire is going the women 
folks have hot and cold water always on 
tap. This system works pretty well. The 
pipe at the barn froze once, and the tank 
leaked for a time, but on the whole it is 
a great convenience in every way. 
The Family Cow.—The one-cow man 
often asks how he can best feed and care 
for the faithful family wet nurse. Old 
Jersey is doing good work for us. She has 
a room of her own—and she deserves it. 
We keep her without rope or halter in one 
of the large box stalls left by the former 
owner. She has a good bed of marsh hay. 
It is shaken up and cleaned out every day. 
She has all the pure water she wants, and 
an occasional brushing—which should be 
given every day. On bright, pleasant days 
she goes to pasture, for the sunshine does 
her good. For roughage she has sweet 
cornstalks and good hay. Her teeth are 
poor, and she cannot handle the stalks very 
well. For grain she has about eight pounds 
of bran a day—half each night and morn¬ 
ing. We don’t keep this cow to see how 
much we can make her give. She is a ma¬ 
chine for working up the rough products 
of the farm. If I were hunting for a ration 
that would best please a family cow I 
would feed one-fourth each corn meal and 
ground oats, and one-half wheat bran. 
Twice a week I would add a handful of oil 
meal. With us it is a question of giving a 
cheap grain ration with our stalks and 
hay, and bran fills the bill well. 
A Cheap Nurse.— The bran costs us at 
present prices less than seven cents a day. 
I do not count the stalks at any figure, for 
the sweet corn ears paid a fair profit for 
all. At this light expense old Jersey stuffs 
us full of milk and cream. A neighbor’s 
boy, who is sick with consumption, has a 
pint of cream every other night, and there is 
skim-milk left for old Jersey’s daughter, 
Blossom. I wish you to understand, too, 
that it’s cream that we eat. People come 
here sometimes and are almost frightened 
to see the way we pour out the cream. I 
know the tricks of the townsfolks. It’s a 
great game to thicken milk with corn¬ 
starch and call it cream. Old Jersey 
knows the real thing—and so do the rest 
of the Hope Farm folks. I’ll tell you right 
now that the butcher will never get his 
knife on old Jersey. When she dies, Hope 
Farm will give her a decent burial—near 
enough to our choicest tree or vine to en¬ 
able her to keep on doing her duty. 
Child Notes. —“The neighbors are get¬ 
ting acquainted with me!” That was the 
proud statement made by the Graft one 
night. It seems that the Graft walks over 
after the mail on pleasant days, and now 
and then the neighbors ask him to take a 
letter or bring one back. I tell him that 
he must make a record for being prompt 
and faithful and then people will want 
him for better and more useful Jobs. The 
little chap sees the point, and he tries hard 
to make a good messenger.The 
little school is quite a success. Our little 
folks show me their work on the black¬ 
board every night. Say what you will, it 
is a great thing, where one can do it, to 
keep the little ones at home. Our public- 
school system of education is a wonderful 
thing—no doubt. It certainly costs enough. 
It is tough, thougn, when your pure-mind¬ 
ed little folks come home from school with 
filthy words fixed in their brains, and try 
to draw the indecent pictures which the 
older children have shown them. I often 
wonder what our moral-suasion folks would 
want to do with a boy or girl who would 
smooch the mind of their little one! 
. . . . This brings up a matter that Is, 
perhaps, the hardest thing a parent has 
to do. The little Graft is getting old 
enough to ask questions that must sooner 
or later occur to every boy and girl. I 
don’t purpose to have our little boys run¬ 
ning off to older boys or black-minded ras¬ 
cals with such questions, though such ex¬ 
planations make about the hardest job a 
man has to tackle. It is likely to make a 
fellow feel that he is a long way off from 
what he should be.The Graft and 
Scion and yours truly have formed a little 
society. We have agreed never to drink, 
smoke or swear. The little chaps say they 
won’t drink or smoke till I do. It seems 
easy to me to get the confidence of such 
little folks if we will only put ourselves 
out a little. It’s worth trying. 
Feeding Notes.— Old Major never looked 
so well as he does this Winter. His grain 
ration is bran, corn on the ear, and curry¬ 
comb. No use talking, our old horse does 
respond to a good daily brushing. Bran 
is famous food for an old horse—especially 
when part of his roughage is cornstalks. 
. . . . The hens are fond of oats, though 
they cost too much for poultry. Corn is 
cheaper grain for poultry. By feeding bran 
In the mash, and either cut green bone or 
animal meal we can readily balance up the 
daily ration.Our “little daugh¬ 
ter,” or the heifer calf, bids fair to be a 
credit to Hope Farm. She is growing large 
and lively. She has a room of her own, 
like her mother, and her girlhood days are 
happy enough. We feed her skim-milk 
still, hay and stalks for roughage, and a 
mixture of oats and bran. I suppose an 
ideal ration for a growing calf would be 
silage, clover hay and oats. We have 
neither the silage nor the clover. There is 
no use talking, the best grain for young 
and growing stock is oats—with bran close 
behind.A wise man who is sup¬ 
posed to know all about pigs looked at 
some shotes recently. “There,” he said, 
“see that curly-haired Berk. He is beat¬ 
ing the rest. The curly-haired pigs always 
do it!” I never said a word, but the 
“curl” on that pig’s hair was not natural. 
He slept on the outside of the pile. The 
rain got at him and rumpled his hair. 
Some experiments that I have heard re¬ 
ported have about as much back of them 
as the curl on that pig—and not a bit more. 
All Sorts.— Snow is called “the poor 
man’s manure.” We had a fair coating of 
it on January 14, but I shall still use fer¬ 
tilizer. Why is snow any better than 
rain? I think it washes out and brings 
down more nitrogen from the air. The 
good effects of snow are, I think, more 
noticeable on grain or grass than on other 
crops. These crops are benefited by a 
cover.We have been throwing 
the coal ashes on the orchards around the 
apple trees. A hard rain came and showed 
us how we were losing fuel. The ground 
was quite black with unburned coal. Now 
we sift the ashes carefully. The Graft and 
Scion pick out the cinders, and are paid 
for the coal they save.Two weeks 
ago I printed a letter from a young man 
who wanted to try the poultry business. 
We seem to find everything through The 
r. N.-Y., for a Jerseyman has written to 
say that while he does not care to loan the 
$3,000, he has land and buildings which a 
live man might turn into hens and eggs. 
.... On January 14 we found the first 
hen with a desire to sit. That is early in 
the season for our birds. I think that we 
shall have to accommodate her. 
We thought we did a smart thing when we 
left some potatoes in the ground until No¬ 
vember 29. When we come to eat them 
they prove soggy and poor enough. That’s 
right, most people have to smart to pay 
for the fun of being “smart.” The soil is 
the place for potatoes to grow in, but not 
the place to keep them. h. w. c. 
English rose growers have been securing 
soil analyses from a number of widely 
separated localities where roses of superior 
quality are grown. The soil differed widely 
in chemical and mechanical composition, 
and the conclusion reached is that favor¬ 
able climatic conditions had more to do 
with the excellence of the flowers than the 
Ingredients of the soil. 
A BUNCH OF DAIRY BRIEFS. 
The ambition of too many men is to keep 
a certain number of cows rather than to 
keep cows of a certain standard as to 
product and profit. 
We would be better off if we kept fewer 
cows and raised all their feed, instead of 
keeping more cows and buying so much 
grain. 
Raise calves. If you haven’t skim-milk 
use oil meal, middlings and water. You 
can raise a cow to her first calf for $15. 
You can’t buy one for that sum. 
There are a good many men who are 
carrying milk to the station every day, and 
who, before they return home, drink up the 
value of a good deal of the milk in bad 
whisky. This Is a poor way to prosper. 
Give the money to your wife rather than 
spend it for foolish things. 
A good slick talker came around selling 
an abortion cure at $4 a gallon jug. I 
finally bought a gallon, and haven’t had 
a case of abortion since. Perhaps I should 
explain that I put the jug in my corn 
house and haven’t drawn the cork yet. My 
neighbor bought several gallons, gave it to 
his cows regularly and has had abortion 
in his herd right straight along. 
If of limited means, you can improve 
your herd quickest by buying a purebred 
sire; see that you get an animal of in¬ 
dividual merit, not simply one that has a 
pedigree. Get one from an ancestry that 
has had a lot of good cows. 
The biggest compliment ever paid m* 
was when my hired man told a neighbor 
that a cow kicked Mr. - right over in 
the manure; he got up, brushed off his 
clothes, spoke kindly to the cow and went 
on milking as if nothing had happened. 
The value of manufactured products an¬ 
nually produced in the United States is 
$288,000,000, while that of agricultural prod¬ 
ucts Is $854,000,000. Yet, people think that 
manufacturers are the life of the nation. 
Of the 148 creameries and cheese fac¬ 
tories of New York State that were visited 
by the Cornell authorities, only 83 wer* 
fairly clean, the remainder fairly dirty. In 
63 of these there was the use of tobacco 
while at work. We don't want a nicotine 
flavor in our products. A foul smell about 
a factory means dirt, and the smell means 
that It’s ashamed of itself and trying to get 
out of the way by decay. The reason so 
many creameries and cheese factories are 
dirty is because the consumers do not visit 
the factory. If they did, appearances 
would change. h. g. m. 
•when fed with the things eggs 
are made of. Eggs are mostly 
albumen, produced by the hens 
from the protein they absorb 
from their food. 
Bowker’s Animal Meal 
gives a hen the maximum of 
protein and other egg making 
material. Always sold in 
yellow bags and packages. 
The Bowker Co., 
43 Chatham St., Boston. 
THE . 
armers* 
Forge. 
■v utp n 
MAKES 
BLACKSMITH 
& REPAIR BILLS 
SMALLER. 
USED^ 0 ENDORSED 
BY FARMERS IN 
EVERY STATE. 
Welds a A inch 
^ Wa«fonTire. 
The Egg 
Harvest 
is now. Hens will keep in best 
condition, assimilate most egg- 
making food, and lay most eggs 
while eggs are high if you feed them 
SHERIDAN’S 
Condition Powder 
One pack. 26c.; large 2-lb. can 
§ 1.20; si x $5.00, prepaid, 
ull particulars “How 
to Feed for Eggs,” 
and sample best 
poultry paper, free. 
I. S. JOHNSON & CO. 
Boston, Mass. 
good FREE 
Send um yonr name and address and we will send you POULTRY 
TOPICS one month Tree. The poultry paper that Is full of 
hard sense and money-making suggestions. Vyrite immediately. 
POULTRY TOPICS. Box 12. WarRnw. M o- 
2000 PREMIUMS 
were awarded my fowls at 12 State Shows in 1899. 
FOWLS AND EGGS w^“™ 0H e*,‘c 
Send5o for illustrated catalogue. rUK OALC. 
rHAg nAMMPBMNfiPR. Box86. Columbus.0. 
AUSCHER’S 
I Stock 
WinQ In the hands of 
,,,0 hi8 customer 
i uv , it id uupiuuici 
f and takes every prise In sight. Never fails. We lead 
in quality and lowest prices. Largest pure bred poul¬ 
try farm in the Northwest. Few mnininoth poultry 
book and catalogue explains all. Worth $25, butsent 
forioc. johj eauscher,Jr,Box 66,Freeport,III 
EASY ECC MONEY 
▲ man can easily make money selling eggs if he can but get theeggs. 
He can get the eggs aurc—twice as many, if he will feed his hen. 
on tireen Cut Bone. No better way to prepare it than with 
ADAM’S 
GREEN BONE 
CUTTER 
It cuts on the shear plate principle. Takes off 
a fine ribbon like piece, easily consumed by the I 
chicks or fowls. No sharp splinters to injure throat, u 
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Catalogue No.88 free. W . J. ADAM, Joliet, III. 
THE CROWN »?«•! 
hones. For the poultry man. Best in the world. 
Lowest in price. Send for circular and testi¬ 
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ff CJJST US $4,000 'ZTISo 
We have spent $4,000 on our new book, 
“How to Make Money with Poultry and 
Incubator..” It tell.it all. Leading poultry 
men have written special article, tor it. 192 
pages, «xl 1 In. Illustrated. It’s a. good a. 
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Incubators and Brooders 
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Kcv. 1L He user made a 100 Egg Hatcher, cost 41.00 
BARGAINS IN INCUBATORS- 0 ,Sr 
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nCATU Tfl I IPE on HENS and CHICKENS 
ULnln IU LluL 64-page book jtbeis. 
D. J. LAMBEBT, Box 307, Apponaug, U. I. 
Is as large and will do as much work as any $10 Forge 
made. Guaranteed to be as represented or money 
refunded. 
cncnill HCCCD-Until March 31, 1900, 
Or CulAL UrrELIl we will oiler this Forge 
complete, ready for use, at $3.75 each. This oHer 
will not appear again. Send stamp for special cata¬ 
logue and testimonials. 
The C. A. S. Forge Works, Saranac, Mich. 
Thrice-a-Week World 
Gives you ail the news of the whole world 
every other day. It’s the next best thing to a 
daily paper—18 pages a week, 156 pages a 
year. It is independent, fearless, and is with 
the plain people as against trusts and mono¬ 
polies. We can send it in combination with 
Thh Bubal Nkw-Yobrbb, one year, for $1.65. 
