THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
Hope Farm Notes 
Bad Teeth. —Frank's leg got so bad that 
we had the veterinary come to look at 
him. There comes a time when I rather 
lose faith in our own powers to cure the 
sick—then I want an expert. While ho 
was hero tho Vet. looked all the horses 
over. Johnnie has had several attacks of 
colic which we could not acoount for. An 
examination of his mouth showed that 
some of his teeth had grown out so far 
that he could not chew his food properly. 
His stomach-ache really came from his 
teeth. These long teeth were filed down 
so that the jaws would come together, and 
then the little horse felt more like a colt 
than he had for some years. Major's 
teeth were getting so sharp and rough 
that they hurt his gums. A little filing 
put them right. I feel sure that many 
horses suffer because their teeth are not 
attended to. Tt is folly to suppose that 
the nerves of the human jaw are the only 
ones that twitch and jump when tne air 
strikes them! I also believe that there 
are many elderly people who have some¬ 
thing of Johnnie’s trouble. They have 
lost most of their teeth and still try to 
eat the same kind of food that was satis¬ 
factory when they had a full set of teeth 
to prepare it for digestion. As the teeth 
go we ought to discharge them gracefully 
by eating soft food. Many a human will 
grunt and growl with all sorts of ailments 
and dose with everything from pills to coil 
liver oil when what ho lacks is a tooth or 
two. We can’t get the Vet. to como and 
file good digestion into our teeth, but we 
can switch off on to softer food,, and that's 
the most sensiblo thing to do. When T 
was a boy they gave me all the hard crusts 
because “they would make my teeth 
grow." Tho old gentleman who had charge 
of me found these crusts too much for him 
until ho soaked them in his tea. I think 
there aro many of us who would do well 
to resign the tough food to young teeth, 
and content ourselves with soaked food. 
Farm Notes.— The rain is still falling— 
so are our hopes for good corn fodder! We 
have cut between showers, but the stalks 
are still green, and this dull, steady wet, 
without sunshine or wind, gives them no 
chance to dry out. The ears are large and 
full, but still soft, but we have no business 
to let the corn stand after October 5, for 
then we are face to face with hard frost. 
Wo cut small shocks (3G hills) and leave 
them open so that the wind can blow 
through them. We shall get the fodder 
under cover as soon as it is lit and begin 
to shred at once.There seems to 
be some little demand for pumpkins this 
Fall. Our crop is very fine. I planted 
what I supposed was the old Connecticut 
field variety, but we find two quite distinct 
types. One long variety will average over 
20 pounds in weight, a bright golden color 
and of very good quality. The boys named 
it Hope Farm Gem, and took first premium 
on it at the fair. We shall pick the best 
specimens for seed. I intended to feed all 
the pumpkins to the stock, but if the price 
is right I will turn what I can into cash. 
• ... It is said that pumpkins in the 
corn come about as near to giving some¬ 
thing for nothing as anything that goes 
into the soil. In one sense that is true, 
yet the pumpkins interfere with good cul¬ 
tivation, and are greatly in the way when 
we want to sow clover or rye in the corn. 
Our pumpkin vines were so rank that wo 
missed a seeding of clover on nearly half 
the field. We can put in rye later, but 
this is not so good.The rains 
have started the Fall weeds and grass in 
the cornfield, and delayed us so that it 
will not be possible to seed to grass this 
year. When the corn is cut, and as soon 
as the soil is dry enough, we shall broad¬ 
cast rye over the field, work both ways 
with the cultivator and then roll, working 
as close to the shocks as possible. This 
is rough seeding, but the best we can do 
this Fall. I am not satisfied to let any 
soil go bare through the Winter if I can 
help it. 
Will you not make any exception to that? 
Yes, a tough old sod that has not been 
plowed for many years! I would turn that 
up in rough furrows and leave them ex- ! 
posed to the weather This would destroy 
some insects and break up the soil. All 
cultivated fields ought to be covered with 
some living crop during the Winter and 
Fail, because that is the time when most 
of the soluble nitrogen is washed away. 
I suppose your fields are all covered? 
i regret to say that the potato fields are 
still bare! By the time the potatoes were 
dug the rains began, and we were not able 
to get in rye. When the rain slacked a 
little I figured that it was more necessary 
to cut the corn. Then the fact that Frank 
is a cripple just now puts back our team 
work. There are times on the farm when 
several jobs come up together. They can¬ 
not all be done at once, and we must de¬ 
cide quickly which is most important. 
• • . The Fall crop of little pigs is 
about ready for sale. Spring pigs sell 
better usually, but we expect little trouble 
in turning our stock off. We have several 
purebred Yorkshires that are too good to 
make into pork. 
Feed Notes.— I sold the wheat at 80 
cents a bushel and the rye straw' at $15 per 
ton. I think it pays best to feed rye at 
home rather than to sell it at 56 cents a 
bushel. It doesn’t pay to guess at these 
things. There ought to be a way of know¬ 
ing about it. The chemists have picked 
apart average samples of different grains 
and give us these figures to work on: 
Food Value In 100 Pounds. 
Muscle Fat Pure 
makers.formers. fat. Price. 
Middlings . 9 55 2.50 S1.35 
Oats . 0 43 4.80 1.37 
Rye straw .SO 36.50 .40 .75 
Wheat .12 61 1.20 1.33 
Ryo .10 65 1.00 1.00 | 
Corn . 8.50 0,1 4.80 1.23 ! 
Bran .10 48.50 3 1.05 j 
T have figured here the. amounts of di¬ 
gestible food in 100 pounds—that Is, tho 
part which an average animal can readily 
digest. I think these figures show quite 
clearly why I decided to sell rye straw 
and wheat and not sell the rye. Of course 
those figures do not tell the whole story. 
Some kinds of feed are better than others. 
Few farm animals like ryo. Mix it with 
other whole grains and feed it to hens and 
they will pick out the other and barely 
touch tho ryo. I do not like to feed it to 
cow's. When ground with corn and oats 
it makes good horse feed—in fact, I think 
it should always be ground for best re¬ 
sults. Our Winter roughage for ah stock 
is shredded corn fodder. Thus we want 
to buy tho grains that contain most muscle 
makers, and this means at present prices 
chiefly bran and oil meal. I consider the 
price of middlings altogether too high as 
compared with bran, yet we need them 
lor the little pigs. 
But how about tho manurial side of it? 
That is worth looking at, too. A state¬ 
ment of this will look about as follows: 
Plant Food In One Ton. 
Rye straw . 
Ni¬ 
trogen. 
Pot¬ 
ash. 
Plios-. 
acid. 
15 
4 
Wheat . 
10 
16 
Rye . 
.35 
11 
17 
Corn . 
.32 
8 
12 
Bran . 
28 
Oats . 
9 
12 
Here you will see again that it pays well 
to sell rye straw and wheat and buy bran 
if we consider the manurial needs of the 
farm. You wall notice how rich wheat 
bran is in the elements of fertility. Let 
us suppose we get a ton and a half of rye 
straw and 20 bushels of ryo per acre. We 
can sell the straw for $22.50. This takes 
away from the farm 12 pounds of nitrogen, 
22 pounds of potash and six pounds of 
phosphoric acid. Our stock also loses 16 
pounds of muscle makers. Now with the 
$22.50 we can buy 48 pounds of nitrogen, 
30 of potash, nearly 60 of phosphoric acid 
and over 200 of muscle makers. We do not 
consider the fat formers In purchased 
feed, because our cornstalks supply all wi¬ 
nced. 
I)o you mean to toil us that rye and rye 
straw contain as much fertility as wheat ! 
and its straw? 
The chemists report that there is more j 
potash and phosphoric acid and a little I 
less nitrogen in the rye and its straw. 
Yet rye will grow fairly well on soil too I 
poor to grow wheat! 
That is true, and it indicates that ni- ! 
trogen is very necessary for wheat. It 
also shows that rye has some power to 
utilize plant food in the soil, which wheat 
does not possess! 
Bto crops. — inis proposition from an 
old friend iu Pennsylvania is too much for 
me: 
“Why do farm papers want farmers to 
raise bigger crops so they can sell cheaper? 
Farmers never get a fair price unless pro¬ 
duce is scarce. Why not raise less und 
get more for it? The South got more for 
a crop of 9,000,000 bales of cotton than 
they did for 11,000,000!’’ 
If farming were like a manufacturing 
business it might be possible to regulate 
the year’s output so as to keep up prices. 
My great-grandchildren may see the time 
when that can be done, but I never shall 
unless events march faster than I think 
they will. To unite farmers so that they 
could agree to cut down the total crop 
of the country will require an intelligence 
and faith which we can now hardly con¬ 
ceive of, or some iron-handed authority 
ihat ought to have no place in a republic. 
1 do not see how the agricultural papers 
can do otherwise than urge their readers 
to do the best they can. My own experi¬ 
ence is that many of us try to cover too 
much ground. We would be better off if 
we would seed down half our land or even 
let it go to weeds, and put the most thor¬ 
ough work on the best half. Another 
thing must be understood—it is not the 
lota! money taken in during the year tlvt 
shows good farming, but rather' the bal- 
an ,ce left on hand! The little man who 
soils $500 worth of produce and so man- 
ages that he has $150 cash left after paying 
his bills has made a better showing than 
he whose sales ran to $3,000 at an ex¬ 
pense of $3,300! There are many sides to 
this question. Most of them look alike to 
the despondent man on the underside of 
a mortgage, but for the average man 1 
know no better advice than to do his best 
within his own means. I grant the truth 
of the statement about southern cotton. 
Efforts have, been made, again and again 
to curtail the planting, but after all flood 
and frost are the only masters of the sit¬ 
uation, and one year with another that 
man is best off who does his best! 
H. W. C. 
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