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THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
December 28 
thus cut, and for hens it furnishes exercise. I prefer 
corn stover cut with this cutter into two-inch lengths 
to that run through a shredder. I have never tested 
the two side by side with my own stock, but I am 
certain I can feed the cut feed to my own stock with 
less w'aste than any of my neighbors do with shredded 
fodder (or stover). This may be the fault of the 
feeder. Many writers say that the refuse from shred¬ 
ded stover makes excellent bedding. I have nothing 
to say against the quality, but certainly if the quan¬ 
tity left by a horse or cow is sufficient to bed it prop¬ 
erly the practice of feeding shredded stover is not an 
economical one. The tendency of the shredder is to 
make the whole mass more palatable. This makes it 
difficult for stock to separate the really undesirable 
portions from the rest, and the result is that more or 
less of the besit of it is “nosed” over and is rejected. 
If cut the eatable portion is not so great, but the parts 
not eaten are easily sorted from the rest with no 
waste from being “nosed” about. Then if fodder 
(stover) is shredded when dry, as it often is, the 
leaves are pulverized and quite a large quantity lost. 
But neither method of preparing the stalks pays for 
feeding sheep. Careful experiments in feeding cut 
stalks to my own flock and observation of the feeding 
of others who used shredded stalks convinces me that 
sheep will leave a greater per cent prepared either 
way than when fed whole. j. d. p. 
Archbold, Ohio. 
R. N.-Y.—There seems to be a misunderstanding 
about this discussion of shredded fodder. Some of 
our readers refer to the work of the large machines 
which husk the ears and tear the stalk in pieces. On 
our own farm we use a machine which has an ad- 
justible cutting cylinder, the “shredder” consisting of 
21 sharp narrow claws or knives which split and tear 
the stalks. With us fodder torn in this way suits the 
stock better than that sliced off with a clean cut. In 
our experience they eat more of it. Where the fodder 
is simply chopped in pieces we have found that stock 
are likely to cut or bruise their gums in chewing it. 
HENS THAT BALANCE THEIR RATION 
And Save the Hen Man’s Steps. 
Part I. 
The picture shown at Fig. 392 was taken in front 
of the barn of 0. W. Mapes, the hen man. This barn 
is close to the road, and Mr. Mapes, who stands hold¬ 
ing the bucket, believes in airing facts about agri¬ 
culture. So he has written the announcement which 
appears on the little blackboard. 
The R. N.-Y. is somewhat responsible for this “bal¬ 
anced ration.” Seven years ago we had a series of 
articles in which the various food elements were de¬ 
scribed and the importance of having a fair propor¬ 
tion of each brought out. At that time Mr. Mapes, 
though feeding over 1,000 hens, had not paid much 
attention to this side of the matter. Like many oth¬ 
ers, he fed grain and other foods, not knowing wheth¬ 
er there was a surplus or a deficiency of the expensive 
muscle makers or protein. These articles led him to 
feed his hens with a lead pencil—that is, he took the 
analyses of the different foods and figured out Ms ra¬ 
tion to see whether he could make it balance, and 
also to see whether he could feed his hens for less 
money. At that time his ration was about as fol¬ 
lows: 
Morning: A mash consisting of four pounds wheat 
bran, one pound cornmeal, one pound ground oats, 
one pound malt sprouts, one pound animal meal, 2% 
pounds pot cheese. 
Noon: Four pounds of oats. 
Night: Ten pounds whole corn. 
This was the feed for 120 hens, and it gave fair re¬ 
sults, but two of our Massachusetts readers gave Mr. 
Mapes new ideas. One of them told of keeping 29 
hens in a little house 5x20, which cost only ?7. These 
hens were laying 20 eggs per day in zero weather. 
They were fed each day three quarts of wheat feed 
and one-half pint of beef scrap and bone for break¬ 
fast, and three quarts of whole corn for supper, with 
plenty of cabbage and boiled potatoes now and then. 
Then came a man who made an average of 151.74 per 
year each from a flock of 250 hens. He let them take 
care of themselves, feeding wheat chiefly, and giving 
them a run on grass. This man said it did not pay 
to fuss with mashes, and that if grain and grass pro¬ 
vided a balanced ration for cows, so it would for hens. 
Mr. Mapes spent some months in figuring and ex¬ 
perimenting and finally hit upon a mixture of dried 
meat and various ground grains which he called the 
“balanced ration.” This he fed with great success 
several years, but all the time the thought of the man 
who let his hens take care of themselves kept bobbing 
up. Has a hen sense enough to pick out her own food? 
In Summer, when she has free access to all sorts of 
food, she seems to balance her ration without the aid 
of the scientist or the fussy hen man. Mr. Mapes ob¬ 
served this, and so he began to feel his way along 
in a new direction. The result was that when 1 
visited the farm in November the hens were actually 
feeding themselves! In former years the morning 
mash was mixed at the barn and carried in a wagon 
from house to house. This was no small job, as there 
are 40 houses well scattered. Thus far this Winter 
the hens have had no mash at all. In each house is 
a box of wheat and a box of corn, and a pan of skim- 
milk. The hens help themselves at will, and eat just 
what they want. Mr. Mapes has weighed the corn, 
the wheat and the milk repeatedly, and he says that 
the hens feed themselves just the proportions of pro¬ 
tein, carbohydrates and fat that he gave them in his 
mixed balanced ration. The hens are kept constantly 
housed, and the warming device described two weeks 
ago keeps them comfortable. They are never hungry, 
but take small quantities of food at a time. They are 
laying as well as in former years, and are as happy 
and prosperous-looking as hens need ever be. 
But do not hens need a mash or soft feed of some 
sort? 
“Why?” answered Mr. Mapes. “If they are kept as 
warm as mine are they surely do not need it to heat 
them up. I do not know of any reason why a mash 
should be given except that it is the best ordinary 
form for feeding the strong protein portions of the 
food, such as meat or blood. As I am able to supply 
plenty of skim-milk I do not need to feed meat, and 
therefore the mash is not necessary. I do not expect 
to feed any this Winter, though the coldest weather 
may change my opinion about this.” 
Do you consider it really safe to leave a hen alone 
with unlimited food? 
. “Certainly—provided you give plenty of protein or 
muscle-making food so that she can easily digest it. 
It would not be safe to let a hen have nothing but 
corn before her, but with wheat added and some sub¬ 
stance like milk she will surely do her own mixing. 
THE SIGN OF THE HEN MAN. Fie. 393. 
I have kept a hen in a berry crate for months with 
different foods within reach and she laid day after 
day and kept in perfect health.” 
Is there any substitute for the skim-milk? 
“I think cut bone would answer and perhaps a cake 
made of bran, ground oats and animal meal dried and 
crumbled.” 
It would make this article too long to discuss in 
full Mr. Mapes’s remarkable plan of feeding. He 
feeds the mixed ration to pigs. Why not let them 
balance their own rations? Is a pig more of a “hog” 
than a hen is? These and other points must be left 
until next week. h. w. c. 
SEED SELLING: OLD AND NE» METHOD. 
Seed selling through agents is a very old plan, the 
agent originally being the local storekeeper; this 
plan is still followed in some sections of the country, 
with the modification that flower seeds are now sent 
to the stoi-ekeeper in many instances through the 
mail instead of being delivered by team. In the early 
days firms like the Landreths, of Philadelphia, and 
the Shakers, of New Hampshire and New York, put 
their reputation into their seeds, and gave them a 
character for reliability, but other firms who entered 
the market with their box seed, mere money-makers, 
without a conscience, greatly injured the business 
through the districts where they marketed, making 
such seed a by-word for unreliability. This and the 
defect more general among the box trade of not sup¬ 
plying the newer improved varieties gave birth to the 
mail business, which was an effort to supply the pub¬ 
lic not only with good seed but with seed of improved 
varieties of flowei's and vegetables. B. K. Bliss, I 
think, was the first to start the mail trade in an ex¬ 
tensive way, and the late James Vick and Peter Hen¬ 
derson and myself followed closely after. In the 
early days of over 40 years ago, we had to pay letter 
postage on all seed, and it was not until special and 
cheaper rates were made by the Government that the 
mail seed business grew into its immensity. In the 
early days the great West was the especial market of 
the mail seedsmen, but as towns increased in size the 
seed trade would become localized in their midst, 
and our market would move on to fields and pastures 
new. In those times we nurtured through their in¬ 
fancy, by giving control of local territory, provided 
they would agree to sell our seed only, men who have 
since taken rank among the leading seedsmen of the 
country. J. C. Vaughan, the great seedsman of Chi¬ 
cago, was, in his early days, one of my proteges for 
two or three years, under this arrangement, and the 
thorough honesty he displayed in carrying out his 
part of the agreement, w^as but a manifestation of 
that reliability which has justly won for him the 
large patronage he now enjoys. The mail trade is 
still a large and live business, bringing to tens of 
thousands of isolated homes blessings in vegetables 
and flowers that were formerly the monopoly of the 
more densely settled sections. Besides selling seed 
directly to the farmer the mail business invited its 
customers to act as agents at a per cent of profit, and 
it also sought to graft its business on other trades 
by traveling agents for such caking this as an addi¬ 
tional source of income. Within a few years the seed 
business has developed along lines now followed by 
so many trades, that of having traveling agents of 
its own to whom are allotted certain sections of coun¬ 
try to be canvassed between harvest gathering and 
seed planting. This is a costly way of doing such a 
business, and one that will not pay outside of the 
region devoted to intense farming where the demand 
is for large quantities of the higher priced seed. In 
addition to the outlay for salary and traveling ex¬ 
penses, which in scattered communities are large, 
the sales are rarely for cash; this necessitates extra 
labor and delay in collecting, with the risks that are 
always incidental to a credit business. 
Marblehead, Mass. j. j. h. greoouy. 
LEGAL REMEDIES FOR FOUL SEEDS. 
I was greatly interested in the article on “A Seeds¬ 
man’s Guarantee” in your issue of December 7. The 
decision in that case is right on principle, and will 
not be reversed upon appeal, unless some merely tech¬ 
nical error has crept in at the trial. That question 
was tried out in the courts here several years ago, 
and decided in favor of the farmer, who bought Al¬ 
falfa seed and got foul seed along with it. The jury 
awarded him the damages which he proved, and the 
court sustained the verdict of the jury. There is a 
general legal principle and implied warranty that 
anything is suitable for the purpose for which it is 
sold, and that a fair price warrants a good article. 
“Seed oats” means oats that are suitable for seeding, 
and not oats mixed with foul seed. Seed grain gen¬ 
erally brings a higher price than grain for feeding, 
and a good price implies a good article suitable for 
the purpose for which it is sold. The farmer depends 
and has a legal right to depend upon the judgment 
of the seedsman, and it is the business of the seeds¬ 
man to know what he is selling. The same is true 
of fruit trees. If a nurseryman sells infected stock 
and the farmer is injured thereby the nurseryman 
can be held to respond in damages. The same is also 
true as to animals. If a farmer buys an animal for 
breeding purposes and he proves to be diseased“or 
worthless the seller can be required to make good 
the loss. It is a general rule that where an article is 
sold for a special or particular purpose, along with 
the article goes an implied warranty that it is suit¬ 
able for that purpose. Farmers are not supposed to 
be experts, and are only required to use ordinary care 
in order to protect themselves. The seedsmen and 
nurserymen are presumed to be skilled in their spe¬ 
cial business, and are required to exercise a greater 
degree of care than the farmers who purchase from 
them. If the farmer knew that the grain was mixed 
with foul seed, or that the nursery stock was infected, 
and still used it, he would be guilty of such contribu¬ 
tory negligence as would bar his recovery. If after 
receiving the seed or stock he should discover that 
it was unfit to use it would be his duty to return it 
to the seller at once or notify him that it was held 
subject to his order. t. w. h. 
Topeka, Kan. 
AMERICAN HAY IN FRANCE.—When investigating- 
the stories about “adulterated hay,” or rocks and sticks 
in the bales, we wrote to a number of foreign hay deal¬ 
ers. The following note is from M. Cottard, Havre, 
France: 
“I am sorry to say rocks, sticks and similar things that 
we found in baled hay in 1893-1894 were not jokes, nor 
was buying baled hay a gamble then. France bought 
from North America’s dealers In 1893-1894 thousands of 
tons of baled hay, and If we received many lots of Tim¬ 
othy and clover hay that were of prime quality and in 
good condition, I am sorry many of them, especially 
later in the season, gave us a big loss through bad con¬ 
dition. Then we found rocks, sticks and old damaged 
hay inside the bales, musty, etc. Many claims took 
place then, and finally American hay was discredited on 
our markets. We might have imported hay from your 
side in August and September last, your quotations be¬ 
ing then lower than ours, but Frencli buyers prefcried 
to buy home hay dearer rather than buy American hay. 
I wish you might induce your friends to ship their best 
hay to France whenever we can do Dusmess with your 
country.” 
