98 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[March, 
floor there is a root-cellar, and under the prin¬ 
cipal hay-bay a storage room for plows, har¬ 
rows, etc. The general arrangement of the cat¬ 
tle floor and liay-room is shown in fig. 8. The 
ox and horse stables open into a small yard, 
separated from the cow-yard. The animals 
have access to the latter through the doors at 
the end of the building. The feeding passage 
is not wide enough for a cart, but it is wide 
incloses the manger on this side. Eighteen 
inches in front of it is a board four inches high, 
nailed to beveled blocks at intervals of three or 
four feet. These blocks support a shutter,which 
may be turned back against them for putting in 
cut feed or meal; or turned up straight and 
closed with a button against a three-by-four 
timber which supports the hay-rack. This rack 
consists of strips of Georgia piue2£ in.wide and 
enough for a team alone when unhitched from 
a loaded cart or wagon left standing upon the 
thrashing floor. 
The features of this stable to which we espe- 
. dally wish to call attention, are the arched floor 
and the arrangements for tying and feeding. 
The main timbers supporting the floor are 28 ft. 
long, running across the building. There are 
two of them, one about one third the distance 
from either end of the cow-room. These are 
supported each by two 10-inch chestnut tim- • 
hers, resting on foundation stones, and standing 
under the lines of the upright posts to which 
the cattle are tied. Before these were put in, 
and after the outside of the building was fin- 
ished, the cross-timbers were screwed up in the 
middle as much as they would bear, having a 
“ crown ” of about six inches, giving an arch¬ 
like form to the floor,The middle of the feeding 
passage being six inches higher than the outside 
of the passage behind the cattle. The floor- 
joists were then notched in to these timbers and 
to the end sills to a uniform depth as far back 
as the rear of the floor on which the cattle 
stand. At this point a drop of four inches is 
given by spiking a scantling against the floor 
joist. From this point the passage floor rises to 
the side of the building. This gives good drain¬ 
age, great simplicity, and great strength. The 
construction of this floor and of the feeding ap¬ 
paratus is shown in fig. 2, 
the details being more 
clearly set forth in fig. 4. 
There are no partitions 
between the cattle, save the 
bars which separate the oxen 
from the cows. At the left 
side of each cow’s neck, on 
one side of the barn and 
at the right side on the 
other, stands a turned post of chestnut, three 
inches in diameter at the bottom and two inches 
at the top. To these the cows are tied, by ropes 
arranged with a running loop fastened around 
the posts, and with buttons and eyes to fasten 
around their necks. A board six inches high 
one inch thick. In front of it there is a shutter 
3 ft. wide, hinged at the bottom, which may be 
turned flat against the slats when hay is not be¬ 
ing fed, or may be dropped back the length of 
the chain which supports it when necessary. 
Fig. 1 is a perspective view of this barn from 
the down-hill side. 
The Story of a Good Cow. 
BY GEORGE E. WARING, JR., OF OGDEN FARM. 
She is a Jersey, of course—not that there are 
not good cows of other breeds, but then I am a 
Jersey man, and my interest in this breed leads 
me to learn more of the good qualities of this 
family than of others. Her sire and dam were 
imported from the island of Jersey by Col. God¬ 
dard, of Provi¬ 
dence ; and her 
name is “ Theresa.” 
She belongs to Mr. 
E. B. Perry, of Pro¬ 
vidence, and I had 
heard enough of her 
to induce me to pay 
her a visit. She 
lives on a little farm 
about two miles 
north of the city, 
mx 
Fig. 4.— SECTION OP STALL. 
and has all the care that it is possible for a 
man who is fond of her to give. 
I have seen handsomer cows—indeed, she has 
few of what arc known as “fancy points,” be¬ 
ing large, raw-boned, crumple-horncd, and big- 
bellied. She is far from being solid-colored, 
and she has not the “black points” of which 
we read so much in the agricultural papers and 
see so little in the best Jersey cows. She is of 
“the real old Tainter kind.” If handsome is 
that handsome does, then “ Theresa ” is a beauty 
of the first order. She is eleven years old, and 
had her last calf March 18th, 1871, and is to 
calve again March 16th, 1872. 
The account given below is made up to the 
last day of 1871—275 days from April 1st (13 
days after calving). The family she supplies is 
a large one, and aside from the milk required 
for other purposes, much fresh milk is used in 
cooking. Mr. Perry estimates the value of the 
milk used in his family at $50—say 17 E /' a cents 
per day. Fresh milk and cream were sold to 
neighbors for $12. Probably these items repre¬ 
sent nearly 1,000 quarts of fresh milk that was 
not used for butter-making. In spite of this, 
there were made from this cow alone in the 275 
days 301 s / 4 lbs. of as fine butter as I have ever 
seen, which is sold to a gentleman in Newport 
for 75 cents per pound. The value of the butter 
at this price is $226.31. Value of slammed 
milk fed to pigs and poultry, $20. 
The product of butter averaged for May, her 
best month, 9 r n 0 4 a per week, a yield which many 
a common cow could beat under the same cir¬ 
cumstances; but then she averaged about 7 s / 4 
lbs. per week for the whole 39 weeks—a feat 
that, so far as my information goes, has rarely 
been equaled. 
The regularity of her production is surprising, 
especially when we remember that she was with 
calf for more than two thirds of the time, and 
that in December she was milked but Once a 
day, in the hope of drying her off. She pro¬ 
duced in April 38 a / 4 Iks.; May, 44 lbs.; June, 
(all the milk being sold for three days), 82 s / 4 
lbs.; July, 34‘/ 4 lbs.; August, 34 a / 4 lbs.; Sept., 
35 lbs.; October, 33 y a lbs.; November, 28 ’/„ 
lbs.; December (milked but once a day), 20'/» 
lbs. A better illustration of what is meant 
when it is said that a good Jersey is the best 
family cow I do not know where to find. 
The total value of the produce of the 288 
days after calving, supposing all the butter to 
have been sold (as it might have been) for 75 
cents per pound, and including $35 for which 
the calf was sold, was $343.81—an average of 
$1.19 per day. Allowing about $20 for the 
remaining 2 */ a months, she will have produced 
one dollar per day the year round. 
Caponizing. 
The object of caponizing is to improve the 
quality and increase the quantity of the flesh of 
fowls. A capon will outgrow a cock of the 
same age, just as an ox will exceed a bull in 
weight, and for the same reasons, which are 
that castration makes an animal less restless 
and quarrelsome, and less of the nutriment it di¬ 
gests is diverted from flesh-forming. 
The operation is not difficult, and is so quick¬ 
ly performed after a little practice, that opera¬ 
tors earn high wages by caponizing cockerels at 
$5 or $6 per hundred. There are sets of instru¬ 
ments for the purpose, which are advertised by 
the “ Poultry World” in our columns, and we be¬ 
lieve are sold bj r several other parties. To save 
expense an ordinary pocket-knife and tweezers 
can be used instead of those made especially 
for the business, and the remaining instruments, 
which are illustrated in fig. 1, may be made to 
order by any jobber in metals, a is a tube 
with the end (5) flattened to an oval about one 
third of an inch in its greatest diameter. 
