The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1872-06-29
THE MANAGEMENT OF COWS.

The following communication on the
above subject is furnished the Germantown
Telegraph, by N. P. Hedges of Erie county,
N. Y:
A and B have farms of about 100 acres
each, and live five or six miles apart
They both send milk to the same factory
the season through, and they each kept
about 20 COWS in 1870. AS returns from
the factory were $5G1.46, an average of
$27.07 per cow; BIS returns from the fac
tory the same year were $1307.Ss, or an
average of $G5.39 per COW. Each have one
son at home. A manages to get along
without any other help, while B keeps
irst-class work hand the year round that
costs him $3.50. A manages to sell ten,
fifteen and sometimes twenty tons Of hay in
tie spring; in 1870 he boosted of 5000 hay
money B raised more roots, more sowed
corn, and then has to buy something gen.
orally bran for the COWS every year. In
1870 he paid out about 800 for bran, thus
making $3.50 outgoes that A avoids. Sub
tract this from $1307.SS and it leaves
$957.sS. At the same time A can add his
5000 hay-money to his $561.4G, making
$719.46 net income: but it is not as much
as BIS income by S196.42. Now let us 60
to each ones barn and see what is the
cause of the difference. A has good barns,
| good stables, except that his COWS stand
too close together, and the manure on
straight plank floor is left untouched be-
hind them for week and sometimes two
weeks, and the COWS have a miserable
dirty look. Every pound of hay A sells
his COWS would eat if they could get it.
He believes in doing a little better by them
for week or two before they come in; he
waters them but once day, and they have
no exercise except to walk few rods to
water and are Immediately put back in the
stable trembling with the cold, Il large
| amount of water and from want of exercise;
but he gets his cows through the winter all
weak, when he feeds little corn or meal
| for few weeks and they are all right.
A has excellent pasture and his cows are
all right through the summer. A general
ly sows an acre of corn for fear of dry
time, but he says he seldom needs it until
winter. B sows five acres and he seldom
has enough to last his COWS over four
months commencing August list. A
studies to get his cows through the winter
with as little cost as possible, both as to
feed and care, and seems to believe that
the only time it will pay to feed cow well
is when she gives milk.
Let us pass over to BIS barn. This we'll
defended yard and shed is where the COWS
drink, and exercise about six hours each
day. The noise in the barn is the hired
man running a cheap one-horse tread-power
attached to a strawcutter, where he cuts as
fine as chaff about ton at time, mixing
all kinds of feed together-a portion of the
cornfodder, buckwheat straw, pea straw,
oats, wheat and rye straw and second quail
ity hay all enter into the composition of
this pile. When he has finished about a
ton, it is spread out on the barn-foor about
a foot or more in thickness and a mixture
of all the grains he can spare from the farm
ground together, generally with an addi-
ton of bran or middlings, and portion of
this mixture is distributed over the mixed
ckaff little salt is added, then about fif-
teen pals of water are sprinkled over the
whole; this mass is well mixed and thrown
into large heap to get warm. When one
pile is nearly gone another one is made
The COWS are put into clean wide stalls,
with four-inch manure drop behind them,
about three P. NJ, and fed with a SCOOP
shovel about all of the mixture they will
eat At five they are looked to and often
fed little more of the mixture; at six they
are fed hay, at about half past six in the
morning each cow is offered water in a
pail and it generally drinks; then again the
mixture is fed until all have all they will
eat. At about nine A. NJ. they are turned
into the yard, stuffed uncomfortably full,
but little exercise and drink soon relives
them, and at three o'clock they go into the
stable hungry and ready to repeat the pro-
cess. Under this treatment BIS COWS are
hard to dry off, and are sleek, heavy and
comfortable in the spring, approaching the
appearance of beef cattle. BIS manner of
feeding was carried on strictly by hand
previous to the introduction of the one
horse tread-power. There are several
other noticeable differences in BIS fovor,
such as the quality of the milk, the size
and quality of the manure piles, and the
| present value of COWS OH hand e is teach