Port Royal commercial and Beaufort County Republican. [volume] (Port Royal, S.C.) 1873-1874, 1873-12-11
F., Farm, Garden and Household.
Winter Care of Stock.


Farmers Club the subject for discus
sion was Winter Care of Stock" MIR.
James Wood advocated warm stables as
o matter Of economy. A certain part
of the food used by cattle is consumed
in keeping them warm, and if they are
well sheltered less food is required.
Attention should be paid to ventilation.
Cows require large quantity OF food,
as their digestive apparatus acts best
when the stomach is distended. With
horses it is different they should be
fed at regular intervals sufficient
quantity to keep them in good condl-
tion. but not enough to make them
"paunchy." ,
Mr.. JoseSh Haines would not object
to stables where it would freeze oc-
casionally. Did not think the cows
would be less healthy on that account.
He favored feeding grain to both horses
and cattle, since hay alone was the
most expensive sort of food.
Mr.. Godfrey Haines preferred warm
stables and advocated taking good care
OF stock in winter. He especially men,
toned the propriety of feeding horses
regularly three times q day enough to
keep them in good condition, and said
that horses fed all they would eat were
worthless to drive on the road.
Mr.. Joel Mable spoke at length OF
keeping cows and horses in warm, ven-
tilated stables, which should be by no
means in basement. Would face the
COWS and horses toward windows and
let them see the prospect, instead of
facing toward a bla3k wal, or making
them stare at one another in parallel
lines. Keep COWS happy and they will
give more milk and better milk. Pure
water was especially necessary. Carrots
for horses, and beets and carrots for
COWS, he considered indispensable for
good winter feeding. Turnips he
thought little of estimating that they
were worth just what they cost, viz,
the labor of gathering. He objected
particularly to the use of brewers
grains.
Mr.. Oliver Green advocated warm
stables and careful treatment; he would
keep cows in stables in severe weather
nearly all the time /; and would con-
slider it an advantage to have water
slightly warmed for their drinking in
excessively cold weather. In sunny
weather would let them run out several
hours day. WHAT he thought most
injurious was a sudden change from
heat to cold.
Mr.. Stephen Wood agreed with the
general view of those who have spoken
in regard to good stabling and proper
care. He had made it his practice
to have cows sat up the hay clean by
saving the refuse formed in the managers
and once week or so putting brine on
it. He favored variety of food for
cattle, instead of giving them stalks
till the stalks are gone and then hay
tin the hay is gone. He spoke at length
of the improvements in agricultural
science.
The President spoke of the plan of
keeping cattle in stables throughout
the day, and said the tendency now was
to let them run out more than few
years ago. He mentioned cases of
farmers who maintained that their
herds had been injured by too much
care and too high feed. He favored
liberal use of sowed corn fodder.
Poisoning sheep by Dipping.
One of most common and fatal causes
for mortality and destruction of sheep
in dipping and suffocation in handling,
is the use of metallic preparations for
the cure of scab, and killing the para
sites that abound in the feeces. Arsenic
and corrosive sublimate are substances
which enter largely into the compost
tion Of these killing mixtures, and we
learn that q well-known, largely-adver-
tised nostrum, which is principally
composed of arsenic, was used on an
occasion when forty animals were rem
dered liieless in somewhat less than
four hours. Sheep farmers frequently
turn newly dipped sheep back to the
Same pastures and localities which
abound in the parasites which torment
them, and newly-clipped sheep are al
lowed to mingle with lambs without
any precaution being taken to guard
against the passage of the lice, ticks,
&C., from one to the other. thus the
operation, confined to ewes only, tavors
the parasites seeking greater warmth in
the thicker and closer feeces of the
lambs. When ewes are dipped, it
would be we'll to dip lambs also, and in
using q compound, that selected should
be one not essentially for bleaching and
cleaning the wool, but for its power OF
attaching itself to the fibres of the
fleece, and thus rendering it untenable
by the parasites. There is, however,
some difficulty in the choice of materi.
ais which will affect this, and more SO
when the bath is used, as all substances
cannot be conveyed in watery solu-
tion. For this reason we advocate the
more effective, although slower, plan OF
pouring, with which every sheep-far-
mer is thoroughly conversant. BY this,
many agents, perfectly harmless to the
sheep, but>deadly poisonous to the par
asltes, may be used, conveying comfort
to the animals, effecting more speedy
cure, and preventing not only the loss
OF flesh, which is never regained, but
also the loss OF the animals themselves.
-ScotiSh Farmer.
How TO Feed Horses.
The Vermont Farmer says "Mr.
Emery, of Worcester, after trying sew
eral ways of feeding horses, has settled
down on the following He feeds whole
hay with six quarts of bran and corn
meal, half and half, twice a day, wet.
He has fed so for the last year. His
horses look finely, and he works them
hard, but at the same time he is care
full man with n team. He intends to