Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1875-10-15
soms,hInr abou, vernon, Farming.

land Farmer has been spending lew Gays
among the farmers in this State and has
written TO his paper some interesting let
ters about what he saw here. From his
last letter we take the following in regard
to the farm of Mr.. f. b. Douglass of Shore
ham, to which some interesting general OBJ
seryations are added
"The butter made at this farm stands well
in market, and is in demand at prices some
what above quotations. The tubs entered
this week at the State fair at Rutland, took
the second premium, but were pronounced
No. by butter dealers from the city mar
kets. Mr.. Douglass formerly carried his
milk to the cheese factory, which is within
a short distance from the farm, but he finds
butter making more profitable, If the butter
is first class. The milk made into cheese
brings only about two cents per quart in
the cheese factories, either in Vermont or
elsewhere, and if one is so situated that but
ter making is impracticable, this is the best
way for farmers at long distance from
market to dispose of their milk. 1t saves
great amount of hard work at home, and
with the women folks is generally more
popular than butter making; but if the
ter, and a taste for the business, more mon
ey can be made from it than by cheese. The
butter made at the Douglass farm is worth
now from 32 10 "a cents per pound at whole
sale, which, at two cents per pound for the
milk, allows 16 to II pounds of milk TO the
pound of butter. 1t will be seen that if
pound of butter can be made from IL or ID
pounds of milk there is gain of rs per
cent, and if il could be made from ten lbs.
of milk, so per cent would be gained over
cheese making.
"Aside from the better returns from but
ter making, the value of the sour milk is
no small item from dairy of 20 or 80 cows.
Mr.. Douglass keeps four breeding sows of
the Chester breed, and raises pigs for his
own use and for sale. He prefers 10 use
Berkshire boar, as the pigs from this cross
mature earlier and bring better prices. He
usually feeds about ten spring pigs and gets
them in market before cold weather. Dur
ing the whole summer they are kept almost
wholly on sour milk, which is fed five times
day. Up to the 18th of September, the
Ten pigs had eaten only twelve dollars
worth of grain, and they are in excellent
condition, and will DO TO turn early. The
sour milk will bring this year about $500
In pigs and pork, while the large pile Of
manure in the pens is an item of no small
account. AT the present time the farm is
carrying q cows, yearlings, 10 calves, 8
borses, one pair of oxen, 8 fat cattle, and
100 sheep, but is under-stocked, as there
are several large stacks of good English
hay for sale of the last years crop, and one
ofth outlying pastures is used for pas
turing stock for others.
81 think never saw so good land for
dairy farming as find here in Shoreham,
and yet almost every farmer l see appears
to be burdened by too much land. 1t might
seem at first thought, that if land is good
one cannot have too much of it; that il one
acre will yield profit, two acres will yield
double profit; and so it might, perhaps,
under certain circumstances. If a large
farm could be worked with the same econ
omy as a small one, the larger the better;
but in practice, the large farm seldom
proves equally profitable with one of medi-
um size. 1t costs good deal to buy farm
here, in this part of Vermont. Good land,
without buildings, is worth not less than
$40 per acre, and If one gets larger farm
into his hands than he can pay for, the item
of interest money is by no means an insig-
nificant one. And as long as a farmer is in
debt, he will generally fail to make the best
use of his capital. The hundreds of stacks
of hay and grain TO be seen here in all d.
rections, the small low barns, scattered
here and there over the farms, many of
them at long distances from each other and
from the farmhouse, the overwhelming
abundance of Canada thistles and other
noxious weeds, the moving, pasture and
tillage, each and all indicate that here, as
elsewhere, farmers are burdered by too
much land. If some of the farms have
visited could be cut down one-half by sell
ing the out-lands at the prices they are
priced at, and the proceeds used for i'm
proving the remainder, there would be
fewer mortgages to pay interest on, better
and larger barns, and more and better
tools for cultivating the soil. And if the
farms were smaller, and the farm houses
nearer each other, as they should be, farm
life would be much more social than 1t is
at present.
The most lonesome sight saw, while in
Vermont, was one whole school district on
the bord ers o. the beautiful Lake Cham
plain, owned entirely, or nearly so, by
one man. He commenced life poor boy,
was industrious and frugal. Afler a few
years spent in working for others, he
bought farm which he worked in such a
way as he could obtain most money. He
cut the wood, sold the lumber, and brought
the land into pasture, kept stock and sold
beef and some butter and cheese. AS he
increased in wealth he bought adjoining
farms, and letting the buildings run down,
used the land for pasture and moving
And so one farm after another was pur-
chased and run down, until now there are
but half dozen houses in the whole dis
trict, and these are owned by one man and
his grown up boys, who, like their father,
are more anxious to buy more land than to
improve that which they have. 1t was
from this farm or from one very similar to
1t, that forty-one COWS made in one year
1900 pounds of butter, or tribe over 100
pounds each, which sold at twenty We
cents per pound, yielding an income of
$685., while not very far distant was an
other farm where 800 pounds per COW were
produced, aud OF such quality that II sold
for sixty cents, or $3.50 per COW.
Vermont has been the great dairy State
Of New England, but II has produced not
only butter and cheese, but also a great
crop OF boys and girls, who have gone of
to build up the cities aud develop the re-
sources OF the great West. Vermont has
the best of soil and plenty of II, and it is a
wonder TO me why so many farmers sons
have len II. Aside from the mud and the