The Somerset press. [volume] (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977, 1878-06-06
TOPICS FOR FARMERS,

The Value of COw.Dung.-Farmer
are apt to undervalue the dung that is
made or can be made from their cattle.
1t has often been estimated that COW
produces forty pounds of excrement and
twelve pounds of urine daily, when
stabbed, or yarded, and well fed. Let
us see what the value of these excre-
ments are when both are saved. When
cattle are well bedded, the most of the
urine is absorbed by the bedding, and
stables, l think, will admit that in
twenty-four hours what dung is re-
moved from each COW, with the saturated
straw, is not less than fifty pounds,
amounting in 365 days to Is, 259 pounds.
When this dung is thrown into heap
in the yard, and exposed to the rains,
which are a benefit if the heaps are
made compact, the weight increases, say
one-third, making the weight when used
on crops %, 333 pounds, or about twelve
two-horse wagon loads, and worth to any
farmer not less than twenty-four dollars.
This, [ claim, is a fair valuation of the
manure of a cow in a year, when kept
stabbed or yarded, where all her excre-
ments can be saved and which may be
saved on the soiling or green feed plan.
But these estimates are below, perhaps,
what they ought to be, as no farmer,
probably, would be willing tosell all the
| manure made from a COW or an OK from
November to May for less than twenty
dollars, because he could not replace it
for less 1nney, and it would be worth
that sum to use on his farm. In brief,
the manure of COW will about pay for
her feed, unless highly fed, ETC., and in
| that case its value is much increased, as
the real value of the manure depends
on the quality of feed given to animals
Soil Texture.-Somebody has sale
that the texture of soil, and the proper
ton of the earth of which it is com
posed are the first and most importan
condition of its productive powers
When there is good natural loan which
retains moisture without becoming we
or overcharged with it, and permits tn
influence of the atmospheric air to pei
wade it, the crops cannot fail to be NOR
certain and remunerative than in loos
sand or tenacious clays, however ricl
they may be in those elements whicl
are supposed to supply the element
from which the Juices of plants ar
chiefly composed. These are facts wei
worth remembering, and they poin
clearly to the advantages to be derive
from an application of sand to heav
retensive soils, or of clay to ligh
sandy one. While such admixtures ar
not, of course, always practicable, an
in many cases would prove more costl
than profitable, there are in almost ever
farmers experience, circumstances ur
der which they could be made to &C
vantage.
, Protecting Young Pigs.-A lette
from Paris says that many plans hav
been tried to prevent sows from devoul
ing their young; the mothers voracit
| is due to the pain the young inhict o
, her when first commencing to suckl,
, for they are Uttered with milk teetl
, and the latter, often not being suff
, GENTLY distant from one another, th
teat is thus bitten. In France, the mil
| teeth are extracted from the jaw, so th
/ mother, not being wounded, does not b.
, come furious. Another plan is to ru
the young with gin, and also the motl
, er's snout; the odor will ward off her a
: tacks. Or pour into her ear at the MI
ment of littering, some drops of a mil
5 ture composed of two parts of tinctul
| of opium and fifteen of camphored a
| cohol; this will cause sleep, and whe
/ she awakens the young will have take
possession each of its teat, and the fir