The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1879-02-13
Bedding for Stock.

IN this cold climate good bedding IS
almost as essential for the comfort and
thrift of stock as is good food. Bis
marck says the latter is inspiration.
1t. certainly puts new life into man,
energy into the horse, strength into the
OK, milk into the COW, and lard into the
hog; but if half the virtue of the food
is required for keeping up animal
heat, and the other half in renewing
the wastes of the body, greatly in
creased by every annoying circum-
stance, from whence is the inspiration
to come to stimulate energy or secre-
ton of milk or fat? 1t is good, but
rather difficult, thing to imagine our
selves in the place of the inferior ami
NAL, and consider how we would like
to be tied up and compelled to lie on
bare boards, and to breathe the foul air
arising from filthy fermentation. Bis
marck, with. all his genius, and nour-
ished bountifully with roast beef, sour
krout and lager beer, would feel little
inspiration "to govern men and guide
the State" were he not allowed to sleep
comfortably O. nights. Quiet, rest and
refreshing sleep ARE essential not
only to the thrift, but to the very exist
ence of both man and beast. Expert
ments have proved that men and ami
mails suffer fully as much from want of
rest and sleep as from the want Of food,
and every man knows that sleep, in or
der to be refreshing, must be attended
with sense of comfort. If the Sleep
er is shivering with cold, or aching way
into his bones from lying on ropes or
hard Stats with thin layer of straw
over them, the comfort and refreshment
are small.
Of course, the inferior animals are
not as sensitive to cold, filth and dis
comfort generally as is man. Many
treat them as though they were desti-
tute of nerves, and had no idea of neat
ness and no need of repose and COM
fort. sect up, you lazy BRUTE" has
been uttered many time to a reposing
COW, and enforced with q kick, appar-
emily with no motive except to show
the power of man over the beast.
Though our domestic animals may not
suffer to like degree with man from
cold and filth, still it should be remem-
bered that they discriminate between
comfort and discomfort, and are COM
PEELED to suffer much more of the latter
than either necessity or economy war
rants. In comfort, they thrive even on
limited rations, but abundant food cam
not compensate for discomfort. Judg-
ing from the manner in which our do
nestle animals are often kept, we
should conclude that their owners con-
sidered filth as congenial to their ma
lures, but the truth is they are all. the
hog not excepted-naturally neat. We
can think of no animal that does not
look neat when in its normal condi-
ton. Even the toad, that makes its
house in the dirt, when he comes forth
from his hiding-plac looks as slick as
new pin, and not particle of dirt
sticks to the eel, though he plows in
the mud for his living. The woodchuck
burrows in the sand-hill, and though
he has no wash-bowl, nor towel, nor
comb, nor brush, who ever saw one
dirty or with hair disheveled? The
whole feathered creation are as careful
of their personal appearance and as
nice and tidy in their dress as a bride.
It is only in their domestic, abnormal
condition that the inferior animals look
filthy, and are filthy, and here it is not
their fault, but their misfortune. They
are under the dominion of man, SUBJ
ject to his mercy, which sometimes is
cruelty.
1t is perhaps impossible that animals
confined in stalls, sheds or other close
quarters should not be more or less
contaminated with filth and foul
air, but every tidy farmer will sec to it
that the contamination is less rather
than more. Economy demands this as
emphatically as does humanity. He that
keeps his animals above boards and filth
by a liberal use of straw or other bedding
will keep himself above board by the
increased returns of milk, beef, pork
and wool. If we have learned any
thing from long experience of farm
life, it is that animals thrive most
when kept in the greatest comfort. We
have seen pigs making slow growth SO
long as. they slept on bare, dirty
boards, and wallowed in mud, take a
new departure in life so soon as their
dirty quarters were exchanged for COM
Portable ones, and this, with no inn
provement in their rations. Good bed
ding is a great auxiliary to good feed
ing.-Aleranler Hyde, IN N. Y. Times.