The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1879-08-21
AGRICULTURAL NOTES.

! AGRICULTURAL NOTES.
3, FRENCH chicken producers find that
feeding the fowls with boiled or steamed
carrots, chopped into small pieces, rap
| idly fattens them and imparts an agree
able flavor to the flesh greatly relished
by epicures, and that fowls thus fed sell
more rapidly than others.
If, after wool has grown in consider
able length, sheep or lambs become an.
noyed with lice or ticks, wash them in
strong decoction of tobacco. Another
way is to take pair OF bellows and in
hale tobacco smoke with considerable
force among the ticks. This will prove
instant death to them.
A MOST valuable remedy for heaves
and said to be a sure cure: Forty su-
mac buds, one pound of resin, one pint
of ginger, half pound of mustard, one
pint of unslacked lime, one pound of
EPSON salts, four ounces of gum guia-
cum, six ounces of cream-tartar. Mix
thoroughly and divide into thirty pow
ders, and give one every morning in
their feed before watering.
Mr.. MARTIN SMITH reports this ex-
pertinent to the Montgomery County
(Ohio) Farmers Club: {" Last fall he
sowed a wheat-field with an eight hoe
drill, only using every other hoe, con-
sequently the rows were sixteen inches
apart, and it required but half the usual
quantity of seed to the acre. This field
was now the incest on his farm, and he
expected it to yield more per acre than
any other.'
THE CultaUator says of squashes:
"The seeds of the different varieties are
very apt to mix when planted in close
proximity, and hence it is rather hard
to get pure seed, the seed growers often
being too careless about the location
when they have seed. Unripe or partly
decayed squashes are often fed to stock
and make good fat They should, how
ever, have the seeds removed first, as
these have diuretic effect injurious to
cows''
PRESIDENT j. M. SMITH of the Wis
consin Horticultural Society favors and
practices yearly renewals of strawberry
plantations, of which the Prairie Farm
er says: Z" In looking over an exceed
ingly fine bed a short time since bearing
full crop, and which was set last year,
he remarked to the gentlemen present
that if they would visit him next fall he
would show them as nice a field of cab.
bage on the same ground as were the
strawberries at that time"
CoRN-MEAL alone is not the best food
for young chickens, but it may form a
part of their supplies. "Cracked -
corn is better than meal, and in all cases
the corn should be mixed with its weight
of good sweet bran, and the mess moist
ened with scalded sour milk. Oats,
barley and wheat make good feed for
young poultry, but should be ground
coarsely. Potatoes boiled and mashed,
with oat, barley, wheat or corn-meal
added, and the whole scalded with sour
milk and place in shallow troughs, is as
good as need be, but it must not be fed
to young chicks in wet, sloppy state.
CURRANTs ARE PROFITABLE.-AM Mr..
Powell, in the Rural New Yorker, says
, he finds nothing pays better than cur
rants. Few people will take the trouble
of dusting the bushes with little helle-
bore, thus losing their fruit. The pc
, culiar acid is invaluable in hot weather
and almost every one Graves for it. He
sold all he could raise at four dollars 8
bushel. At three dollars they pay
, abundantly. 1t is best to plant the white
variety in preference to the red, as they
are not so much noticed by the birds
His plan is to set the bushes in rows
about ten feet apart, and six feet in the
row. Between the rows corn or any
J hoed crop may be planted. In the rows
, plant beans or potatoes-c cultivate anC
, hoe the whole ground. 1t is good te
, plant gooseberries near the currants
the worms will at first appear on these
, and can be promptly disposed of witt
, two dustings of hellebore, applied wher
, the dew is on the bushes.
New WAY TO PROPAGATE PLANTS
) 1t is generally desirable to increase new
plants and plants of slow growth fastel
than they furnish wood for the purpose
1t can be increased from two to ten folt
) by commencing at point of we'll es
7 tablished plant and splitting it down
!. ward an inch or more according to it:
nature and growth, leaving it in tina
5 condition for day or two. Then com
! mence at the point of these halves AMI
/. split them down into quarters. Leay'
( them from two to ten days to callous
8 when each quarter will make a cutting
/ almost certain to grow, even if it Gu
g into single eyes. AS soon as the cut
D tings have rooted, been potted and wei
g established, split them also half thei
length, and in few days more continu
: the split down to and through the roots
7 making two or more plants instead o
J one. This plan is advantageous wit
= tri-color geraniums, double primulas
: etc. 1t does not endanger the life Q
: the parent plant, for they can be take
+ off few at q time, thereby lessening th
!, shock the parent plant goes on CROWN
/; without the necessity Of repotting. Tn
e young growth of most hard woode
: plants might be facilitated in the sam
: way.