The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1880-02-26
AGRICULTURAL NOTES.

is to feed her deSSertSpOOnful OF salt
peter once a day in her meal.
THE extent of loss farmer suffers in
his live stock is about proportloned to
the amount of exposure to the animals.
THE value Of live stock received at
the Union Stock-yards in Chicago, for
1879, was STA, 795. 1884, an increase of
more than SS,500,000 over 1873.
In recent trial of feeding cotton
seed meal to mich cows, dairyman
found by careful tests that the percent
age of cream increased from Is to IS
pei. cent. 1t is claimed that butter made
from the milk of COWS having daily
ration of cotton-seed meal, is of a irmer
texture and finer flavor than if oil cake
Is used.
NEVER put a peach tree in the place
of one that has died or is dying. 1t is
useless to do so. The disease is there
and will inoculate the new tree. Never
trim your healthy tree with the Ratchet
with which you have cut down sickly
tree or you will inoculate the healthy
tree with the disease.
AS matter of experience, it is found
that the mixture of cut straw and root
pulp, alternate layers of each, should
stand for atleast twenty-four hours before
being fed, after which it becomes heated
of itself, and the cattle eat it with great
relish. There is nothing better for young
and growing stock.
In Great Britain machine has been
invented by which wet grass is rapidly
turned into hay. The machine has
worked very successfully during the
past wet season, and it is said that this
method of making hay is to be intro
duced on many large estates in England.
The admonition of the old adage, "to
make hay while the sun shines,'' is in
danger of losing its force in that coun-
try.
THIS is the season of the year for
farmers not only to secure their wood
for the coming year, but also to cut it
up in sufficient supply for spring, sum-
mer and fall use. 1t would be all the
better if the stock, well housed, lasted
through the following winter. A suita-
BILE out-building should be connected
with every farm, in which good stock
of wood could be stored, also room
enough for man to work stormy days
saving and splitting.
"AsHEs," said Marshall P. Wilder, a
few years since, g are worth 80 cents
per bushel to apply to orchards and are
the cheapest manure for that purpose. :"
That aches have very beneficial effect
is shown by the fact that on all virgin
soils recently burned over we get the
fairest fruits and the best vegetables
The same authority cautions the use of
salt as manure for orchards, believing
that it has no beneficial effect on land
near the ocean, where the atmosphere is
constantly saturated with salt.
SOME farmers think that top-dressing
with manure is best done during the
winter. In the fall the manure, unless
very fine and evenly spread, will cover
up injuriously much of the plant. When
spread in winter, on the contrary, it
acts as a mulch and protection while
the plant is dormant, neutralizing the
effects of freezing and thawing. An au-
thority on the subject advises that artifi-
cial fertilizers be spread on grain lands
in the fall, and the barnyard manure
after the snow comes.
The premium butter at the New Jer-
sey State Fair was made from herd of
thorough bred COWS, on the farm of
Martin r. Dennis in Sussex County.
The ordinary dash-churn was used, and
only the cream churned. The dairy
house is built of stone, and through it
runs a stream of spring water. with a
temperature of 49, The milk is set in
shallow pans on the floor, which is of
slate slabs. The butter is sailed with
Ashton salt, at the rate of 81 of an
ounce to the pound. The feed of the
cows in summer is pasture only; and in
spring and fall, during the milking sea-
son, four quarts of corn meal are added
to all the good meadow hay and corn
stalks they will eat. The average yield
from April l, 1878, to April 1, 1879, was
261 pounds per cow, some of them be-
ing two years old, with their first calves.
The cows were MIXED about nine
months, dropping their calves in April.
The Cow-pea is destined to do for the
worn lands of the South, the Dizie Far
nler thinks, what red clover does in
higher ATTITUDES, for it will gather am
monia as readily, fattens stock equally
well, and grows with less attention on
their ground. Then, too, it is cheap as
compared with commercial fertilizers,
saves transporting and distributing
stable and other manure, and is evenly
diffused over the whole surface of the
field, and easyo of cultivation. The land
is laid off into three-foot drills, and 10
or II peas are dropped together at every
short step, and covered with two light
burrows. The only cultivation needed
is the breaking out of the middles in
two or three weeks, and the running of
sweep-furrow in the middle when a
month or six weeks old. By this time
the ground will be so shaded as to keep
out other vegetation, and it will be inn
possible to distinguish where the origi-
nal rows were. From ordinary uplands
10 or Is bushels OF peas can be gathered
from an acre. What hay is not cut for
stock should be plowed under early in
the fall.
Yicissitudes in the Life Of q Writer.
l was standing in front of Haver-