Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1881-09-01
4arm anS 6ousebolS.
For the American.
Lightning-inviting Barns.

The frequency with which barns ars struck
by lightning, or are supposed TO be, when as
now so much wet hay is housed is very
noticeable.
A great many We, hay barns are
burned. and is charged TO lightning or an
inoendiary, when spontaneous combustion
did H.
There is no danger Of spontaneous com
bustioR when hay IS housed green; there j.
danger when it is housed wet Green hav
may ferment and heat. but it does not gen
crate All lnhammable gas, as vet hay does.
This gas among the hard words Of science.
known as "carburetted hydrogen" readily
takes fire when mixed with certain pro
portions Of air or lightning NAV set FIRE to
ii, and the barn j. burned not by lightning
but by ignited gas
When hay must be housed. more or less
wet as during the thousand mile storm"
Of this hay so many tons have been.
N4As NlAAf a4AA hAtt Ni44AAA Yum i'1AAN
with the teachings OF science. j. to exclude
the air. HAY in all air-tisht NOV NAV heat
a. hot a. '.Nebuchadnezzar' furnace" with
out danger Of fire. The hay should be
slowed evenly over the surface Of the NOV.
and firmly tread around the sides, and the
barn doors and other openings kept closed.
If the NOV becomes hot cover it with
straw. old hay OF al old sail, or anything to
keep the air out. With these precautions,
fewer barns will be struck by lightning"
The filling Of silos with green fodder,
which keeps for months, provided the air is
excluded, eXplodes the moss-coyered practice
Of admitting air 10 prevent the hurting of wet
hay, or green. The introduction Of silos,
may bring about a new departure in hay
making and the system Of sun spelling hay,
become dead thing Of the past.
WEATHER PRoGNosTICs-Nota few in
dulge in covert filings and oblique innuendoes
At Nennors weather guesses" a. they seem
pleased to call them. Guesses or not, Nennor
has run "Old Probabilities" hull doirn in
prognosticsting the weather. The Canadian
tells US nat the weather is to be tomorrow.
not what It's going to be yesterday. So far
as farmers are concerned, the predictions of
the l. S. Weather Bureau are Of no utility,
for the spells" of weather, come first. DIR.
Loring can't do the agriculture Of the
country better service than to look after this
matter. Storm-signals on Green and Blue
hill Mountains would warn" half the
farmers of Hancock county.
A NEW CANDIDATE for public favor is
the last report Of the Maine Board Of Agri-
culture. With the exception Of a few
practical papers il has the lear marks" of
pretentious aim.
The theft" of the Report, is devoted to
Slos, Sugar Plants and Cattle Feeding.
That, on EnsilAge in Silos, even with its
quotation marks left out is q very readable
paper on an impractieable subject. With a
good location, moderately sized silo, with
the appliances to fill it, costs from $500 to
$1,000. On farms fat and vet silo needs
Golfer Dam, or Double Plunger Steam
Pump. TO keep water out. Why not sug-
gest utilizing the abandoned prospect
holes" by reconstructing them into Ensilage
Pts Such suggestion has the merit of
originality, 10 say the least
The extraordinary claims set up for en-
silage, remind one Of the magnetic healers'
who advertise TO magnetic anything from a
ajewsharp to thunder. That ensilage will
increase the flow Of milk, is conceded; that
twill fatten an animal no one contends. To
that large class Of farmers, housed in unadorn.
calculations, through whose barns the ~ lid
winds whistle Free" there is not ..bon-
anza in the farm with silo for ensilage.
The paper on Sugar Growing Plants
reads well, and as a matter of information
is we'll: but is ii practical Ii smells of
LeDuc's tea farm growing tea at cost oil
$40 a pound. Why recommend to the
farmers of Maine, to grow corn or sorghum
for sugar, when the best chemists say
"there is not science enough in America &c
get sugar from amber cane" No writer on
agriculture can run short for themes, while
farm practice is yexed by S thousand unsoiyed
questions, each with brood of conflicting
theories, which,
1.-The truth it is, and truth doth say,
Summer after summers fight
Ends not the eternal Fray
The many PACED paper on Cattle Feeding
is the "cap-sheaf-' of the trio. As 9
specimen of pedantic hifalutin, it X. LIS.
Its formula for the "digestibility of total
aibuminoids and attractive carbohydrates, "
is as unintelligible to the average farmer, as
"Greek Testament to an idiot" and quite
a. useful. The labor of spelling out the
hard words, recalls the Scotch farmers def