Sacramento daily record-union., 1882-01-28
AGRICULTURAL.
MATTER PREPARED SPECIALLY FOR
THE "REcoRD UNION"
The Dairy on the River Bottoms-The
Best Cora for Ensilage-Early Veg
etables-faking Risks.


OF all the specialties in farming. the dairy
has proved in all countries and in all ages
among the most profitable. The dairymen
of Germany are and have always been among
the most substantial and solid men of the
country Even in France. where the vine
and the mulberry tree have given most lucra-
tive employment to large portion of the
rural population, and where these industries
have contributed SO much to make French
agriculture the most wonderfully recuperative
of the world, the dairy has ever kept those
engaged in it among the most prosperous and
weil.to-do of the agricultural population
OF the Atlantic States, New York takes the
lead in general prosperity among her farmers,
and in this great State no portion is SO pros
porous and contains so many wealthy agri-
culturists as the counties where dairying
has been the leading industry from an early
day. The dairy in Ohio has given that State
more certain and general success than wheat
culture or wool-growing, notwiths standing she
has been leading State in both these
great industries. In whatever country we
find the dairy, its home has ever been on
the Deep rich soils of the river bottoms
Other localities may for time seem to take
the lead in this speciality, as have the billy
lands of Sonoma and Marin, and other coast
counties in this State, but in the long run
the low fat alluvial river lands will show
their superior adaptation to this rich indus
try, and the banks of the Sacramento and
San Joaquin in fifty years from now will be
the acknowledges home of the dairy interest
in California. The test of adaptation of lands
to the dairy is found in their ability to pro-
duce an abundance of food for dairy stock, so
that the cows can obtain it with no more
travelling than is necessary for their healthy
condition. The test applied as between the
ri yer bottom and hilly lands of the coast
counties, or those of the foothills of the Sierra
Nevadas, is about as ten to one in favor of
the river lands That is, 100 acres of the
river bottoms will, if properly managed, sup
port in good condition about as many dairy
COWS as ], 900 acres of the hilly lands. The
natural products of the SOIL however,
must not be depended upon for the
highest production. Cultivation is neces-
sary factor in large production, whether on
good or poor lands. The Hollanders, who
make their lands pay by the dairy an interest
on one thousand dollars an acre, do not allow
3 foot of those lands to go to spontaneous
production. Every acre is made to do its
best in the product to which it is best adapt
ed Some is devoted to grasses which by fer
tilizers and irrigation produce four and five
crops OF hay or greed fodder to the acre.
Some they put down into roots, and on others
they plant corn for O summer crop, and SOW
rye for spring crop. Our river bottom lands
L j ;. Al.
No lands will do their best for the dairy de-
voted to the pasture Cows should not be re-
quired to gather their own foo', except to a
limited extent One acre Of land in alfalfa
or rye grass, if cut and fed to stock, will
produce about the same as two acres where
the cow is allowed to harvest her own food as
in pasture. With the present condition of
the river bottoms, subject as they are to an
nual overfows, in which the water remains
on the land for a month or more, neither
alfalfa or rye grass can be depended
upon except by annual sowing By an
nual sowing with alfalfa three crops Of
green hay can be obtained and good pasture
in addition for four or five months in the
year. This, with the higher lands on the im-
mediate banks of the river. The lands farther
back from the hanks or near to and in the
tule, must be devoted to other crops, as beets
and corn planted later in the spring, and fed
green or preserved IN Jn6 SlLO. Id COFu tDese
lower lands can be made to produce from
thirty to fifty tons per acre of good fodder,
This fodder, cut up and preserved in the silo
as we have heretofore directed, may be kept
any length of time and fed as wanted. Thus
by proper management every acre of the river
bottom lands devoted to the dairy. can be
made to do full duty and to produce an
abundance of food for a COW the year round.
Stated in other terms, one hundred acres can
L. l. = h.
This may seem like an extravagsnt state
ment particularly when it is taken into con-
sideration that on account of the foods, that
often come SO late in the season, much of the
river-bottom lands cannot be cultivated until
late in June or July, and that then it is too
late to produce and mature any valuable crop.
But it must be remembered that corn will
grow to full size of stalk, and generally ma
ture fair crop of grain, even after July 1st,
in the mild climate of the interior of this
State. It must be also remembered that to
secure the greatest amount of fodder from
corn to preserve in the silo, it may and should
be cut at the full tassel, or at any time be-
tween this stage and the formation of the ear
and the milk in the kernel. 1t is very seldom
that any OF the tule lands adjoining the
higher borders of the rivers can not be plowed
as early as July, and very few of these lands
under proper cultivation at that time will
or ensilaged food for COWS to the acre.
Sixty pounds day of this food will keep
COW in frst-rate condition while giving milk.
At sixty pounds day, a cow will consume in
a year. or 800 days, 81 900 pounds, or little
less than eleven tons. Thus in the light of
these figures the statement above that every
acre of the river bottom land can be made to
keep dairy COW, or one hundred acres for one
hundred COWS, does not appear extravagant.
MOUNDS NECESSARY.
To make these low lands a safe place to
carry on a profitable business in the dairy
line, it becomes necessity to build mounds
on which to locate the residences, stock barns,
storehouses, silos, and all other buildings nec-
essary TO be used in times of high water. As
general thing these mounds can be built at
comparatively little expense, the material
being obtained from the bars formed in or
along the banks of the rivers. These mounds
may be built from the river bank back, SO
that the levee becomes part Of the mound,
or the mound becomes simply an extension of
the levee. A mound covering quarter of an
acre would be sufficient for a large dairy
farm supporting say two hundred cows.
Such mound would cost comparatively
little, when its value is considered in connec-
tion with the great value of the lands, the
use and occupation of which it renders safe
in the highest of foods. With mounds to
keep the cows on in high water, and silos to
preserve late crops of corn-fodder in, the
river bottom lands may be lifted fully out of
the qusgmire into which they have sunk from
want of preparation to make them useful
and rendered the most valuable and best pay
ing lands in the State.
The Best Corn for Ensilage
There seems to be quite difference of
opinion as to the kiad of corn to plant for
ensilage Some have planted Blunt's pro-
li6cbecause while it gives large and high stalks