The Portland daily press., 1884-02-05
AGRICULTURAL
Hints for Fehrunrx.


Look here boys, just go round back side
of the house and see if you think that great
daub on the snowdrift where the Stops have
run from the sink or been thrown out of the
window is any ornament to the place. Per-
haps you think it is, but it is a costly en-
bellishment. Can you not remember that
all last summer there was pool of filth and
mud there, polluting the air and soaking
under the house, liable to breed fever?
Don't you know that the thistles and bur-
docks grew very rank around the edge of
said pool? Well. now take the hint and
while you are at work in the woods get out
a log someday and theInext stormy day take it
into the woodhouse or barn and make a
spout to carry that water on TO the grass.
Perhaps you can find tall fir that is rotten
at the heart, SO you can dig it out easily. If
you cannot do any better, nail some long,
narrow boards together. Do something.
Don't endure that waste and dangerous
nuisance another year.
Keep your eye on the sheep; those loose
strings of wool hanging on their sides show
that they are ticky, or that they have to
60 through too narrow door. Ticks should
be killed, and sheep with lambs should not
be obliged to crowd through door or among
the flock at the feeding rack.
These warm days, when the snow melts
on the barn roof, the water is apt to run in
to the shed or cellar under the straw, where
3, it will not be noticed unless you look for it.
but the sheep will have wet feet. This should
not be allowed. Keep them dry by drainage
or bedding. When sheep manure is
is wet, it throws up a very pungent odor,
which is dangerous to the health of the
flock. See that your corn fodder is all fed
out before the juice is all taken out by freez-
ing and drying. A dozen sheep will eat
shock of corn fodder, stalk and all, during
the night, if they are fed swale hay most of
the time.
Level down the tops of the manure pile in
the cellar, so the liquid will not all run down
the sides and into the ground
If you have dry knoll or barren spot in
the pasture, get out some poles this winter
to build fence around it, and next spring
SOW on some ashes or plaster and tnrnip
seed aud fence it and when the turnips get
their growth let the sheep in to eat them on
the ground. Sow on grass seed and winter
rye and let the sheep tread it into the soil,
and see if you do not have better feed than
in ten years.
Be laying your plans for spring. Don't
be confined to old ruts or governed by old
traditions. Cultivate your common sense
and use it for your own advantage Don't
be afraid the neighbors will laugh if you try
something new. If you have gumption
enough to invent something out of the old
track, you will learn something in time, if
it is nothing more than you are wrong. Be
ing laughed at is as good discipline as
young man can have. You will learn to
; like it after a while.
If you are going to raise early pigs, get
the pens ready beforehand, so as not to be
tearing about 10 the pens and making chan
ges and disturbing the SOW when the time
comes. Spike poles on the posts inside of
the pen, six or eight inches high, SO the sow
cannot crowd the pigs againss the boards.
Get her tame and used to having 20 u in the
pen beforehand Some people know all
about this, and perhaps some do not.
Are you all ready for the sap business?
Have you good supply of sugar for last
years molasses hogsheads? Then you are
all right.-Mirror and Farmer.
NEanures.
On this subject the Farm and Garden
makes the following remarks, which have
the ring of true sympathy with the laborer:
THAT the liquid weddings of stock are the
more valuable part of the manure is an in
disputable fact and every farmer is aware of
it, While the gentleman farmer, however,
or the brother with a fair bank account,
may have his cemented stable floors, drains
and cisterns, and thereby catch and save
every particle of urine from his stock, the
small farmerwho has to labor hard, and
then perhaps finds it hard to make both
ends meet, can hardly afford all these con-
trlVances. we take the poor brothers. part,
quite decidedly, and are strongly opposed to
the practice of some writer's who are only
too well pleased to throw at him all sorts of
= epithets on account of this deficiency, and
charge him with shiftlessness and waste
fulneSs. In unreserved recognition OF the
truth of all that is claimed for the liquid
manure, we, fully satisfied that by far the
greatest part of it is absorbed by the litter,
which nearly every farmer uses plentifully,
or drawn to the field in the barn-yard scrap
ings, still maintain the assertion, that the
assertion, that the loss or waste in this re-
gard is much less thon these writers try to
make us believe. We have found some far
mers who use dry loan as an absorbent.
where straw is scarces The plan is an ex-
cellent one, though dry muck, where OBJ
tainable, is a still better material, greatly
adding as well to the bulk as to the value of
the manure pile. Mirror and Farmer
Breaking Young steers.
The Orange County Farmer knows of no
more profitable pastime for the boys, than
the breaking of pair of young steers OF
calves to the yoke, if an extra team is likely
10 be needed The calves will not only
soon grow into oxen, but the actual contact
Of the lads with the calves, and the ups and
downs in the conflict of breaking them in
will nos only do the calves good, but will
improve the boys from the healthy exercise
of ho,, - OILS atTO