The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1886-08-11

use scarcely any commercial fertilizers.
HUNDREDS and thousands of New
England farm-houses show sink drains
and wells that are standing invitation
to diphtheria and typhoid fever, and
everybody in the neighborhood takes
it as a matter of COURSE" says the
Springfield Republican, and we fear it is
true bill.
AGRICULTURE is regarded by some
as not occupying such an honorable po-
sition as that held by other professions.
Farmers, however, are very much COM
plimented on political occasions. Is
there such thing as better employ
ment than the cultivation of the soil?
1t is an absurdity.
How can leached ashes be worth as
much for plant-food as unleached,
though it is certainly true that in nu-
merous instances one has grown just
as good crop as the other? Obviously
such apparent contradictions are ex-
planned by the fact that potash was not
what the soil needed.
THE revival of the sheep business is
so well assured that it may be fitting at
this early day to caution farmers
against rushing into the business reck-
lessly. Remember that sheep increase
very fast and that by the time you get
a flock to sell there will be many others
in the same condition.
IT is better for the farmer to market
his lambs as young as possible, because,
in the first place, he gets as much for
his lamb when fat and able to turn the
scales at twenty-five to thirty pounds,
dressed, as he would by keeping the
lamb thirty days longer, and then mar
ket him weighing over thirty-five
pounds.
PEOPLE usually plant double the
area of strawberries that they ought.
In other words, if the fertilizers and
labor were employed on half the land
the net profit would be larger. Do not
set out more land than can be thoroughly
enriched and prepared. 1t is scarcely
possible to make land too rich for
strawberries.
Do not be tempted to put twenty hens
in building that should contain only
ten fowls. You will get as many eggs
from ten hens we'll cared for, with
ample room, as from double that num-
Der crowded in close quarters. A build
ing ten feet square is not too large for
ten hens, as they require a space for
busting and exercise when the snow is
on the ground.
EVERY dairyman must admit that it
no longer pays to make anything but
the best quality of butter, as all low
grades come in direct competition with
oleomargarine and imitation buffers.
Butter-making is indeed the fine art of
agriculture. 1t consists in series of
processes and conditions, all of which
must be correct, that the result, the
butter, may be perfect.
BRAN to-day is much poorer than it
was before the new processes for flour
making were introduced, but it is now
everywhere recognized as in its prov
ince one of the most valuable feeds that
we have" says an exchange. But, on
the other hand, we hear millers say that
roller mill bran contains the chit of the
wheat kernels, and is richer in nitro
genous substance than the old sort.
EVERY farmer must have observed
that wood and other substances decay
much faster when kept moderately
moist, or in alternate wet and dry state,
than when kept in either very wet or
very dry state; so it is with the con-
stituent elements of the soil, in which
there is little change, unless when they
are in a moderately moist state and
when exposed to the influence of the
atmosphere.
FOOD contributes to the sustenance
of an animal only when it is health.
fully compounded. 1t must contain
certain elements in certain proportions
otherwise it is injurious instead OF
healthful. Chemistry teaches us what
elements are required by animals and
in what proportion they should be used
but it is practice and experience alone
which show how far these may be
used with advantage and profit.
F. b. GARDNER, in Everybody'
Paint Book, says that where an eco
nomical job is desired paint may bt
made as follows: Yellow ochre Of
Venetian red, fifty pounds; sifted road
dust, one hundred pounds. Mix to {
stiff paste with cheap paint oil resir
oiD and add soft-soap until the mass is
in condition for spreading with {
brush. This paint, he says, will BIZ
found extremely durable as well al
cheap.
A MOST successful butter-makine
dairyman, who keeps a large herd, say
one of the best average rations he has