The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1886-08-20
Vhe Farm.
FARM MISCELLANY.


be to have them ready for slaughter as
soon as the first good cold spell comes
A bushel otcorn when thethermometeri is
600, will increase the weight as much as
two bushels when the thermometer is
300 or lower. The reason is obvious.
The temperature of the animal body
must be maintained at the normal point
of go. Tue food of the animal is his
fuel also.
1t should be the aim of every farmer
to keep his land in good healthy con.
dition. 1t is mnch easier to keep land
up than it is to bring it up when once
it has run down. The loss of time as
well as the loss of crop is to be taken
into consideration. Outside of the ap-
plication of barn-yard manure, there is
nothing equal to clover, plowed in as
green crop, occasionally. We know
that it looks to some as an extravaganza
plan to pillow in a crop of clover, but
one trial will satisfy the farmer that it
will pay him a hundred fold, and it
will require no argument there after to
open his eyes to its value.
A continuance of the proper kind of
treatment will not only pay, but i'm.
prove the productiveness of the farm,
and make 1t easier to cultivate. This
is one answer to the question of how to
make the farm pay. 1t involves the in.
telligence, judgement, and skill of the
farmer. Has he the ability to make
any farm pay? If the farmer lacks in
this, it is impossible for him to make
any ordinary farm pay, and und, r his
management the best farm will soon
cease to pay. The average run of farm
ers need to put more brains into their
work, to learn more about the principles
of agriculture, AM to qualify them
selves to apply the better methods of
farming which are slowly being intro
duced.
Zone word in regard to the profit re-
sulting from proper preparation of the
soil. And as one example will go furth.
er than great many precepts, the case
of farmer in Shawnee county, Kansas,
may be mentioned. He took especial
pains to make the soil compact for his
wheat in October. At the harvest in
July, he threshed out ffty-six bushels
and thirty pounds per acre of wheat,
weighing sixty-one pounds per bushel.
And no doubt the majority of farms in
the United States are fertile enough to
produce as much as this, if the crops
were not damaged through the poor
mechanical preparations of the ground,
against which manure or natural fertil-
izer cannot prevail. The average yield
of wheat is fifteen bushels to the acre.
No doubt with perfectly prepared soil
this yield would be double. What then
is the actual value to the farmer of an
implement that is perfectly adapted to
this requisite preparation of the soil,
such as the "ACME'' Pulverising Har-
row, Clod Crusher and Leveler has
proved itselfto be beyond all question
of doubt?'
In storing potatoes several methods
are adopted, yet they are all practically
the same, the object being to protect
them against freezing, whether buried
in pits or stored in cellars. The first
consideration is to keep them in perfect
darkness, the next is the bins should
not be too deeI-not over three feet
to produce warmth and cause them to
sprout When stored in the field,
straight trenches are dug, say twenty
feet in length and four or five wide,
which are filed to the dep.h of three
feet with potatoes, then well.covered
with straw, on top of which put
eighteen or twenty inches of earth. In
pit twenty feet long there should be
about three gas escapes or ventilating
openings, which should be plugged
with straw and covered with a board
set at an angle to turn the rain. If in
cellars, barn or otherwise, the bins
should be covered with rugs, old car
petings or straw. Those intended to be
kept for late spring sales should be fire.
quently examined and all sprouts re-
moved; for as soon as potato begins to
sprout it loses its so.idity, dryness and
quality.