The Atlanta constitution. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1885-19??, 1888-09-11
FARMS AND FARMERS
Short Talks With Men Who Guide
the PIoW.
Many Questions About the Farm, Answered
by DIR. w. L. Jones, Formerly Of
the Southern Cultivator.
The Cowpea as a Substitute for Corn.


The pea has always been valued highly as
renovatin2 crop, as a food for hogs to be gath
cred by them, and as hay CROP 1t has never
been appreciated as it deserves, as grain
ration for mules and horses. No grain, per-
haps, by itself alone constitutes q perfect
ration; the oat comes nearest to it. Corn con-
tains too much fat, starch, ETC., hydrocarbons
in proportion to its albuminoids muscle
forming compounds. Peas, on the contrary,
are too rich in albuminoids and somewhat
deficient in hydrocarbons. The combination
OF these two makes q more perfect ration than
either by ITSELF Many farmers are afraid to
iced peas to horses OF mules; they fear collie as
q result. There is some foundation for this II
the peas are fed after they have been threshold
are fed alone, not in combination, and are
fed in large quantity. The moro concentrated
food is, the greater the danger of feeding it
freely and uncombined. Even corn will
founder horses But we know from q long
experience that peas in the hull may be fed
with perfect safety and with excellent results
Two points are secured by feeding in the hull !;
first, the more perfect chewing of the grain,
the hulls cannot be bolted down by horse; ;
second, the diluting, so to speak, of the con-
centrated grains by the not concentrated hulls.
The huls contain little albuminoids and much
grain makes better balanced feed than either
alone. But the mixture of hull and grain is
not perfect ration, Judging from experience
A mixed ration of peas in the hull with corn is
better still, and this we commend to the reader
who has never tried it. A half bushel of peas
in the hull and five ears of corn makes good
feed for q medium-sized horse, doing moderate
work. Little additional long forage will be
needed, as the hulls give the necessary bulk.
We have known farmers who fed their mules
on peas alone-no corn-and they did WELL but
they do better with mixed ration of peas and
corn, as above.
The pea commends itself as q substitute for
corn-in part, at least-by the fact that it will
grow on poorer land than corn; that it will
wait on rains better than corn; that it can be
grown on corn and cotton farm without
serious interference with those crops, and
finally can be grown very cheaply. These facts
are well known to our farmers and it is not
necessary to discuss them. The pea can follow
oats, wheat and other grain, and instead of
being heavy tax on the land will often prove
of decided benefit to it.
But the pea crop has one objection to it.
The gathering is troublesome At best il is
tedious, and sometimes it comes at q very in
convenient season, when cotton picking is
pressing. But IL an early maturing variety is
planted early the peas will be ripe and ready
for picking at rather leisure time and before
cotton picking presses. We planted the
speckled or whippoorwill pea this year on the
26th of May, after winter oats had been taken
off the land, and gathered peas before the Goth
of August. Where one has to hire the pick
ing, good plan is to pay by the hundred, as
in cotton picking. This will induce laborer
to bring in his whole family, females and chill
dren, and do the work rapidly. Twenty-Five
to thirty cents hundred is fair compensation.
Or instead of picking, the peas may DO moved,
if not tangled with mower, if tangled with n
blade. The vines will then be taken from the
field, it is true, but they will pass into the
stalls as litter and find their way back to tho
fields again as manure.
If you have a4!y peas, good reader gather
some and feed in the hull to your stock--feed-
ing little at first and increasing up to the
quantity mentioned-half bushel to feed If
it does no other good, it will give variety to
your stock rations, and this itself conduces to
health and yigor. w. l.. j.