Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1889-04-11
brother farmers, and have no doubt
it will pay you largely. Practical



If kept dry through the winter, corr
stalks by alternate freezing and thaw.
ing lose much of their feeding value.
As the sap in them evaporates they
lose their sweetness, and the woody
matter increases. For this reason
| shrewd farmers feed their corn stalks
early in the winter, and keep more OF
their hay and grain for stock during
that most critical feeding time of the
year, between hay and grass
The value of salt to make crops grow
does not mainly depend on the manurial
elements that it contains. 1t makes
those in the soil available. 1t is of
little value on land poor in vegetable
matter. Wherever manure has been
used without due result apply salt and
note its effect. The best salt is now
very cheap, and considering its greater
ease in distribution, costs less on the
land than the coarse humps of impure
salt mixed with earth that used to be
sold for putting on land.
Mice make serious work among corn
in the ear in cribs, They work around
freely among the ears where cats can
not follow them. Rats kill off the mice,
but are themselves worse than the ver-
min they destroy. The best security
against vermin in corn houses is to set
the building on posts capped with a
tin pan so that mice cannot effect an
entrance. The corn house should be
cleared of all rubbish, cobs and the like
at least once year.
Unless the breeding of his stock is
poorer than any good farmer should al
low, it will pay him to keep heifer
calves rather than sell them to the
butcher. IT the male parent of the
heifer is of good milking strain, the
progeny will more than likely prove q
good mixer. 1t is in this way that
pure-bred males soon develop the best
diary capacities in the herds of COWS
that they are bred to. The inexperi-
enced farmer is quito apt TO be deceiv-
ed by appearances in selecting diary
stock to grow, and may easily reject
those that he would find most valua-
BILE.
The true draft horse is too heavily
built for fast driving. He has strength
of limb to get over the ground rapidly
if necessary, but his weight makes his
feet strike too heavily on hard roads,
and this evil is intensified when driven
fast. 1t is this that gives currency to
the idea that heavy horses have natural
ly poor feet. They are not adapted to
the work, and thus wear out before
their time. If always driven slowly,
draft horses remain in good condition
until they are old. They are not ner-
vOus horse, and with horses, as with
men, it is worry, not work, that kills.
Rhubarb, or pic plant, us it is often
called by housewives, is an important
part of evey farmers garden. The
ground can hardly be too rich for it,
and if properly cared for il provides an
excellent acid sauce, healthful and re-
freshing. and better than medicine to
clear from the system in spring the
humors engcndered by two close con-
tincment in the house in winter. To
have rhubarb very early make Il rough
sash around each of few plants.
Bank with manure and cover on the
coolest nights to keep from freezing.
An old barrel with both heads knocked
out is good enough. A single plant and
the above method Of securing early pie
plant is common in many parts of the
country. Cultivator.