Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1901-03-21

| man lately who had set row of apple
trees ia the street outside the sidewalk
for shade trees. OF course the boys
willNget all the apples, but no man has
lived in vain who has helped the boys
of his town to have good time.
A late experiment conducted at the.
Kansas experiment station in the feed
ing of young calves showed that q
bunch of calves raised on sweet sepa-
rator skimmilk made daily gain of
l.54 pounds Mt cost of $342 per 100
pounds of gain; a bunch fed whole
milk made a gain Of 1875 pounds per
day at a cost of $6.64 per 100 pounds,
and another bunch allowed to run with
their dams made gain of LIT pounds
per day at a cost of SAL per 100
| pounds.
Try patch of rape this year. Plant
two acres of sweet corn and sow ia
pounds of rape seed to the acre at the
time of the last blowing. When the
corn begins to harden, fence off half of
1t and turn the hogs in. Let them alone
and go and lean over the fence as the
sun goes down and just laugh to see
them grow. Give them the other half
later on and then raise hundred BUSH
els of corn to the acre there next year.
This is not long item, but it is a
mighty good one all the same.
We do not know about sowing rape
In corn unless both crops can be fed
Off on the ground by either sheep or
hogs. A friend sowed part of his
cornfield with rape at the time of the
last blowing. A big storm blew the
corn crop down in early August, and
the rape started up and soon buried
the corn almost out of sight. And he
had to wait until the frost killed the
rape before he could pick his corn.
This combination would be just the
thing for hog pasture where, with a
portable fence, it might be fed off in
sections.
For the average farmer who wishes
to grow supply of good fodder for his
dairy cows there is probably nothing
better than to SOW corn at the rate of
about bushel to the acre along the
last of June and then cut it with har-
vester or corn binder if sown in drills,
cure it well in the shock and later put
in the barn or stack. This is better
crop than millet or sorghum, so far as
the feed is concerned, and is more cas-
lily and satisfactorily handled. Five
acres of such corn if planted on good
land will easily yield 20 tons Of very
choice fodder.
We lately at farmers institute at
Logan, in Harrison county, Ia, had the
pleasure of listening to brass band
and string orchestra of 20 members,
each one the son or daughter of men
living on their farms. Under a compe-
tent instructor they had semiweekly
rehearsals during the winter months
and have settled in a most happy and
pleasing manner the question of social
pleasure for themselves, while at the
same time they afford others rare
musical treat. Here is an example well
worth following in other localities.
Two-thirds of this organization were
young ladies.
1t may be in place to say a word
about change of seed grain at this
time. Few men realize how much
they would be benefited by doing this.
II the farm is clay soil, try some
wheat, oats and barley from sandy
one, no matter if it is only few miles
/ W sol
seed from some sandy soil 100 or 200
miles to the north of you. If your farm
Is sandy, get the grain, grown on q clay
soil. Potatoes will show more improve
ment than almost any other crop by
this changing of seed. Nature works
on a law of continual change, and it is
well to heed it.
The back acres on the farm-the far
away fields which cannot be reached
| by the farm fertilizers-should have
special clover attention. 1t will be
great day for the centra. west when all
farmers look at clover rather as a fer
tilizer than as a forage plant, for,
| grand forage as it Is, 1t is still worth
far more on any farm as fertilizer.
There is no single line of farm econom-
| les which needs SO constantly to be
kept to the front as this of the value
of the clover plant as soil fertilizer.
Not one-third of the farmers in the
west and northwest seem to know or
care anything about clover.
We came across farming communi-
| ty this winter which has had during
the past ten years periodic spells Of
shifting from dairying to beef raising
and back again, with the result that in
the effort to breed to meet these diver
gent specialties they have got so much
Holstein and Jersey blood into their
herds that the steers are no good for
feeders, and, crossing back to the beef
type with Polled Angus and Shorthorn,
have spoiled their dairy herds and
practically, to all intents and purposes.
have now nothing but the worst sort
of scrub stock. This is all folly and al
ways brings disappointment.