Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1903-03-10

Drought caused q shrinkage of &c..
000,0 1000 sheep and 275, 900 head of cattle
in New South Wales last year.
The owners of the rich Nile valley
lands have to pay an annual tax of
So per acre. We know of men who
kick at a tax of % cents per acre.
The second and third weeks of a
cows lacteal period are the ones dur,
ing which she will, under normal feed
and conditions, give the largest yield
of butter.
The ordinary average farm of the
corn belt is just the place to raise the
heavy draft horse, and there should be
a pair of good well bred draft mares on
every quarter section farm.
At the late poultry show at Kansas
City a three-year-old hen sold for SOL.
This beats $4,000 for a boar pig or $12,-
500 for a Shorthorn bull and beats
Shamrock, who only brought about $40
per pound, including all the prizes he
won.
The dairy COW expected to give q
flow of milk during the winter season
should be provided with some kind of
a succulent ration, either roots or en-
silage. In the line Of roots there is
nothing better for her than sugar beets
or carrots.
A point worth remembering in the
tile draining Of land is that if the tile
are laid in the near vicinity of willow
trees or hedges the ibrous roots Of such
trees will seek the tile drain for the
moisture 1t contains and by filling it
| with a mass of roots thus render the
drain worthless. The roots once inside
of the tile will travel an almost unlim-
tied distance.
The tendency has been in the keep
ing of butter in cold storage to grad
ually lower the temperature year by
year Of the room where the butter is
stored. This season the butter which
has kept in the most perfect condition
and which shows practically no loss
whatever Of fine quality and flavor
has been kept at a temperature of
from 6 to 10 degrees below zero.
No apple grown in the west has been
the recipient Of more unstinted abuse
than the variety known as Patterns
Greening, and still a fruit grower in
central Iowa who has eight acres of
this variety told us recently that he
obtained a gross return of 5000 per
acre from these trees last year. This
would indicate that the criticism re-
ferred to is not altogether impartial
and fair.
A little pest and brute almost un-
known in the west thirty years ago
the civet cat or small skunk-is con-
stantly increasing in numbers so that
in many sections it has become an in
tolerable plague and menace to all
poultry raisers. We know of just two
farms, and these adjoining a city Of
5000 population, where last season
were killed no less than t~hirty-five Of
these pests.
A friend writes asking why apples
shrink up and w1ther when kept in a
cool cellar. The air is probably too
dry and subjects the fruit to a steady
process Of evaporation. When kept in
Ia cellar, apples should not be exposed
to the air. They keep well packed in
moist sand or in an underground pit,
just as potatoes are kept. If kept in
the cellar, cover them with something
which will prevent the evaporation.
Molasses al a b%yproduct of the sugar
factories has always until lately been
regarded as little better than a nui-
sance 1t is now known that when it is
properly mixed with other foods it
makes a most valuable stock ration, es-
pecially for horses. In France and
Germany it is now being used in i'm
mense quantities as food for horses,
and they are being kept in the best Of
condition at a cost of only SO per cent
of the old time grain ration.
One serious drawback to the cooper.
alive creamery business is the seeming
necessity which compels Sunday work
during the summer to properly care
for the milk. OF course the COWS must
be MIXED on Sunday just as on any
other day, and this seeming necessity
of running the creamery on Sunday has
in most cases overruled whatever NOR
al sentiment there may have been in
the community against Sunday work.
We notice, however, that quite a num-
Der Of creameries are giving up this
Sunday work, the patrons having made
arrangements to care for their Sunday
milk at home. Wherever it is possible
to do this it SHOULD be done, as any
form of labor on the Sabbath has a de-
moralizing influence on the community
at large.