Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1911-06-27
Cutting Out the Grain Bill.
HOW FORMER SHOE DEALER MADE A
SUCCESS OF FARMING.

Charles q. Gardner, formerly shoe
dealer in Skowhegan, has made sue
cess of farming primarily by eliminating
the grain bill. To be sure, he did buy
eight bags of cottonseed meal last year,
but to Offset that he sold three hundred
bushels of seed oats at comfortable
margin over market quotations.
Throughout the ten years that he has
owned his place he has uniformly prac-
tised mixed farming, and to-day has one
of the best equipped and best cultivated
farms in Somerset County.
Mr.. Gardner's farm contains 16o acres,
forty of which can be titled. The year
that he bought it there were about five
acres in hoed crops, and it cut between
thirty five and forty tons OF hay. Last
year he put forty-five tons of hay into
the barn, $50 bushels of grain into the
crib. sixty tons of silage into the silo
and one thousand bushels of potatoes
into the cellar. Twenty tons of hay and
the potatoes were sold, but with these
exceptions and the seed oats above men
toned everything else was fed to the
stock.
OF course, there are number of fact
ors behind this remarkable transition,
but first and foremost is thorough TILL
age. Mr.. Gardner owns among other
good tools double action cutaway har-
row that he never permits to stand idle
when there is an excuse to use it. He
follows a four or five year rotation, and
when his land finally goes back into
grass after the hoed crops there is real
seedbed ready and waiting. Then while
he is trying to raise hay he does not un-
do any of the preceding good work by
pasturipg the fields. His second and
third crops of hay are W hat good many
farmers would brag about from new
seeded.
The second big factor that strikes the
observer is the way he handles the barn
manure. Underneath the big stable
there is an unusually spacious basement
containing four hog pens. If any of the
farm made fertility is wasted the amount
is' not large. All the straw used in bed
ding the stock is first run through the
cutter, and, along with the dressing,
finds its way into the hog pens. Then
when spring comes there is something
to load the manure spreader with that
would grow crops on anything except
fiat rock.
Mr.. Gardner does not carry an un-
usual amount of stock, partly or. account
of the farm labor problem. He finds 1t
more comfortable and satisfactory to
keep only what be can care for alone
when necessary, selling any surplus feed
that he may have. At present the live
things inventory as follows: Six cows,
4 heifers, 2 oxen, Jersey bull, 2 work
horses, driving horse, colt, 8 hogs
and 4S hens. The latter, however, are
the especial charges of the better half of
the household, and if they ever lack for
any of the good things of life their ap-
pearance does not indicate 1t. On May
10 they loaded down the egg basket with
six and one-half dozen eggs.
As a partial solution for the labor
problem Mr.. Gardner has from time to
time accumulated one of the best equip
ments of farm machinery in the county
if not in the state. Not for the sake OF
gratifying any fads, either, but from
simple business considerations. In
addition to those things to be found on
every modern farm as matter of course
he has an eight-horsepower gas engine,
grain grinder, corn harvester, ensilage
cutter, grain reaper and binder, manure
spreader and a cream separator. A 75-
ton square silo built into the barn is
largely the product of his own labor,
representing q cash outlay Of about Sl5.
The thing that Mr.. Gardner depends
on to keep the grain bill where 1t belongs
| is a succotash mixture of oats, peas and
spring wheat. The grains are harvested
when ripe, thrashed and ground. For
feeding the dairy stock he uses two parts
by measure of the succotash mixture,
one part corn and cob meal and one part
cottonseed. For the pigs there is the
succotash mixture and boiled potatoes
during the growing period and cornmeal
at fattening, with skim milk, of course,
as the mainstay. Oats, wheat and corn
with little beef scrap and green stuff,
supply most of the wants of the poultry,
and feed for the horses is always on tap.
For the current year Mr.. Gardner will
have fourteen acres In oats, four acres 10
oats, peas and wheat, four acres in buck
wheat, one.half acre In spring wheat,
four acres In sweet corn, four acres In
yellow corn, four and one-half acres in
potatoes and the rest of the meadows in
hay. OF course, there will be besides a
good kitchen garden, and one.quarter of
an acre has also been set aside for an
OK perimental plot Of alfalfa.
Everything about the whole place has
been carefully planned with view to
saving labor. Running water In the
house and barn, tools and equipment OF
all kinds, and land cleared to make their
use both easy and profitable, all help
explain why Charles q. Gardner ia
happy, contented and firmly of the
opinion that farming is the best business
in the world.-Christopher NJ. Gallup,
Skowhegan, in Tribune Farmer.