Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1916-06-28
MODEL FARM NEAR McGREGOR.
Pigs Fed From the Kitchen. Plenty
Water Tanks and IceleSs
Refrigerator.

MCOIcSOT, Id, y uHc AO.-Dy hcAO
ly giving forethought to the relative
location of residence, outbuildings
and we'll, John Bernhard, who is
farming so acres of fine land near
McGregor, has reduced the work OF
feeding and watering stock and car
ing for milk and poultry so per sent.
The highest place on the farm was
selected as building site. The
house and we'll were placed on top
of this high ground and the barns
and stables on the slope below. BY
this side hill arrangement gravity is
made to do much of the work.
The ten roomed modern house
protected from the winds by dense
cedar grove stands on the crest of
the knoll. Within a few feet of the
back door of the house stands big
tank. A pipe extends from the els
tern to it and out of the tank run
some dozen other pipes down hill to
the barns, stables, hog pens, poultry
yard and out into the pastures.
A watering tank is at the end of
every pipe and in every tank float
valve hobs up and down. AS it bobs
| it alternately opens and shuts the
valve in the inflow pipe by pulling
the lever which is attached to it, thus
regulating the height of the water in
each tank.
Wind, gravity and the animals do
the rest, the wind pumping, gravity
distributing, and the stock keeping
the water running. The water is
pumped out of the we'll and into the
cistern by the windmill. From the
cistern it flows to the tank in the
basement of the house and thence to
the stables and in summer out to the
pastures.
Kerosene oil heaters, Mr.. Bern
hard's own invention, are kept burn
| ing in the tanks during the winter
maintaining the water at a comfort
able temperature, so that the year
round winter as we'll as summer the
several hundred horses, cows and
hogs on the big farm are watered
without 1.-The lifting of hand"
As they consume an enormous
amount of water, the supply in the
tank in the basement of the house is
constantly changing, thereby accom-
plishing second big labor saving.
The running water is cold al all
times, so the tank serves as conve-
nient cooling receptacle for the milk
and cream. Beside the tank is gas
oline engine which pumps the water
from the tank through pipes to every
part of the house.
The same engine, by the way, does
the family washing, operates the
cream separator, furnishes gas lights
for house and barns and fills the
tank in the attic from the rain water
cistern supplying the house with soft
as well as hard water.
Because of the relative position of
the buildings gravity does another
important work.
In the kitchen is cement trap for
wet garbage. A big pipe runs down.
hill from it TO the hog pens terminal
ing there in cement troughs. The
farmers wife at feeding times lifts
lup the cover of the trap and pours
in the food. Gravity does the rest
and the pigs though denied the lux
ury of being kept in the parlor as in
former days. are literally fed in the
kitchen.
They get their corn by way of gra-
vty, too. The corn crib is the second
story of the hog pens. Several
chutes extend down from the floor of
the crib to the pens below. They are
fashioned in the shape of perpendicu-
lar boxes with sort Of platform at
the lower end.
The pressure of the column holds
the corn packed in the chutes except
when the column is started moving
by pushing a shovel under 1t.
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