Year: 1860

Of great fertility, and abundance OF natural
pasture, be should have succeeded


To illustrate the accuracy in estimating the
weight of cattle which Mr.. Strawn has by long
experience acquired, we may state that he in
formed US that he had judged lots Of 100 to
500 head of steers, and varied but half score
of pounds from the actual Weig ghts, as ssceF-
tanned by the scales. BE buys in preference
three and four year old steers, but takes them
of all ages, If necessary. Getting them in Feb
ruary and March, be grazes them through
Summer, and until December, when he COM
menoes to feed. This he formerly did as early
as November, because of having had more cat
tie to given quantity of land than he has at
present. He keeps q man to about every
huudred head, which, with his system of man
apement, is sufficient. The cat lie are fed in
timber groves, and the corn is thrown on the
ground, stalks and all, just as it is hauled from
The field. The allowance per head, when stall
feeding, is half bushel daily, and the Ia rye
cattle get even as much as three Pecks. Two
hogs are turned in to each steer, to collect the
waste. Mr.. Strawn thinks sixty bushels large
crop of corn, and mistrusts the fabulous stories
of Yields that sometimes meet US in the papers.


In the old times his practice in feeding steers
was TO commence in October, while the cattle
were still in pasture, giving them not more
than six quarts q day. After feeding them
them ten days he increased the allowance BY
one quart if the cattle were large, and always
feeding at one regular hour. Or if be wished
to get them fat soon. he commenced with two
feeds or five quarts each by the first of Novem-
Der; by the tenth he gives two feeds of six
quarts; and 90, increasing slowly, he got them
up to their fall feed only when the cold wealth
er came, if it should be deferred until January.
r Al l.
of February he would begin to feed so that the
cattle would ever have beds of corn and fodder
to lie upon. Mr.. Strawn advises the keeping
of enough hogs to eat up the waste in any event
II he fed heavily he had half as many stock
cattle as fat cattle to follow. He sells as soon
as he can do so at a moderate profit, replacing
the ones sold with other cattle, for he thinks
that "the nimble sixpence is better than the
slow shilling"


His allowance of pasture and corn for each
head of stock is two acres. In former times,
he bought three Yesr-old steers at SO and
turned them offs Sl6; but the prices have so
advanced that he now pays from S25 to $40
per head and sells for $50 to $50. The profit
10 the same as formerly, but the capital involved
much greater.


He pays no attention whatever TO blood in
cattle or horses, but chooses from their appear
ance alone. The several anecdotes which he
recounted TO US as we sat in the front porch Of
his house, fully evinced his contempt for hose
who are weak enough to devote themselves to
raising blooded stock. His points of merit in
farm horse are large eye, bay color, with
heavy black name and tail, rOnnd body, large
ham-string, short back, long belly, fifteen or
sixteen hands in hight, and to weigh abO ut
200 pounds. For many years he has not let
his stock horses come into a stable, but keeps
them running out all Winter. He gives them
nothing but hay when the snow is on the
ground. He does not wean his eoIts, but lets
them run with the dams as they would in a
state of nature. Last season he wintered over
20 head in this way, without grain of any des


cription. The whole lot did not, he says, eat
more than six tuns Of hay during the Winter.
He thinks that he can raise five colts so as to
be large enough to use, cheaper than he can
raise one steer; but the trouble with them Is
that large lot cannot be sold together for cash


as can always be done with steers.


On high knoll a short distance from the
house, Mr.. Strawn has made a water BASIN
similar to those which one sees all through
Central Kentucky 1t Is twenty rods long


tan wide, and ten feet deep. He rallied ii


arouud and fed corn in the basin to cattla and


hogs, thus getting the bottom well puddled by


the trampling of their feet, and making il
almost waterDtight. The heavy rains of ;
single Winter suficed to pour enough water
into the basin for several hundred head Of stock


and we were assured that it had never been
dried but once in twelve years.