Farm and Garden.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 426, 23 June 1904, Page 2

Farm and Garden.

ORIGINAL. ARTICLES. AN ENGLISH DUCK FARM. a duck farm in England about mfeM. thousand ducks are raised sQU&d annually. Eggs are bought from farmers, and they are hatched by means of incubators and hens. The field or paddook in which the rearing and fattenisg id carried out is twenty acres in extent, fenced across the centre from aide to side, thus forming two ten aore plots, one of which is resting every second year. That is pastured by forty head of dairy cattle kept on the farm, the milk of which is converted into cheese. The land is divided by eighteen inch wire netting into sixty pens, twenty-five yards square, and I thirty pens five to ten yards square for the youngest duokJingß. From one hundred and twenty or more ducklings are confined in each pen. When the day old ducklings are brought into the field they are placed in lote of one hundred and twenty in foster mothers, with a strong lamp in one corner screened off by perforated zinc lamp guards. They are fed every two hours until four days old with minced hard boiled uufertiled eggs and bread specially made, in which but little yeast is used. That is all passed through a mincing machine and mixed along with various kinds of meal, At four days old they are removed to a larger foster mother for another five days and fed on the same kind of food. At ten days old they are placed in an open run of five square yards, covered with fine sand six inches deep, and confined in rquare boxes with no bottoms until a fortnight old. They are then allowed oat for twenty minutes every three hours for the purpose of feeding and exercise. At a fortnight old they step a grade higher and are given a space of ten square yards with a grass run and fed four timeß each day, principally on a mixture of meals and meat, but are still confined in the rearers except during the short time allowed for feeding. When a month old the ducklings are removed to the twenty fire yard square pens and allowed to roam at will during the day but shut up each night. In feeding wooden buckets cut down to about eight inches aze used in e&ch pen, four buckets in each pen, two of which are used for gravel and water and two for food, which is made of a crumbly nature. The water and gravel are emptied out two or three times daring the week and a fresh supply given. In each pen are four boxes without bottoms from foar to six feet equare, with doorways eighteen inches square, with removable doors—one made of wood, the other of wire netting—each of which is used according to the weather. Each day these boxes are removed to fresh ground bedded with sawdust to a depth of two inches. The boxes are turned up every three days and whitewashed with fresh hot lime. The accumulations are brushed up and placed on the manure heap, which is afterward applied to the meadowland with wonderful results as a top dressing. DAIRY FARMING. A good cow is-a good cow the world over, whatever breed she may be. No farmer should keep a cow for milking purposes that does not produse at least two hundred and fifty pounds of butter fat in a year. The expense of-earing for the animal will barely be met by the production of one hundred and seventy-five to two hundred pounds of butter fat. The profit lies in the production above expenses j a cow yielding two hundred and fifty pounds a year gives a fair profit, but pound butter fat cow tires more than twice as much profit. The only accurate way to decide which are the best cows in a herd is to employ some method of determining production—such as weighing or measuring the milk and testing with the Babcook test. Profits in dairying depend largely on the system adopted. Farmers should aim to have their cows produce the largest quantity of milk at the time it will command the highest price. For that reason winter dairying is much more profitable than summer work. If cows freshen in the spring it is true that large amounts of milk can be produced on cheap summer pasture, but at that particular time miik sells at the lowest price. The heat, drought and flies are troublesome, and during the summer period the farmer is busy with his crops and harvest, and the care of milk and the making of butter is much more difficult than during the winter. These cows must also be put on dry food during the winter. The change usually produces a marked decrease in the milk flow, or even causes them to go at j entirely. They must also be fed a liberal allowance during the winter to keep them in good condition. The advances cf winter dairying are numerous, If the cow drops her calf in the autumn she will give a good flow of milk throughout most of the winter season on very little more feed than is necessary to winter a dry cow. In the spring when the milk flow has begun to decrease the cow seems to make a new start when put on grain, thus giving practically two freshings in the year. By this method the greatest milk yield occurs when prices are the highest. In winter also the farmer has more time to his cattle; an ] important point is the fact that it is much ' easier to care for the milk and to produce good butter when the temperature is cold.