FACTS FOR FARMERS.

Waikato Times, Volume IV, Issue 218, 2 October 1873, Page 2

FACTS FOR FARMERS.

It is aiierted from experience that the relative value of grain, 4c, for feeding d«iry stock, all tilings considered, is as follows :— lst, oats, well ground ; 2nd, ryo ; 3rd, barley ; 4th, wheat ; 6th, bran ; 6th, buckwheat ; 7th, corn and oilcake, equal to either. What is left of buckwheat after taking out the flour, will largely increase the quantity of milk, without improving its quality, or the condition of the cow. A member of the Royal Agricultural Col ege in treating upon the management of poultry, gives some very useful information, from which are abstracted the following points : For breeding, there should be two cocks to eight hons in separate yards ; for eggs only, the proportion of sexes is imlmaterial. Th« hen continues for only two, or at most three years in the best state of breeding ; the fresher the eggs the better for breeding. To promote laying, give the bone and scrape of cooked meat. Separate the broods to preserve health, choosing safe and sunny places for the coops. In respect to geese, mate one gander with not more than three Oats can be sown on a great range of soils, from a black muck to the heaviest clay*. It is almost the only cereal that will do well on a granite country. Of all the small grains oats will stand the greatest neglect but well repay good cultivation. They are often sown on new ploughed sod land and occasionally do well enough to induce farmers to continue the practice, notwithstanding the fsct that in nine cases out of ten the result is anything but satisfactory. Better plant corn on the sod land, and sow oats after the corn. A dairy farmer writes that he got a tin pan large enough to hold one milking from ten cows, but got less butter than he did from the same amount of milk in smaller pans. The great secret of successful dairying, or one of the great secrets, is to withdraw the animal heat from the milk as soon as possible. A pan, such as is described, seems much less suitable for the purpose than a deep and narrow can, set to its neck in water. The latter is more conveniently skimmed and more easily handled, cools more rapidly, and exposes a larger proportion of the milk to the influence of the water and less to that of air ; this is better, as the temperature of the water is uniform. We let our milk stand 24 hours (all the time in the «r*ter) ; and we prefer to keep it lower than 62. Probably 50" would be better if water so cold could be bad. The colder the water the larger the diameter of the can may be. If the water stands at 60\ then a diamater of eight inches is large enough. The point is to have the mass of xnillc cooled as «oon m practicable. If it were first passed through a cooler, then the can might be of any size that would not expose too much surface to the air. The American Agriculturist gives the following recipe for ordinary cases of diarrhoea in sheep : — Change the food and give the sheep all they will eat of a mixture of equal parts of GHauber's-salt (sulphate of soda) and common salt. This may apparently increase the difficulty at first, but will usually effect a. cure. Where there are only one or two sheep affected and it is probably caused by weakness, give a pint of fresh milk mide into a porridge with a tablespoonful of wheat flour once a day. If this does not effect a cure, give two ounces of Glauber or Epsom salts and 20 drops of laudanum. If the sheep is very weak, give half a pint of warm ale with a little ginger or gentian. A good permanent whitewash for outdoor use may be made of the following ingredients : — Take half a bushel of freshly burned lime, slake it with boiling water ; cover it during the process to keep in the steam. Strain the liquid through a fine sieve, and add to it 71b. of salt previously well dissolved in warm water ; 31b. of ground rice, boiled to a thin paste, and stirred in boiling hot ; ilb. of powdered whiting, and lib. of glue, which has been previously dissolved by soaking it well and then hanging it over a slow fire, ir a small kettle within a largo one filled with water. Add five gallons of hot water to the mixture, stir it well, and let it stand a few days covered from dirt. It should then be boiled and put on quite hot. For this purpose it can be kept in a kettle on a portable furnace. About a pint of this mixture will cover a square yard. In some experiments to determine the effect of speoial manures on the growth of weeds in conjunction with clover, it w.is found when the land was totally manured, the weeds formed 57 per cent, of the entire yield. Nitiogenous manures effected but little improvement, phosphatic mixtures somewhat greater, whilst gypsum (plaster of Paris) reduced the proportion of weeds to I' 9 per cent. only. But before any one assumes from th ; a result that gypsum is a general antidote to weeds and applies it accordingly on all soils and to all crops, he must remember that gypsum is a special manure for clover, and gives it power to struggle successfully with the weeds and crowd them out. Secondly, it was evident fiat the soil was not naturally gypsiferous. Hence the peculiar weeds there present had an advantage over the clover. But a gypsum soil has its own hssorttnent of weeds, whioh are as much at home there as the clover. Hence the only legitimate conclusion is this : give a plant its favorite manure, and it will master weeds that do not relUh euoh manures. A manufacture which is fast acquiring importance in the United States, and in some parts of Europe, is the mnking of paper from corn husks. It is highly probable that the time is not far distant when a market may be found in this country for the now almost useless produce of the farm. The German paper manufacturers have of late been very successful in the production of paper, and even of a description of cloth from corn husks. The husks are first boiled with an alkali in tubular boilers ; and a result of which the fibres of the hueks are found at the bottom of the boiler in a spongy condition, filled with gelatinous substance or dough, which Utter is preased out from tlio fibre* bjr hydraulio presses, leaving the fibre in the shapo of longitudinal threads intersporsed with a dense mass of short fibre. Linen that is made from the long fibres is said to furnish a very good substitute for the coarser kinds of flax and hemp, while it is superior to jute, gunny cloth, and the like. The paper, for which mostly the short fibres are used— the long fibres being used for spinning — is said to be as strong or stronger than paper of the same weight from linen or cotton rags, and as hard and firm in grain. It is very durable and can be made extremely transparent without sacrificing any portion of its strength. The yield of the husks employed for the purpose is said to be 30 per cent, of fibre, 10 of gelatine, and 60 of dough.

A Breton ponsant, on his way to Paris, stopped at a barber's shop in Rambouillet. While the barber was strop ping his razor the peasant noticed a dog sitting near his chair, tnd staring at him fieraely. " What is the matter with that dog ? " The barber answered with an unconcerned air, "That dog is always there. You see when I out off «n eir » "Well?" 'Well, he eats it." A California merchant sent a dunning letter to a debtor in the diggings, and reoently receiyed the following reply : — | " Dear Sir,— You say you are holding my noto. That is all ! righfc. Just keep holding on to it, and if you find your hands slipping, spit on them nnd try it again. Yours I aflbclionatcl^ '