Part 4

A MACHINE that can take hay, corn fodder, grass, and grain and manufacture them into good, rich milk at the rate of a quart per hour for every hour in the twenty-four, is a valuable one and should be well cared for. There are machines--cows--which have done this. There are many thousands of them that will come well up to this figure for several months in the year, and which will, besides, through another system of organisms, turn out a calf every year to perpetuate the race of machines. Man has it in his power to increase the capacity of the cow for milk and the milk for cream. He must furnish the motive power, the belts, and the oil in the form of proper food, shelter, and kindly treatment. By withholding these he throws the entire machinery out of gear and robs himself.

Compiled Correspondence.

KANE COUNTY, MARCH 17.--Snow is nearly all gone. There is but little frost in the ground. The spring birds have come. Hay is plenty, winter wheat and winter rye look green, and have not been winter-killed to any great extent. Cattle and horses are looking well and are free from disease. We fear the spread of the foot-and-mouth disease. Every effort should be made to confine it within its present limits. Its spread in this county of so great dairy interests would be a great calamity. Our factory men will make full cream cheese during the summer months. The hard, skim cheese made last season, and sold at 2 cts per pound, paid the patrons nothing. We hear of factory dividends for January of $1.60 to $1.66. J. P. B.

GRAND PRAIRIE, TEX., MARCH 8.--The spring is cold and late here; but little corn planted yet. Winter oats killed; many have sown again. Farmers are well up with their work. G. E. R.

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Brown's Bronchial Troches will relieve Bronchitis, Asthma, Catarrh, Consumption and Throat Diseases. _They are used always with good success._

Symptoms of Foot-and-Mouth Disease.

This disease, which is one of the most easily transmitted of contagious and infectious diseases of domestic animals, is characterized by the appearance of vesicles or small bladders on the mucous surfaces and those parts of the skin uncovered by hair, such as in the mouth, on the gums and palate, on the tongue, and the internal surface of the lips and cheeks; on the surface of the udder and teats, and between the claws. The disease passes through four different stages or periods; but for present purposes it will be sufficient to merely mention the most prominent of the successive changes and appearances, as they occur to the ordinary observer. The incubatory stage, or the time between contamination and the development of the disease, is very short (from twenty-four hours to one or two weeks), and the disease is ushered in by the general symptoms of fever, such as shivering, increased temperature, staring coat, dry muzzle, dullness and loss of appetite. The animals seek seclusion, preferably in sheltered places, where they assume a crouched position, or lie down, and there is more or less stiffness and unwillingness to move. The mouth becomes hot and inflamed looking, and covered with slime, the breath fetid; the animal grinds the teeth, smacks with mouth, and has difficulty in swallowing. There is more or less tenderness of feet and lameness, and in cows the udder becomes red and tender, the teats swollen, and they refuse to be milked. Depending upon the intensity of the fever and the extent to which the udder is affected, the milk secretion will be more or less diminished, or entirely suspended; but throughout the disease the quality or constituents of the milk become materially altered; its color changes to a yellow; it has a tendency to rapid decomposition, and possesses virulent properties. Soon yellowish-white blisters, of various sizes, from that of a small pea to a small hickory nut, appear on the mucous surface within the mouth, and which blisters often in the course of development become confluent or coalesce. They generally break within two to three days, and leave bright red, uneven, and ragged sores or ulcers, to the edges of which adheres shreds of detached epithelial tissue. The animal now constantly moves the tongue and smacks the mouth, while more or less copious and viscid saliva continually dribbles from the mouth. The lameness increases in proportion as the feet are affected, and if the fore feet are most affected, the animal walks much like a floundered horse, with the hinder limbs advanced far under the body, and with arched back. The coronet of the claws, especially toward the heels, becomes swollen, hot, and tender, causing the animal to lie down most of the time. The blisters, which appear at the interdigital space of the claws, and especially at the heels, break in the course of a day and discharge a thick, straw-colored fluid; the ulcers, which are of intensely red or scarlet color, soon become covered with exudating lymph, which dries and forms scabs. On the udder, the blisters appear more or less scattered and variable, and they are most numerous at the base and on the teats. Ordinarily, the disease terminates in two or three weeks, while the animal, which during its progress refuses to partake of any other than sloppy food, gradually regains strength and flesh, and the udder resumes its normal functions. The mortality at times has proved very great in this disease when it has appeared with unusual virulency.

Shyness and Timidity.

In common "horse language," these propensities are confounded one with the other or else no proper and right distinction is made between them. A horse may be timid without being shy, though he can hardly be said to be shy without being timid. Young horses in their breaking are timid, frightened at every fresh or strange object they see. They stand gazing and staring at objects they have not seen before, fearful to approach them; but they do not run away from, or shy at them; on the contrary, the moment they are convinced there is nothing hurtful in them, they refuse not to approach or even trample upon them. This the shy horse will not do. He can not be persuaded to turn toward or even to look at the object he shies at; much less to approach it.

Timid horses, through usage and experience, get the better of their timidity, and in time become very opposite to fearful; but shy horses, unless worked down to fatigue and broken-spiritedness, rarely forget their old sins. The best way to treat them is to work them, day by day, moderately for hours together, taking no notice whatever of their shying tricks, neither caressing nor chastising them, and on no account whatever endeavoring to turn their heads either towards or away from the objects shied at.

Glanders.

With a view of shedding light on the important question of the contagiousness of glanders, we will mention the following deductions from facts brought forth by our own experience.

1. That farcy and glanders, which constitute the same disease, are propagable through the medium of stabling, and this we believe to be the more usual way in which the disease is communicated from horse to horse.

2. That infected stabling may harbor and retain the infection for months, or even years; and though, by thoroughly cleansing and making use of certain disinfecting means, the contagion may probably be destroyed, it would not perhaps be wise to occupy such stables _immediately_ after such supposed or alleged disinfection.

3. That virus (or poison of glanders) may lie for months in a state of incubation in the horse's constitution, before the disease breaks out. We have had the most indubitable evidence of its lurking in one horse's system for the space of fifteen weeks.

4. That when a stud or stable of horses becomes contaminated, the disease often makes fearful ravages among them before it quits them; and it is only after a period of several months' exemption from all disease of the kind that a clean bill of health can be safely rendered.

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REMEMBER _that $2.00 pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year, and the subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

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Sand Mulching of Orchard Trees.

In THE PRAIRIE FARMER I notice the interesting note of "O." of Sheboygan Falls, Wis., on the apparent benefit resulting from sand and manure mulching of pear trees.

In the very near future I expect to see much of this kind of work done by commercial orchardists. Already we have many trees in Iowa mulched with sand.

I wish now to draw attention to the fact that on the rich black prairie soils west of Saratov--about five hundred miles southeast of Moscow--every tree in the profitable commercial orchards is mulched with pure river sand. The crown of the tree when planted is placed about six inches lower than usual with us in a sort of basin, about sixteen feet across. This basin is then filled in with sand so that in the center, where the tree stands, it is three or four inches higher than the general level of the soil. The spaces between these slight depressions filled with sand are seeded down to grass, which is not cut, but at time of fruit gathering is flattened by brushing to make a soft bed for the dropping fruit and for a winter mulch.

The close observer will not fail to notice good reasons for this treatment. (1.) The sand mulch maintains an even temperature and moisture of the surface roots and soil and prevents a rapid evaporation of the moisture coming up by capillary attraction from the sub soil.

(2.) The soil under the sand will not freeze as deeply as on exposed surfaces, and we were told that it would not freeze as deeply by two feet or more as under the tramped grass in the interspaces.

(3.) With the light colored sand about the trees, and grass between, the lower beds of air among the trees would not be as hot by several degrees as the exposed surface, even when the soil was light colored clay.

(4.) A bed of sand around the trunks of the trees will close in with the movement of the top by the summer and autumn winds, thus avoiding the serious damage often resulting from the swaying of the trunk making an opening in the soil for water to settle and freeze.

Still another use is made of this sand in very dry seasons, which as with us would often fail to carry the fruit to perfection. On the upper side of large commercial orchards, large cisterns are constructed which are filled by a small steam pump. When it is decided that watering is needed the sand is drawn out, making a sort of circus ring around the trees which is run full of water by putting on an extra length of V spouting for each tree. When one row is finished the conductors are passed over to next row as needed. To water an orchard of 1,200 trees--after the handy fixtures are once provided--seems but a small task. After the water settles away, the sand is returned to its place.

In the Province of Saratov we saw orchards with and without the sand, and with and without the watering. We did not need to ask if the systematic management paid. The great crops of smooth apples and pears, and the long lived and perfect trees on the mulched and watered orchards told the whole story of the needs of trees planted on black soil on an open plain subject to extreme variations as to moisture and temperature of air and soil.

J. L. BUDD., IOWA AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.

Pear Blight.--No. 2.

The mere "experience" of an individual, whether as a doctor of medicine, horticulture, or agriculture--however extensive, is comparatively worthless. Indeed the million "demonstrate it to be mischievous, judging from the success of quacks and empyrics as to money. An unlimited number of facts and certificates prove nothing, either as to cause or remedy."

Sir Isaac Newton's corpuscular theory "explained all the phenomena of light, except one," and he actually assumed, for it "fits." Nevertheless it will ever remain the most thinkable mode of teaching the laws of light, and it is not probable that any more than this will ever be accomplished as to any natural science--if that can be called science about which we must admit that "it is not so; but it is as if it were so."

Of more than 300 "Osband Summer" which I grafted on the Anger quince successfully, one remains, and this one was transplanted after they had fruited in a clay soil, to the same sort of soil between "the old standard" and a stable, both of which have occupied the same locality and within twenty yards, during much more than fifty years of my own observation--this "Osband Summer" flourishes. It has borne fruit in its present site, but grew so rapidly last year that the blossoms aborted thus illustrating the large proportion of vital force necessary to the production of fruit, as the site has a perennial supply of manure from the old stable. A number of standard trees, of the same variety, developed beautifully until they attained twenty or thirty feet, but then succumbed to the blight, after the first effort at fruiting. So also the Beurre Clairgean etc., etc. Their exposure to the same influences, and their growth during several years did not occasion the blight, but the debility which must inevitably attend fruiting seems the most prolific cause.

All the phenomena of pear blight can be accounted for, and we are greatly encouraged in protecting the trees therefrom if, we assume, it is only the result of weakness and deficient vitality; if so, as in epidemics, all the pear trees may be poisoned or ergotized, but only the weakest succumb; and perhaps this debility may be confined to one limb. The practical value of this view is manifest, as it is impracticable to avoid using the same knife, and remove every blighted leaf from the orchard. Moreover, if the limb is a large one, its prompt removal shocks the vitality of the whole tree[1] and thus renders other parts more vulnerable. On the contrary view, the limb may be allowed to drop by natural process, precisely as all trees in a forest shed their lower limbs, leaving hardly a cicatrice or scar, and this may be insured at any season by a cord of hemp twine, firmly bound around the limb. The inevitable strangulation, and the healing of the stump (without the mycelium of fungi which the knife or saw inevitably propagates by exposing a denuded surface, if not more directly) proceed more rapidly than the natural slough of limbs by starvation. Moreover the fruit may mature on such limbs during their strangulation, as this may not be perfected before the subsequent winter.

The next practical result of my view is the fundamental importance of all those means which are calculated to husband the vital force of the tree during its first effort to fruit; one of these is the use of a soil that will not produce more than twenty bushels of corn without manure, thus a large proportion of the setts will be aborted, but one half of what remains should be removed, and subsequently the area beneath the limbs should have a wheelbarrow of good compost. D. S.

Footnote 1: NOTE.--The shock as to vital force is demonstrated by the fact that when young trees are not trimmed at all their girth increases more rapidly, and they bear fruit sooner. Moreover, when old trees are severely pruned (though not half the proportion of wood is removed) they fail to bear during the next year. I find that a hemp cord about the size of the stem of a tobacco pipe (one-fourth inch diameter) will soon become imbedded in the bark if firmly tied around a limb, and perhaps this size is more efficient than a thicker cord.

The Black Walnut.

The black walnut is without doubt the most valuable tree we have for the rich lands of the "corn belt," West, and one which is very easily grown everywhere if the farmer will only learn how to get it started. How few we see growing on our prairies. Why? Simply because to have it we must grow it from the nuts. It is nearly impossible to transplant black walnut trees of any size and have them live; although it is a fact that whenever a non-professional attempts to grow them from the nuts he is almost sure to fail, it is also a fact that there is no tree that is more easily grown from the seed than this, if we only know how to do it.

It is my purpose in this note to tell how to do it, and also how not to do it.

In the first instance we will suppose a man lives where he can gather the nuts in the woods. When the nuts begin to fall let him plow deeply the plot of ground he wishes to plant and furrow it off three or four inches deep, the distance apart he wishes his rows to be. He will then go to the woods and gather what nuts he wishes to plant, and plant them at once, just as they come from the tree, covering them just out of sight in the furrows. This is all there is of it; simple, is it not? But it will not do to gather a great wagon box full, and let them stand in it until they heat, or to throw them in a great heap on the ground and let them lay there until they heat. It will not do, either, to hull them and let them lay in the sun a week or two, or hull them, dry them and keep them until spring, and then plant; none of these plans will do if you want trees. Of course if the nuts are hulled and planted at once they will grow; but this hulling is entirely unnecessary. Besides, the hulls seem to act as a special manure for the young seedlings, causing them to grow more vigorously.

Next, we will suppose one wishes to plant walnuts where they can not be had from the woods, but must be shipped in. There seems to be only one plan by which this can be done safely every time, which is as follows: Gather the nuts as they fall from the trees--of course when they begin to fall naturally all may be shaken down at once--and spread them not over a foot deep, on the bare ground under the shade of trees. Cover out of sight with straw or leaves, with some sticks to hold in place called a "rot heap;" then after they are frozen and will stay so, they may be shipped in bags, boxes, barrels, or in bulk by the car-load, and then, again, placed in "rot heaps," as above, until so early in the spring as the soil is in workable condition. Then plant as directed in the fall, except the soil should be firmly packed around the nuts. Keep free from weeds by good cultivation, and in due time you will have a splendid grove.

There was an immense crop of walnuts in this district last fall, and thousands of bushels were put up carefully, in this way, all ready for shipment before the weather became warm; many more thousands were planted to grow seedlings from, for, notwithstanding the walnut transplants poorly when of considerable size, the one year seedlings transplant with as little loss as the average trees.

There is no tree better adapted for planting to secure timber claims with than the black walnut, and none more valuable when the timber is grown. For this purpose the land should be plowed deeply, then harrowed to fineness and firmness, and furrowed out in rows four, six, eight, or ten feet apart. The nuts may then be planted as directed. It is best to plant thickly in the rows, then if too thick they can be thinned out, transplanting the thinnings, or selling them to the neighbors. They should be thoroughly cultivated, until large enough to shade the ground, and thinned out as necessary as they grow larger. A walnut grove thoroughly cultivated the first ten years will grow at least twenty feet high, while one not cultivated at all would only grow two to three feet in that time.

D. B. WIER., LACON, ILL.

Notes on Current Topics.

ARBOR DAY.

Why can not Illinois have an Arbor Day as well as Nebraska, or any other State. There ought to be ten millions of trees planted the coming spring within its borders--saying nothing of orchard trees--by the roadside, on lawns, for shade, for wind breaks, for shelter, for mechanical purposes, and for climatic amelioration. Nearly all our towns and villages need more trees along the streets or in parks; thousands of our farms are suffering for them; hundreds of cemeteries would be beautified by them, and numberless homes would be rendered more pleasant and homelike by an addition of one, two, or a dozen, to their bleak places. Can not THE PRAIRIE FARMER start a boom that will lead to the establishment of an Arbor Day all over the State? Why not? There is yet time.

HOT-BEDS.