Chapter VI: Part 6

My lawn, under the care of this new one-cow lawn-mower, became the admiration and envy of the whole neighborhood. The chickens followed her and scattered her droppings, so that the lawn was always clean. I found it a great improvement on the old hand lawn-mower, and much less labor, for the staking out was far less trouble than running the mower. Besides, I sold the old machine for almost half the price I paid for the cow. But, strange as it seems to me now, I at first felt a little ashamed of my new mower, for I got in the practice of staking the cow on the front lawn at night, and moving her to the back lawn early in the morning.

She did her work so silently in the darkness that my neighbors wondered much that in so well-kept a lawn they never heard the click of the lawn-mower.

We have no storms in the summer in this latitude from which a cow needs any more protection than a tree affords. When it rained I milked her under the shelter of a beech.

In June, I rented a one-quarter acre lot for two dollars, and for one dollar hired it plowed and laid off in furrows a little over two feet apart. In these furrows I dropped corn, the grains two to four inches apart. I hired it plowed once with a shovel plow. This cost seventy-five cents. At the first frost, I had it cut and put up in small shocks. A woman that does washing for me, and occasionally chores about the house, did this at forty cents a day. She was several days at it, but during the time performed other work about the house. I think she spent about two solid days on it. This corn-fodder, with few large ears on it, but a great many nubbins, made my fodder and grain for the cow for the winter. Later in the fall, when the corn-stalks were thoroughly cured, I had them placed against poles set on crotches around the place where the cow was sheltered during the winter. The stalks were leaned against the poles from both sides, and made a sloping roof both ways, so as to shed snow and rain. From these poles I gave the cow an armful of this corn and fodder night and morning, and though the snow did sometimes lodge on them, and make my mittens cold, I could generally find a spot on one side or the other that was clear of snow. This work of putting up the fodder for winter use cost about two dollars.

My cow had been used to “slops” and meal, and did not take kindly to whole corn at first. I was advised to husk the corn, and get it ground; but by feeding her a few small or broken, or soft ears from my hand, she soon became eager for it, and has learned to grind it as well as the mill, and at less cost of going to and from, to say nothing of the toll. But even if she was not as good a corn crusher as the mill-stones, there would be no loss, for my fowls follow her faithfully, and pick up every broken grain that is dropped; so the miller’s toll that I save keeps me in chickens and eggs. Now that the cow had come to eat whole corn, I was told that she would muss over the fodder, hunting for the nubbins, and waste the stalks; but by sprinkling a little brine on the stalks when she became dainty, I found I could make her eat them as closely as was desirable.

A WINTER SHELTER.

I had no stable. The cow stood out in all the storms until late in December. The hair grew very thick, almost like a buffalo robe, and she did not seem to mind the cold. There was an old chicken house on the place, standing on posts about five feet high. It was in a hollow, and was sheltered by evergreens on the north and west. As I pulled up her stake one night in a drizzle to let her go under the tree where I milked her, she started on the gallop for this house, and from that time it was her winter couch. There I milked and fed her. I tied the chain around one of the corner posts, so as to leave her the choice of the shelter of the building or of exposure to the storm at her discretion, and I must say that she often surprised me by seeming as fond as a child of standing out in the rain. Under this coop I fed her fodder; the stalks she left, littered down her bed, and I had more manure in the spring than I had ever had before. A boy spread it from a wheelbarrow at twenty-five cents a day. The spring before I paid fifty cents a load for the manure, and two dollars and fifty cents a day for the hauling.

ABOUT SALTING.

I never fed the cow any salt for health during the summer, but she kept healthy, and the butter came. In the fall, I began feeding her the house slops, night and morning, and when she did not eat them freely I put a little salt in. When I thought she was not eating her fodder up clean enough, I would sprinkle on a little brine with an old broom. I never fed salt for her good, but sometimes for mine. In the fall, when I wanted her to eat up weeds before they went to seed, I used occasionally to sprinkle with brine such spots as I wanted eaten off closely. I never could make my old lawn-mower cut off weeds any closer than grass, but this new lawn-mower would eat these weed patches to the collars of the roots.

My cow became used to this kind of life, makes me no trouble, has furnished the milk and butter for our family of four the whole year, and some butter to send to my friends, and a little to sell. I have fodder enough from my quarter acre to keep her until grass is abundant, and have one dollar and twenty cents of the price of my calf still on hand.

I might go on and tell you how I used to buy hay at a high price for wintering my cow, and quantities of bran, brewers’ grains and corn-meal; how the hay always made her costive and hide-bound, and how she never ate it with half the relish which she does the corn fodder; how I found it an unladylike act to raise my foot and force the garden stake into the ground, and so contrived a smaller iron that I could more gracefully plant, and that no unruly cow ever could pull up; how with this new stake I can safely leave her on the lawn all night with the fullest confidence of finding her in the morning just where I left her, how when at first the cow got loose and wandered to the garden, I discovered that the taste of the butter was disagreeably affected by her eating certain herbs, and how it was very pleasantly flavored by others; how I am cultivating these herbs to make the sweetest and most golden butter; how—but dear me! for a one-cow story it is already too long.

UNDERDRAINING AND CARE OF MANURE.

BY H. H. HALL, NEW ORLEANS, LA.

Let us locate one acre of land on the thirty-eighth degree of north latitude, midway across the continent, say near the City of St. Louis. While under the intensive system of cultivation which will be pursued, less land than one acre will ultimately be found sufficient to supply the wants of one cow, it would not be advisable to begin with a less quantity. That one acre is sufficient is opposed to the general opinion, as witness the assertion of Mr. Schull, of Little Falls, N. Y., that the land in pasturage and hay, requisite for the support of one cow, is three acres, and this accords with the estimate of Mr. Carrington for moderately good dairy farms in England. Colman says: Three acres are required for a cow in Berkshire Co., Mass. Mr. Farrington, in the Report of the American Dairymen’s Association says, four; while Mr. X. A. Willard thinks that in Herkimer Co., N. Y., one and a half to two acres will pasture one cow, and that in some exceptional cases one acre will suffice.

True it is that these estimates take into consideration grass and hay solely, and the treatment of the land is presumed to be that usually pursued, viz.: scant allowance of manure, absence of subsoil drainage, and consequently shallow cultivation.

But high manuring and deep cultivation are indispensable in view, viz.: the obtaining the greatest quantity of dairy food from the least land. And high cultivation, implying depth of soil, tilth, porosity and aeration is impossible without subsoil drainage; nor in its absence does manure produce its best effects. It is foreign to the purpose of this article to elucidate the action of tile draining upon crops and soil. The lasting and great benefit of the system is, to-day, a matter of such plain fact, that no intelligent agriculturist will question it.

Therefore we begin by selecting an acre of land which affords the best facilities for laying tile-drainage pipes. An easy slope with a good, open outlet into ditch, run, or gulch, is all that is required. The advantages of a sunny exposure are so obvious that, if possible, we should choose land which trends to the south and east. The tile-draining of one acre will necessitate an outlay of about twenty-five dollars; but this expenditure is indispensable to the obtaining of the best results.

THE DUNG HEAP.

Truly did the German agriculturist, Schwerz, in seeing the fertile streamlets oozing and trickling away from the exposed manure piles of his opinionated countrymen, denominate the dung heap the “Fountainhead of Benediction.” This, like other blessings, may but too readily be perverted in its uses.

Impressed with the necessity of husbanding every part and portion of this substratum of good agriculture, we choose between two distinct methods of saving and utilizing the fluid and solid _dejecta_, viz.: the dry and wet. In the former the _dejecta_ are commingled with such absorbents as dry earth, leaves, straw, sawdust, etc.; in the latter, they are received in a tank where they are mixed with sufficient water to stay loss by too rapid fermentation. The application of the manure under either method is respectively in its dry or in its liquid condition.

If the dry or absorbent method be adopted, it will be found advantageous to locate the stable on a little declivity, so as to secure a manure cellar with the least excavation.

Thus, in fig. 24, _C_ represents a manure cellar under the cow, with a door at _K_ for removal of manure. The floor and walls, to a hight of two feet, of this cellar should be cemented. The floor, on which the cow stands, should be of two-inch oak plank, with a gutter behind, and a trap to empty the contents of the gutter into the cellar. On level tracts of ground the Flemish stable, as used in parts of the Brabant, and as described in the following plan fig. 25, by Felix Villeroy (Manuel de l’Eleveur de Bètes, â Comes, 6 Ed., p. 63), could be advantageously used for one cow. In figure 25, _A_ is the place where the cow stands; _B_, Passage for distributing food, etc.; _C_, Depression where the manure is allowed to accumulate behind the cow; _D_, Cellar for roots; _E_, Hay loft.

In this plan the floor _A_ and _C_ would require to be finished in brick and cement, or concrete.

The warmth of the stable might, at times, develop a too rapid fermentation of the manure. This would be checked by working the pile and by forking it over.

But to secure perfect cleanliness, purity of air, and freedom of the hay stored above from the odors of fermentation going on in the dung heap, the manure would be better placed outside of the stable walls, as suggested in figure 26 (see next page).

The bottom of the manure bin is only twenty-four inches below the surface, as on level ground the labor of raising the manure from a deep cellar would be disproportionate to the advantages of the depth. The floor of the stall should be laid in brick and cement, or in concrete, as should be the floor and lower walls of the manure bin. The floor of the stall should be kept covered with dry earth, leaves, sawdust, or spent tan-bark; and the bottom of the bin should be covered to the depth of several inches, with similar absorbents. In the absence of these to-be-preferred materials, weeds, straw, or other dry vegetable refuse, may be used. With the gutter sufficiently inclined, the excessive urine will of itself flow readily to the bin; the solid matter should be removed twice daily, just before the cow is milked. The gutter should be washed down with a pail of water daily, and sprinkled with gypsum (sulphate of lime). The manure pile, as it increases, should be constantly commingled with fresh absorbents. This is most readily and economically done by baiting a pig with a handful of maize cast on the manure in the bin. The lusty porker will go to the bottom of the pile, if need be, for each grain, and by his energetic rooting and trampling, will daily incorporate the materials in the most thorough manner.

On page 260 of Boussingault’s Rural Economy (Law’s translation) are some very urgent warnings against the frequent turning of dung heaps. His objection, Mr. Law thinks, should be limited to more than three turnings of the dung. But this objection and limitation apply to horse manure, the more active fermentation of which rapidly develops the highly volatile salt known as carbonate of ammonia. There can hardly be too thorough a working together of cow-manure, with its organic absorbents, particularly when the working is accompanied by the compacting tread of animals.

The pile should be watched, and the slightest perception of the pungent ammoniacal odor should be the signal for more absorbents, bearing in mind that all organic matter thus composted becomes a valuable fertilizer, and remembering that nothing should be left undone to increase to the greatest extent possible the source of your anticipated blessings.

The manure bin should, of course, be so covered as to exclude rain and sunshine.

If the liquid or dilute method be employed, in place of the manure bin in the plan, it will be necessary to construct an underground cemented tank or cistern, say of a depth of eight feet and diameter of six to seven feet at the bottom. This tank must be provided with a pump for raising the fluid, the tube of which should terminate in a strainer at about twelve inches from the bottom of the tank. An opening should be left in the top of the cistern for inspection, and for the insertion of a proper implement to stir the sediment. The pump should rise sufficiently high to permit the pumping of the fluid directly into a tank on wheels used for the distribution thereof in the fields. A condemned watering cart, which could probably be purchased cheaply, would be an excellent instrument for this distribution. Sulphate of iron, green vitriol, should be freely used to change the carbonate of ammonia into the sulphate, thereby obtaining a fixed, instead of a highly volatile salt.

KEEPING A COW IN A VILLAGE STABLE.

BY ORANGE JUDD, FLUSHING, L. I.

A business man of New York, living in one of the neighboring villages, being troubled to get good milk for young children in his family, took our advice the latter part of the winter and, so to speak, went into the dairy business on his own account. The result will be instructive to tens of thousands of families in cities and villages. He has no pasture grounds, the only convenience being a roomy stall in a carriage barn, with opportunity for the cow to sun herself and take limited exercise in a small area, say fifteen by twenty feet, at the side of the barn, and this was seldom used. The stall is kept clean and neat, with fresh straw litter, and the cow has remained in excellent health and vigor. Chewing her cud and manufacturing milk seem to give all the exercise needed. Her feed has been bale hay, cut in a small hay-cutter, and mixed wet with corn-meal, bran, and shorts, with some uncooked potato parings, cabbage leaves, left over rice, oatmeal, etc., from the kitchen.

A laborer is paid one dollar a week to milk and feed and brush her night and morning, and take care of the stable, and he is allowed any excess of milk she gives over twelve quarts a day. He prepares a mess for her noon feed, which is given by one of the boys at school when he comes home to lunch. The cow is a grade, probably three-fourths Jersey and one-fourth common blood. Her milk is rich, yields abundant cream, and, as the owner’s family say, “Is worth fully double any milk we ever got from the best milk dealers.” One neighboring family gladly takes six quarts a day at seven cents a quart, and would willingly pay much more if it were asked, and other families would be happy to get some of it at ten cents a quart; but six quarts are kept for home use, and it is valued far above seven cents a quart, and worth more than that amount in the saving of butter in cooking, making puddings, etc. So it is a very low estimate to call the whole milk worth seven cents a quart. No one could deprive our business friend or his family of their good, home produced milk, if it cost ten or twelve cents a quart. An accurate account is kept of the feed; the man in charge orders at the feed store anything he desires for the cow, and it is all down on a “pass-book.” Here are the figures for one hundred days past:

THE COW’S DEBIT AND CREDIT FOR ONE HUNDRED DAYS.

_Dr._

850 lbs. bale Hay, at $22 per ton $9.35
1,000 lbs. Corn Meal, at $1.35 per 100 lbs 13.50
400 lbs. Bran, at $1.30 per 100 lbs 5.20
200 lbs. Fine Feed, “Shorts,” at $1.55 per 100 lbs 3.10
20 bundles of bedding Straw, at 10c. 2.00
Paid man for care and milking, $1 per week 14.30
------
Total expenses for 100 days $47.45

_Cr._

1,200 Quarts of best milk (12 quarts per day) at 7c. $84.00
------
Money profit in 100 days $36.55

Or, to put it in another way, the six hundred quarts sold actually brought in forty-two dollars cash, and the entire six hundred quarts used at home cost five dollars and forty-five cents. The cow cost, say, sixty-five dollars. The entire care, which was not paid in the surplus of milk above twelve quarts per day, is charged in the expenses above. The manure produced, if sold, would more than meet interest on the cost of cow, and any depreciation in value by increasing age. Allow the above average to be kept up only two hundred days in a year, and at the end of that time suppose the cow is sold for half price (thirty-two dollars and fifty cents), and a fresh one substituted, there would still be a gain of forty dollars and sixty cents for two hundred days, or for a year a profit of seventy-four dollars and ten cents.

With good feed the sixty-five dollar cow will keep up a full supply of milk at least twenty-six weeks, and then be worth forty dollars for continued milking and breeding. Sell her then and buy another fresh cow for sixty-five dollars—a loss of fifty dollars a year. The above liberal allowance of forty-seven dollars and forty-five cents for feed and care one hundred days, amounts to one hundred and seventy-three dollars and nineteen cents a year. Adding the loss of fifty dollars for purchasing two fresh cows, makes the total annual expense two hundred and twenty-three dollars and nineteen cents. This would make the supply of milk, twelve quarts a day (four thousand three hundred and eighty quarts), cost about five cents a quart, or not quite fifty-one cents for ten quarts. This is not an exaggerated estimate for a sixty-five dollar cow, renewed every twenty-six weeks. The feed and care may be very much less than the above forty-seven dollars and forty-five cents per hundred days, by saving all waste foods suitable for a cow, and by securing pasturage seven or eight months, and especially when a cow can be cared for by members of the family, thus saving fifty-two dollars a year. Taking the country as a whole, probably fifty dollars will ordinarily buy a cow that will, on fair feed, average ten to twelve quarts per day for the first six months after calving.

PORTRAITS OF FAMOUS DAIRY COWS.

I.—Jersey Cow “Eurotas,” 2454 (_Frontispiece_), owned by A. B. Darling, Ramsey’s, N. J. She yielded during one week in June, 1879, twenty-two pounds six ounces of butter.

II.—Ayrshire cow “Old Creamer” (page 23), owned by S. D. Hungerford, Adams, N. Y. Weight one thousand and eighty pounds. She has yielded one hundred and two-third pounds a day for three days, and ninety-four pounds a day for the month.

III.—Jersey cow “Rosalee,” 1215 (page 34), owned by S. G. Livermore, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. She has given twenty quarts of milk a day. In ten days in June, 1874, she made twenty-five pounds three ounces of butter.

IV.—Guernsey cow and heifer (page 51), owned by Mr. Rendle, of Catel Parish, Island of Guernsey.

V.—Swiss cow “Geneva” (page 67), imported by D. G. Aldrich, of Worcester, Mass. She gave from November first, 1877, to December thirty-first, 1878, ten thousand nine hundred and five pounds of milk, which yielded five hundred and seventy-three pounds of butter.

VI.—Dutch (Holstein) cow “Crown Princess” (page 85), imported by Gerrit S. Miller, of Peterboro’, N. Y. She has yielded thirty-four quarts of milk a day, and averaged twenty-three quarts a day for six months.

VII.—Shorthorn dairy cow “Cold Cream 4th” (page 101), owned by H. M. Queen Victoria. She is kept at the Shaw Farm, Windsor Home Park.

VIII.—Jersey cow “Abbie” (page 123), owned by Mr. Harvey Newton, of Southville, Mass. She yielded from April, 1876, to March, 1877, ten thousand seven hundred pounds of milk, from which four hundred and eighty-six pounds of butter were made.