Around The Farm

Having occasion to build a post tence : on one side of my orchard, abouta dozen of the holes were left unfilled for a i couple of days, and on going to set the posts f rom one to eight field mice were found in each hole, having fallen in and being unable to climb the emooth sides of the hole. - Maine Farmer. We have long been satisfied that the best way to get rid of ther.e evils growing out of boarding the farm laborers in the farmer's family is to build tenant houses and hire married men to occupy them and work for the farmer. If it seems best to employ some single men in addition, make arrangement to have them boarded with the tenants. - Rural Home. A. house should be so placed that tho direct rays of the sun shall have f ree admission into the living apartments ; because the sun's rays impart a healthy and invigorating quality to the air, and stimulate the vitality of human beings as they do those of plants, and without sunlight, human beings, as well as plants, would sicken and die. The aspect, therefore, should be southeast. - Popular Science Monthly. It is a good plan, both for the wheat and the catch of clover seed, to harrow wheat in the spring. Select some day when the ground is dry enough to pulverize freelv, and if possible, just before a rain." Where wheat has been drilled-in a common heavy drag will only break down the ridges between tho rowa and cover exposed roots. If sown broadcast, the Thomas smoothing harrow should be used, and is preferable under any circumstances. It is a fact that all the domestic auimals fatten iasier in diinly-lighted places than in the full light of da,y. This is well known in respect to poultry. From experimenta made with sheep, it has been ascertained that in a dark shed, well ventilated, and keptat asuitable temperature, they will make most mutton from a given amount of food. But dark stables are not good for horaes, or breeding stock of any kind; with such, fat is not the most important object ia view. I notiob that some of yourcorrespondents recommend feeding onions to poultry. If they themselves eat the eggs thnt are produced on onion feed, it is all well nough ; but if they sell them it is a little too bad. I like a well-flavored egg, if I eat one ; especially if I buy them at present prices. I would just as soon have butter ñavoredwith onions, as íw5dayrs1aS'-fBattí fKsnttllPfiot j than rotten. I believe it to be j ble to obtain good No. 1 eggs unless hens are fed on proper food. Onions i are good in their place, but not for flavoring eggs.- Cor. Country Gentleman. Dr. James, the Commissioner of Agriculture, of Georgia, writes as follows: " Taking into consideratios ie cost of production, the chemieal analysis and comparativo freedom from stealage, oats are cheaper as stock food than corn. One bushei or thirty-two pounds of oats costs twenty-nine cents, making a difference of thirteen cents in the cost of 100 ponnds of the two. Chemical analysis shows that oats contain twelve per cent. of albuminoids, or flesh and muscle producing principie, while corn contains ten per cent. It will thus be seen that for work animáis oats are more valuable than corn as food when equal weights are used. Consider, now, that 100 pounds of oats cost thirteen cents less than 100 pounds of corn, and the case stands decidedly in favor of oats for work stock. How rr Pats to have Good Oows. - I herewith send a statement of the income of eight Jersey cows for the year ending January 1, 1867: Twenty-nvo hundred and sixty-six pounds eleVen ounces of butter made and sold at 40 cents per pound '02?'nn Creain sold 2.00 Eight calves (six heif era) raised 185.00 Ten piRS raised and fattod on nour milk and 25bushelsof meal 207.5U Total $1,421.17 Leas 25 bushels of meal 25.00 Total $1,396.17 My cows are full-blooded Jerseys and three grades. I feed meal all the time they are giving milk. In the summer they have two quarts of corn-and-cob meal per day. Fall and winter, three quarts - one-half corn-and-cob meal, onehalf bran. We never have any soft butter in warm weather. I feéd no roots of any kind, nothing but meal and all the good, early-cut hay they will eat.- Vermont Farmer. A Pjennsylvania farmer tells, in a contemporary, how he treats muck, and it may be a good way, though many persons prefer to keep it a year exposed to the weather, and then, when dry, use it as an absorbent in the stables and cowyards. As the muck was dug, he mixd with every five loads one barrel of fresh lime. This was spread evenly in layers between layers cf muck a foot thick. In twenty-four hours the heaps were smoking hot. He threw more muck over the top and beat the surf ace closely to exclude the air, and in a few days the heat went down. When he carne to draw the rmick, it had become a black, rich mass, that exhaled a very pungeiit odor, much like barn-yard manure; and, although it was late in Ootober when it was spread upon the grass, the color of the ñeld becatne at once a deeper green, and a rapid growth started. Wood ashes, half e, hiishil or more to a load of muck, will produce equally good remota, bflfc more time is required for decomposition.