Farm Notes

An apple-tree in ex-Gov. Palmer's yard at Springfield, 111., lias borne two crops of apples this year. Quite a mimber of horses have been poisoned in Kansas by being fed raw castor beans. The Agricultural Bureau of Nortli Carolina does not cost the citizons of that State anything. The Bureau of Georgia has a surplus fund of over $19,000. Do yot: ieed your cows notliing but hay and straw in winter, and keep them on a short pasture in summer? Then you ueglect to put $1 into the expense seale that might put $2 or $5 into the other scale. The joint in a sheep of the best breed and in fair condition, which contains the least proportion of fat, is the leg, and next to tl) at is the shoulder, while the loin, neck and breast have the largest proportion. As a rule it will not pay to winter poot stock of any kind if the food they consume costs aiiything, besides all animáis are in better condition at the ginning of winter than at any other se.ason of the year. During the winter most kinds öf stock lose flesh unless they are bountifully fed and warmly housed, and it does not pay to take this trouble and incur this exponse for anything but the best. The weeding prooess is, therefore, in order. Winter is the time for reading and study also. No reason why a farmer shon'ldn't take time for intellectunl culture as well as anybody else. It freshens his mind for more active dnties. No fear of beinga" book farmer." Tf hè lon't rcad up, lio'll soou find llinlself falling behind the times. Nor will it do to forget or neglect the social duties altogether. None of US can avoid them without positive detriment to ourselves. Cultívate neighborly feelings, therefore, and do something for the comfort and happiness of others as well as yourself. - Exrhange. Raw-hide horse-shoes are not fashionable on prairie land. In fact, the natural hoof does better, and really well, except on rocky roads. The raw-hide shoe is really more valuable, if valuable at all, ondry hard roads than on wet or muddy roads. So on frozen roads, where there is no ice, they may wear tolerably well. Nevertheless we ir. -nnt snnnnsfi thp.v will soon supplant iron, where shoes aro uecessary at all. Ia the " prairie región " farmers are fast finding out tliat slioeing is not so essential as lias been generally supposed, except wnere the team is to be drive on ice or stone roads, and the latter are not at all eommon in " prairie land." - Prairie Farmer. The alfalfa, now so famous, is only the lucerne of England, acclimated in Chili, and from thence transferred to California. In England it had the advantages of a very humid climate ; in Chili, the disadvantages of a verj dry one. But, v.hen it had been made. to thrive there, it was jnst the grass for the dry climate of California. It wonM not flourish everywhere. It is very sensitive to frost in the early stages of its growth. Yet in England, and in Pennsylvania, where it i producen, we hear little about its being killed by frost. In Chili its character was changed. It did not make the battle against frost, but asainst drought. It bears the same