AN AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 13, Issue 1026, 27 February 1869, Page 3

AN AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.

I Prom tho " American Agriculturist."! I have just returned from a visit to the Michigan Agricultural College at Lansing. It is doing a great work, not only in educating the students, but in making experiments. Dr. Miles, the Professor of Agriculture, was made for the position, and has accomplished wonders. The whole farm is admirably managed, and docs great credit to tho students, who perform nearly all the labor. During the morning they attend to their various studies. Professor Abbott took me into the rooms where they were reciting, and a finer sot of young men I never saw together. Most of them are farmer's sons. In the afternoon they put on a working suit, and for threo hours are employed on the farm, or in the garden or tool house. They are allowed from 6 cents to 7-| cents per hour. Some were hoeing corn ; others were helping the sheep shearers, tying up ! the wool, weighing the fleeces of the different breeds and their grades, and entering tho weights in a book, with appropriate remarks in regard to length of staple, fineness, &c. One active young fellow was pushing a hand-garden cultivator through the cleanest and best crop of onions I ever saw growing ; another was cultivating a young apple orchard ; others were in the hayfield, where a new mower had just started. And tho foreman told us that, beforo working hours, there had been quite an animated discussion as to whether the clover was ripo enough to cut ; the freshmen, as a rule, : taking the ground that it was too green, and the seniors that while there might not be as much bulk, the hay would be sweeter and more nutritious than if allowed to stand longer. Another question discussed was, whether it was or was not best to use a tedding machine in making clover hay. A horse was attached to a tedder, and though tho clover was hardly wilted at all, and was very heavy, worked to perfection, and an opportunity was thus afforded >of testing the matter. A twohorse cultivator was at work in the cornfield, tho young man riding and steering. It was light work, and though the day was very hot, noither man nor horse needed to stop to rest every few bouts, as is so generally the case with an oldfashioned one horse "corn scratcher." Now, you need not tell me that a young man will not learn a good deal at such an institution. Leaving science entirely out of the question, what he sees of good cultivation, good implements, and machines, improved breeds of cattle, sheep and pigs, will go far towards making him a good farmer. Success to the American Colleges, and may the day soon come (and it is coming very fast) when trained minds and skilled hands shall banish drudgery from American farms. Mark you, I am no advocate for ease and indolence. I believe in work ; but I want work to tell. As I came home I saw more than one case where a man was cultivating corn with a boy driving the horse. The poor horse doubtless wished the boy at college. Near Dotroitlsaw two men cultivating potatoes, one leading the horse, and the other holding the cultivator ! Prof. Miles has been making some experiments in feeding grade Merino sheep, grade Southdowns, and grade Cotswolds. Tho Merinos and Cotswolds wero Ininbs, and the Southdowns yearlings. Tho former two, th^efore, give results that are strictly comparative ; the latter not. These grado lambs were from common Merino ewes crossed in tho one case with a through bred Vermont Merino ram, and in the other with a through bred Cotswold. "What do you mean," I asked Prof. Miles, "by common Merino ewes ?" "Tho ordinary kind of sheep in this section, such sheep as could have been bought here last fall for 75 cents to $1 a head." The lambs were shut up in pens on December 13, and were fed on corn and clover hay for 23 weeks, or till May 15. At the commencement of the experiment the two grado Merino lambs weighed 125Mbs (ono 701bs, the other 65£lbs). The two grade Cotswolds weighed 16Slbs (one 861bs, the other 721b5.) Tho Merinos cat 3251bs of hay, and 2Mbs of corn, and gained 36§lbs" Tho Cotswolds eat 3981bs of hay, and 3691bs of corn, and gained 69^1bs. A littlo figuring will show that it took 15721bs of hay and corn to produce lOOlbs of increaso with tho Merinos, and only 113Clbs with with tho Cotswolds. Professor Miles has figured up the amount of food consumed for each lOOlbs of livo woight. In the 22 weeks the grade Merinos, for lOOlbs of livo weight, cat 231.8L1bs of hay, and 186.131bs of corn, and the grado Cotswolds 212.811bs of hay, and 186.431bs of corn. Tho Cotswolds eat more corn and less hay in proportion to livo weight than tho Merinos, but the total amount of food consumed in proportion to live weight is almost identical. Thus tho Merinos consumed 399"961b5, and the Cotswold 399-26lbs, or a little over 2f lbs of food per day for each 1030lbs of live weight. It is very ovident, therefore, that for the production of mutton the grade Cotswolds are far superior to the Merinos. It is equally clear, too, that by the use of thoroughbred Cotswolds or Southdown rams we can soon get a very useful class of mutton sheep from common Merino flocks. And at present tho wool from

these grade Cotsw.olds is^ worth full ; as - much as ordinary Merino, and a good deal more than that of fleeces which are more than half yolk.