Category Archives: Newsy Notes

Soiling Versus Pasture For Swine

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This is a point I would like to see the experimental farms take up. The fact that they would seem to strengthen the impressions now general among farmers that these farms are of doubtful utility. The soiling of dairy cows has been experimented with to some extent, but the system has not become popular. Those however, who reported the result, speak highly of the system. Soiling cows and sheep requires, of course, great attention, and the majority of dairymen prefer to pursue the less irksome system of pasturing or partial soiling at most. All admit that fully three times the number of cows can be kept by the soiling system as by ordinary pasturing.

But the soiling of swine would not seem so irksome, for pigs are soiled, as it were, in the majority of cases. When pigs ate feed in the pen, and not pastured, they are said in a measure  to be soiled. What I mean, however, by soiling is not feeding pigs in a pen with meal, milk, or boiled feed. Pigs on pasture to attain early maturity must not be allowed to depend on the grass alone, but require an addition of meal and grain. By soiling them, I mean cutting the grass and feeding it directly to the hogs in a large paddock contra-distinction to permitting the hogs to cut and feed on the grass at their own sweet will.

Feeding the Pigs

Pigs do very well, and probably attain greater weights by simple pen-feeding with milk, whey and meals than by either soiling or pasturage. But pen-feeding is expensive at the prevailing prices of hogs. We want to lower the cost of production to a paying point, and to this end endeavor to supplement the feeding with green feeding crops, to be fed either in the pen, or allow the pigs to harvest the crops for themselves The meal fed pig, in a close pen, does not make a good bacon pig, because exercise is precluded; the digestive organs become inactive, and there is a surplus of fat. Green feed then is apparently indispensable, either fed in the pen or allowed to be eaten on the field as it grows. Which is the more effective method? If heavy weights are to be attained in the shortest interval, I believe soiling the pigs in the pen will be found the most satisfactory. Pigs having the run of a pasture field waste a good deal of energy, and make too much muscle growth. It takes a hog, even in the best pasture, quite a while to graze the bulk of a bundle of grass that may be cut and thrown in the pen. 

 The object sought is another thing. If the pigs are intended as breeding stock, the exercise and fresh air obtained in a pasture field is quiet essential. If breeding stock are soiled, i.e., the green feed cut and carried to them, they will make greater weights in  a given time, but they will require very large yard and paddock I would not care for a breeding sow or boar that was fed all its life in a small pen and had gotten no soiling food during its growth. Good breeding stock can be produced without pasturing if the precaution is taken to have a large paddock connected with the pen, and green crops such as rye, clover, peas, corn, rape and turnips cut and thrown into these large yards, upon which there should be a generous feeding floor. Stock grown in this way should be very nearly as good as those kept i the Pasteur, and may be grown as cheaply. Grown in this manner, the pigs should make good breeding stock and excellent for the packer. This method of growing either breeding stock or bacon pigs will cost a little more, but maturity will be attained in a shorter time.

In 1958 The dramatic success story of Prince Edward Island’s Yorkshire hog is unique and perhaps unprecedented in the history of livestock production.

Better breeding stock, however, will result from pasturage, and it is quite essential that the brood sows have unlimited pasture from spring to fall. I do not think it well to have the pasture lot too large; an acre lot is large enough and is quite sufficient for 30 pigs. Pigs will not make much of pasture before they are three months of age. A good rule is to have an acre of pasture crops coming in in regular rotation to each three brood sows. If litters come in February, a field of rye will be right in month of May; when this is eaten down, a field of clover should be ready; after the clover peas, and alter the peas rape and the second growth of clover. The rape would be grown in the rye ground. Allowing an acre for the pigs of three brood sows, or 30 pigs, would mean three acres to carry them through the season, or, in other words, one acre of land to each brood sow on the farm. These three acres of land devoted to pasture crops, coming in regular rotation, as from the feeding of four tons of the best ground feed of a mixture of shorts and corn or barley, peas and bran.

At prices of ground feed in the older parts of our country, the growing of pasture crops makes quite a saving in cash laid out for purchased feed. Pigs grown on continuous pasture will not come to maturity, or be ripe for the  block, so quickly as if penned up all the time, or even as if soiled. Even fairly good herding stock may be produced by soiling, and maturity will be attained sooner. But this system does not give as good results and the cost of production is greater. It is a very good system, though, to produce bacon pigs. Pen-fed pigs I would not tolerate for breeders; but If I wanted to finish a batch of spring pigs for market in the shortest time, I should confine them in the pen all the time and feed as heavily as they would stand; and if these pigs were of the right breed, and from healthy, robust parents, and intelligently fed and managed up to weaning time, I would have no fears; but at five or six months of age they would be ripe for the block, and make good bacon pigs too. 

The points are: 1 To have the correct form and breed of brood sow. Never confine her. Let her roam the fields at will and the yards in winter; feed her intelligently while suckling, and wean at six weeks; then force the youngsters for all they are worth till five or six months of age ,and sell. 2. Breeding stock must not be confined in a pen. They must have unlimited pasture crops right through the season, or they may be confined in large paddock, and soiled. ― J. A. MacDonald, P. E. I., in Country Gentleman. 

– Pigs and Other Livestock, The Charlottetown Guardian. August 30, 1898

Source: Islandnewspapers.ca

Experiment With Millet

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In the fall of 1942 a reader who takes an interest in these notes sent me three small packets of millet seed which she received from the neighbourhood of Winnipeg. Two of the samples were yellow and unnamed; the seeds in the third sample were of a glossy brown and were labelled “Early Fortune ”’ There were all together about four tablespoonsful.

Millet

I put the seeds by, in a cool dark place for the winter, and the following spring (1943), when the soil was well warmed up I planted them in the garden, in several short rows, mixing the two kinds (illegible) I did so. The year, as you will remember, was anything but ideal for the experiment,  but the millet grew amain, and towards autumn branched into the loose spray of the true millets – not the spiky heads of what are called Italian millets. (The latter are related to the pernicious foxtail grassss [sic] of our potato fields)

As the grain commenced to ripen my troubles began. All the birds of the air came a-prying and a-robing; and a flock of late chickens which were small enough to squeeze through the picket fence, found out about the millet and made good use of the knowledge. However, at the end of the season I had two large sheaves, and when I threshed them out I had two and one-quarter pounds of good seed.

Had the season been normal this millet might have been cut and cured as hay, while in an earlier stage But the summer and fall were very wet, and as I wanted to see how it succeed when sown for grain. I did not try that part of the experiment.

Millet

Millet is used for human food in some eatern countries, the seed being simply parched. Some who are the epicures of these lands, pound the grain and make it into a light paste with melted fat. I have heard that it was imported into Britain as poultry feed – for which it seems well adapted – but I never saw it used in the North of England. There is little notice of it in books from the U.S.A., in my possession; yet it must be grown there, as they advise farmers to sow about 25 lbs. to the acre, Canadian seed lists say it is grown for hay or live-stock feed. It would be an added interest if the generous donor of the “Early Fortune” seed, could tell us how farmers in the neighborhood of Winnipeg make use of this millet.

-Newsy Notes by Agricola, April 8, 1950

Source: islandnewspapers.ca

Parting With The Farm Animals

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Another fat hog went to market this morning; provision was made for pork for the home barrel and plans were laid — and sad I was to hear them! — to sell Kelly the cow. With her disposal, in one of the Springs months all of our old friends will have gone from the stable and a new generation we shall meet then at the milking. There is usually a warm spot in a farmwife’s heart for a favorite cow, though it may be only a memory. One hears them speak of it. There is a certain to be mention of an “old Brindle — as wise as any human” and linked with a past “i brought her from home with me.” There would be, of course a “Spotty she whom small lads learned to milk, a tiny pail- held between knees while seated on the edge of a milking stool, head against broad patient flank, Small hands tugging desperately when “this milk doesn’t seem to want to come.!”

1912 milking a cow by a fence Prince Edward Island

There would be “the jersey” small and dainty. She was the one that grew older along with you and the youngsters. Indeed by this they could “race you” at the milking and tears ran down your cheeks —and theirs the morning she was sold. “A good thing she went in a truck” you said, the parting was not so difficult and were you glad when the machine was gone out of sight beyond the hill through the vacancy in the stable was there for many days to come. So down the years one becomes attached to the likable dumb creatures that for the time are as familiar as the sun at morning. The Kelly cow with a crumpled and missing horn is the one of our milking herd whose fate was determined this morning.

Jamie was among those of his kin who hauled feed for some of the stock from trucks at the corner-store today. In the glory of this March afternoon, when it semed [sic] as if “all things that love the sun” were out of doors. Delightful then the day had become with brilliant sunlight and the wind moving in the branches of the old spruces in the orchard with soft breath and it full of honeyed promises. Icicles dripped and snow that had clung to nooks of roofs disappeared. At morning, Jamie had tried a new undertaking. He hitched Mutt, his faithful; companion and friend to his small hand-sled Not without considerable effort, I am led to believe , and drawn to it doubtless by the fact that on the opposite slope two neighbor lads were about the from meadow with “Biddy.” She is a versatile creature. She ceases playing with her young masters each Spring, long enough to present them with an adorable litter and is also evidently more reconciled to the feel of harness than is Mutt. ‘unless I led him” Jamie explained “he just sat there!”

Ice-hauling, which work of late, years seems to go hand in hand with the seasonal hooking or quilting indoors, commenced today. Though neither James nor I could place the spot in stream or pond from whence the loads of it we saw winding out along a field, had been harvested. Other hauling as well there was in today’s sunshine: grits to the mill and, heralding the return of the Spring sawing at the mill, first loads of lumber came then. A blue Jay called joyously from the orchard; a lone wild duck flew down to the river; Karolyn began to make a quilt and jeanie in moments of leisure continued knitting a sweater for grand-daughter, who made this the last port o’ call on her day’s outing. Mr. B. was off to town to visit the sick and small boys cleared a skating space on Kristy’s Pond.

Shipping cattle out of Charlottetown Harbour Prince Edward Island heading to Newfoundland

This evening in a ceremony which ended beautifully for those most concerned, the kitchen pump, idle of late, was set back in place after certain repairs had been made to the cylinder. And in spite of fears and conjectures that perhaps the never-failing stream had disappeared for “we dropped a pebble down and herald no sound” the machine works perfectly. There were moments of suspense after it was in place and we gathered round to see what would happen. Jmes pumping vigorously had that expression which shows no expectation of success. It was Jamie who heard sounds of rising water. He looked up at me and nodded and smiled. ‘She’s caught!’ he said “there’ll be no more bringing the hose from the other pump into this kitchen now! This method as always had proved most enetertatinign to Jmaie and me…

“Listen, Ellen!” James draws my attention to a weather forecast then adds since I have failed to hear it “snow tomorrow!” Well, we,all of us… young and older have had this lovely day

-Ellen’s Diary, March 9, 1943

Source: Islandnewspapers.ca

The White-throated Sparrow

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This sparrow, only slightly smaller than the white-crown (AOU 554), has sufficient resemblance to it to mislead the novice in bird-watching. The distinct white patch on the throat and the yellow lores (space between the eyes and the bill); will allay any doubts .

White-throated Sparrow

This is a handsome bird and a good singer: Bian alludes to its “clear ringing whistle.” Some translate the whistle as “Poor Bill Peabody, Peabody, Peabody,” whence the vocalist is sometimes called the “Peabody-bird.” Others, more pessimistic, assert that it utters “Hard -times- Canada-Canada-Canada!” 

Quoting my own records I have seen three White-throats fro every single White crown so far observed. I would therefore class the white-throat as “a common summer resident, breeding here.” The nest is made on the ground or, more rarely, in small bushes. The eggs are pale greenish blue, thickly spotted brown. The range of the White-throat is from the the northern range of trees, to its wintering place in the southern U.S.

White-throated Sparrow vs White-crowned Sparrow

It is of value as a weed-seed eater, and, note well, it is fond of great quantities of insects which it digs up by scratching among the fallen leaves White-throated Sparrow. AOU. 558. Common summer Resident, Adult Male: Crown with a clear white central stripe, a broad black stripe on either side of it; then a superciliary stripe yellow next the bill, then white, passing backward down the neck; throat with a clear white patch; Back chestnut brown streaked black, feathers partly margined grayish; rump and tail grayish brown, the latter well notched. Wings with white wingbars. Underparts grayish darker on the breast. Females and immature birds have the throat buff instead of white. Length of adults 6.75

– Newsy Notes by Agricola, March 27, 1950  

Source: Islandnewspapers

The Vesper Sparrow

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The Vesper Sparrow is fairly abundant everywhere, and it is a singular circumstance that Bain does not mention it in his “Birds of P.E.I.,” 1891. Are we to suppose that this pleasing songster did not visit the Island in those days? It was listed in the 1915 Bulletin, and the late Mr. Ludlow Jenkins marked it as “common and increasing” in 1934. I examined and described a dead Vesper Sparrow, Sept.4 1944.

VESPER SPARROW LIFE EXPECTANCY

This bird gets its name from its habit of “tuning up” as evening closes in. “Song, a clear ascending series of whistle”’ — Reed’s Guide. It is otherwise known as the “Eay-winged Sparrow,” or the “Grass Finch.” The white outer feathers of the tall, best seen in flight, are the surest marks of distinction.

As for diet the birds and their nestlings consume large numbers of insects; while later they turn to a diet of weed seeds. They are thus exceedingly valuable to the farmer. There are, however, two great hindrances to their increase: first, they make their nests in meadows and fields, where the eggs and young are easy prey for predators; and second, since the increase of poison-sprays, caterpillars must often be poisonous to the nestlings as well as to the old birds.

Vesper Sparrow

The Vesper Sparrow Breeds from our latitude south to N. Carolina, and Nebraska and winter to Gulf Coast and Texas.

Eastern Vesper Sparrow. AOU, 540 “Common and increasing” (1934). Upper parts brownish gray streaked with black and a little buff; eye-ring white: wings with bright chestnut shoulders, and two dull wing-bars; tall with white outer feathers, next one to these broadly tipped white, the rest dusky. Breast and sides streaked black and buff; underparts white. Length of adult about 6/15 inches.

– Newsy Notes by Agricola, February 25th, 1950.

Source: Islandnewspapers.ca