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IMPORTED AYRSHIRE COW, "JEAN ARMOUR,"

THE PROPERTY OF H. H. PETERS, SOUTHBORO', MASS.

For the yield of this cow in the summer of 1862-being one of the deepest milkers in Mr. Peters' herd of seventy-five pure bred Ayrshires, all from his own importation-see pages 134, 135.

The agriculture of Maine, viewed as a whole, may properly be termed low farming; that is to say, the breadth of land occupied is large compared with the value of the returns. "Low farming"

is not to be understood as a term of reproach, for, in its place, and pursued with discretion and judgment, it is as creditable to the operator as the production of great crops from a small area by the addition of abundant labor and manure.

The price of land and of labor, location, demand and other circumstances, have much to do with determining what style of farming may be most successfully pursued. But whether high farming or low farming, whether the land be a rocky hill pasture where the plow cannot be used, or a teeming market garden, wrought by spade labor, the husbandry should be such as to put the land to the most profitable use for the production of food for man and beast.

That Maine is better adapted to a stock, rather than a grain husbandry, will, I presume, be readily conceded by all. It comports with cheap land, for we can use much for pasturage, with dear labor, for we can get along without a great deal, with our markets and soil, for we can more cheaply convey animal products to market than vegetable productions, while the manure yielded by the consumption of the latter at home enables us gradually to increase the fertility of our lands.

The term stock husbandry, however, is a very broad one. It includes the breeding and rearing, the keeping and using of all the animals of the farm. It is not deemed necessary to urge its adoption, it being in fact the leading feature of the agriculture of Maine at the present time. But there is room for great improvement in the methods of conducting it, and in the selection of the branches of it to be pursued.

It would be ill advice to recommend the rearing of more cattleat least until the means of supporting them are greatly increased. More have been reared in years past than could be well supported and brought to maturity upon our farms. Consequently large numbers have been sold off, young or lean, and the prices realized have been very low compared with the cost of rearing. If fewer

had been reared, a larger proportion might have been brought to maturity; and the feeding or fattening of cattle, when judiciously pursued, under favorable conditions, and no more attempted than can be accomplished, is usually a paying operation; while the richer manure saved to the farm assists materially to enhance its fertility.

I have repeatedly urged increased attention to sheep husbandry. In a considerable portion of the State, the culture of sheep with primary reference to quantity and quality of wool, would, during a series of years, be accompanied with a good profit. In a very large portion, and indeed almost everywhere within tolerable nearness to a good meat market, their culture, with special reference to both quantity and quality of meat, is very desirable, and would prove lucrative. Mutton is all the time becoming better appreciated as an article of diet, and this tendency will increase as it becomes better known. It is within the truth to say that really fine mutton is at once the best, the most healthful, the cheapest grown and the dearest and scarcest meat sold in our shambles.

The unusual demands and exigencies of the present time, growing out of the tremendous struggle for national existence in which we are engaged, have so enhanced the price of wool, of all grades, that any other exhortations to sheep husbandry are quite needless. I will only remark, therefore, that it would not be difficult to introduce a reform in our practice which would, ere long, (whether the present high prices keep up or not,) add hundreds of thousands of dollars to the wealth of the farmers of Maine. It is simply this: let those whose circumstances and surroundings induce them to cultivate fine wool, breed their ewes only to pure bred Spanish Merino bucks; let those who aim chiefly at weight of carcass, use the pure Cotswold or other well bred long wool bucks; and let those who desire a superior quality of fine flavored, juicy, delicious meat, which will command the highest price wherever known, procure the best bred improved South Down bucks, and breed their ewes only to these; let the grade ewes of these several sorts be served only by other pure bred males of the same breed, but from distinct families; let all breed steadily in their several directions, and then bestow suitable care and treatment, and the work would be done. We should then have reliable, profitable flocks, of known and definite properties and qualities, instead of crosses and mixtures innumerable, a few good, some tolerable, but mostly quite

indifferent. All would be good, each best for its own specialty, all profitable; and should the price of wool tumble to-morrow to old rates, the operation would be as judicious and as safe to-day, as it would have been three, or five, or ten years ago.

THE DAIRY. My object at this time is more particularly to call attention to the dairy. As will be seen by reference to the vote of the Board of Agriculture, passed at its last session, given on page 59, I was instructed so to do in this report; and the duty is an agreeable one, convinced as I am that that is a very important branch of stock husbandry, and well deserving greater attention at the hands of the farmers of Maine than it has yet received. Prof. Low, in his excellent work on the Domesticated Animals of Great Britain, says, "The dairy is a branch of rural industry deserving of attention in the highest degree. There are no other means known to us by which so great a quantity of animal food can be derived for human support from the same space of ground." The capability of the State of Maine for the production of butter I assume to have been sufficiently proved by the fact that it has been made in quantities nearly or quite sufficient for the wants of its inhabitants. It is true that more or less butter is annually brought into the State for consumption, but the amount is comparatively small, and at the same time some which is made here is sold to go out. As good butter, too, has been and is every year made here as any which is brought in, and if this be true of only a part, it proves rather a lack of skill or of care in the manufacture, or of proper attention to pastures, than any lack of capability.

The manufacture of cheese within the State is far more limited than that of butter, and the assumption above made regarding butter could not be made in respect to cheese, and the little which is made is disposed of near by. Maine cheese is scarcely known as an article of commerce in most of our larger towns and manufacturing villages. So far from exporting any, or even supplying our own wants, we import largely. Probably very few farmers have any adequate idea of the amount or proportion of the cheese consumed in the State which is brought from other States.

It is next to impossible to ascertain precisely the facts of the case, but the opinion expressed by those of whom inquiry has been made on this point, and who, from their position, have the best opportunities for judging correctly, is that not less than three

fourths, and probably nine-tenths, of the cheese consumed by those who are not themselves producers, is brought from other States.

Upon inquiry of a business firm in Portland, which probably deals more largely in butter and cheese than any other, the opinion was expressed that, judging from their own transactions and what they knew of others, not less than five hundred thousands pounds annually were brought into Portland alone from other States. If we look at the many towns on the seaboard and railroads which also import directly, and think of the large consumption in manufacturing villages, we should be inclined to deem this less, rather than more, than a quarter of the whole; and if so, we have here an importation of two millions of pounds, or a thousand tons, worth at ten cents per pound, two hundred thousand dollars.

Of the quality of the article now made here, little very flattering can be said. I have eaten good cheese, excellent cheese, made in our State, but such is the exception and not the rule. The great bulk of it, so far as I have had opportunity to know, would not be ranked higher than a second rate article by good judges, and much of it would be deemed unsatisfactory by both the makers and consumers, were they familiar with the distinguishing characters and properties of a really good article.

I have yet to learn of the existence of any insuperable obstacle to the abundant and profitable production of cheese of prime quality in this State. I firmly believe wherever it will pay to raise veal calves, or young stock, or to make butter, at the prices which these usually bring, that cheese can be made, with proper management, at a larger profit, even for exportation, and to compete with that from other States; and to an extent sufficient to supply the home market, amounting to hundreds, if not to thousands of tons annually, it can be made at a profit greater still ; for to this extent we should not be obliged to compete in a distant market, with freights and commissions to be deducted from the proceeds, but could sell near home, at a price equal to that current in the great marts of trade, with the cost of freight from thence and dealers' profits added thereto.

The great similarity existing between the physical geography of the most noted dairy sections of the country and large portions of Maine, deserves consideration in its bearings on the adaptation of Maine for dairy husbandry. They are emphatically hill countries. Herkimer county, N. Y., the most famed, is quite hilly; so is

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