IMH 74:4 355-56

"Chronicles of Upper Burnet" (1)

Friday, December 10th.

The weather was very like that of yesterday though it felt a slight degree warmer, and pleasanter.
Father spent all day in making a "bob-sled." He began it soon after breakfast and the sun _ had
set when it was completed. Alvin helped him the greater part of the time, though he and I hauled
up a sled-load of fodder and put in the cow-barn, also picked up a lot of the chip and chunks left
around said barn and hauled them up to· the house. They were snowy and somewhat nasty and
I rather wonder now why I hauled them up here.

Teaching Notes: A favorite way of storing corn that is still practiced by the Amish is to place the
corn in a shock. It could be quiet large. My father ( born in 1920) told me about the time he was
caught in a blizzard while rabbit hunting. He simply burrowed into the center of a shock of corn
and let the snowy winds blow. When the Harrison wanted to feed their animals
cattle, they would take their sled to the field and push the shock over on it. That is the fodder
that is referred to in several entries in the journal. In later years, a horse powered and later
tractor powered fodder chopper was developed and made the stalks finer with less waste.
Cattle like the flavor of corn stalks and will often choose them in preference to good grass hay.
One advantage that a cow or oxen had over the horse was that due to its"seven stomachs,"
it could convert roughage into protein...not so, Mr. horse. That is why oxen were the best
choice  when going on the long journey of the Oregon Trail.