No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 407 



*'WLat can you substitute for (lie shovtago of oui- hay crop?" 

 MR. PHILIPS: Down in Cliester county, which is one of the 

 gToat dairy t-ountics of the State, it has so far been very dry, until 

 last Friday, and the problem of roughage for winter feed had be- 

 come very serious, and you will find there that almost every farm 

 has a large acreage devoted to fodder < oiii. and in some instances 

 the farmers contemplate cutting their oats for hay. Now you un- 

 derstand that with us oats is not a good paying crop. It is only very 

 rarely that we have a good oat crop, which is not true of the north- 

 ern part of the State; so v,'e realize we will get the greatest return 

 from our oats by cutting it in the immature stage for hay rather 

 than run the risk of its maturing. 



A Member: I shall not attempt to tell my farmer friends what 

 to do to help out on the shortage of hay, but a young man, neighbor 

 of mine, started in the dairy business last year, and he didn't have 

 any clover, and he ploughed about three acres and sow^ed it in sor- 

 ghum, and he sow^ed it thick enough that it grew- only two and a 

 half feet high, and he made it that much richer. Last fall, if you 

 will remember, we had a verv excellent season for curing anv- 

 thing of that kind. Sorghum I do not think would cure out by cut- 

 ting in sheaves with the binder, unless we had favorable weather, 

 and we had that last fall. I asked him about the result of his curing 

 it out. He let it stand in small shocks, tjdng it with the binder in 

 small sheaves, and after it had cured in the shocks for perhaps three 

 weeks he hauled it in. I asked him with regard to its feeding value 

 and he told me it was as good as any clover he had ever fed. I asked 

 him whether he cut it and he said no, he fed it in the sheaf and he 

 didn't have a particle of loss with it. I have no difficulty to sup- 

 ply my dairy with clover, but if I did I w'ould resort to sorghum as 

 filling out the shortage in clover hay, along with corn. The sorghum 

 will stand more drought than any crop I have ever known. I have 

 raised it for six years, but not with the intention of making hay from 

 it; but if I didn't have hay I would sow some of it. I feed it just 

 as a sorghum crop to my cows on account of shortage of pasture. 

 When shortage occurs I feed it green. This young man had excel- 

 lent results from the sorghum hay. I do not know of anything that 

 would take clover's place any better. 



MR. SEXTON: There is no good telling of our country despair- 

 ing of not accomplishing what we expect to do at the commence- 

 ment of the season. Now then, w'e have lots of time yet from now 

 on in the different localities of the State to put in some catch crop 

 between now and July that will take the place in the shortage of 

 hay that certainly will come. Corn ])roduces more than anything 

 else that we can put into the ground. There is not a dairv farm in 



