HINDRANCES TO SUCCESSFUL FARMING. 85 



maintains in good condition a large flock of sheep, and the 

 improvement of this pasture has been so great that a dozen 

 lieud of cattle feed and do well upon it, beside the sheep. 

 The reasons for this are obvious to any one who has ol)- 

 served the hal)its of sheep. They are more indiscriminate 

 feeders than cattle ; they nip the shoots of almost every shrub 

 as well as weed, extirpating many kinds in the course of two 

 or three years, and in this way they make room for such 

 grasses to grow as have been shaded out or displaced. 



" This, however, is only one of the many advantages which 

 sheep bestow upon pastures when they are impoverished. 

 They scatter their manure in the way to produce the largest 

 benefits ; beside which it possesses in the highest degree the 

 requisites for restoring to the land the phosphates which it 

 loses by long depasturing with cattle. The manure, too, of 

 the sheep suffers no waste, being in a highly concentrated 

 form, and at the same time it is minutely divided and evenly 

 distributed over the surface of the ground." 



Another wrong which farmers are apt to do to their pas- 

 ture lands is turning in more stock than the pasture will 

 carry well. A good pasture is desirable and valuable, and 

 there is always a temptation to crowd more beasts into the 

 grazing grounds than can thrive as they should. Beside their 

 own animals, farmers are often induced to take those of 

 other people, who are always willing to pay a good price for 

 a run in good feed. This is very well in the spring, when the 

 feed is flush ; but the consequence is that when a dry time 

 comes, and it always does come, feed is short, gnawed into 

 the ground, the cattle get thin, and the pasture is perma- 

 nently injured, — the grass roots are exposed first to the dry- 

 ing up of a burning sun and again unprotected against frosts 

 of extreme severity in winter. 



The consequence of this is, that the finer grasses are killed 

 out and coarse herbage is likely to usurp their place. In 

 this connection I may say that it is not considered good hus- 

 bandry to feed cattle on the mowing land in the fall ; poach- 

 ing up the ground by the feet of the cattle, and exposing the 

 grass roots to the winter's freezing are sufficient reasons for 

 this. 



