Dairy Suggestions from Europe. 201 



pings, having decomposed, are again spread upon the pasture. The 

 fields are usually pastured one season and in meadow the next. The 

 manure from the \^dnter before has been carefully stacked and rotted, 

 and the liquid confined in a cistern. In August this well rotted manure 

 is hauled onto the pasture by means of a three-wheeled, one-horse 

 wagon. The manure is put in piles of two to three hundred pounds 

 each, 25 feet apart, malting an application of from eight to ten tons 

 per acre. These piles are later carefully and evenly spread over the 

 land and after each pile is spread, the man goes over the ground, hitting 

 the chunks a glancing blow with the fork so as to pulverize it all very 

 thoroughly. [Besides this, the cleanings from the canals, the mud and 

 rank growth of soft reeds and water plants that are yearly removed 

 when the sides of the canals are cut down, are placed in piles, and after 

 they are thoroughly rotted are applied as fertilizers to the land. 



Some meadows are cut twice in a season, and under ideal condi- 

 tions it is not infrequent for the grass to grow as much as fifteen inches 

 in a single month. Their method of handling hay seems crude, indeed, 

 to an American farmer. The grass is cut with a scythe and raked by 

 hand. The Dutch farmer claims it is cut closer and that less injury is 

 done the soft sod by this method. When once begun, the mowing pro- 

 ceeds uninterruptedly, regardless of the weather. When partially dry 

 the hay is put into small cocks and later, as the curing advances, these 

 are piled into larger ones, and so on until it is sufficiently dry for the 

 mow, when it is hauled to the barn in a one-horse wagon. It often 

 happens that these piles are wet through by rain and have to be re- 

 spread and dried, so that the hay may lose its greenish color and aroma, 

 but mustiness or decay is never permitted, and the cows relish the hay 

 as their winter ration. 



DAIRY CATTLE. 



One of the first things that attracts the attention of the traveler 

 in Holland is the large numlier of fine black and white cattle. Thick as 

 are the sheep on the Cheviot Hills of Scotland, even more numerous 

 seem the black and white cattle on the level pastures of Holland. 

 Everywhere, as far as the eye could reach, the landscape was thickly 

 dotted with fine cows. A more beautiful dairy scene could scarcely 

 be imagined. History tells us that for two thousand years the coun- 

 try now Imown as Holland has been famed for its cattle. For the last 

 two or three centuries these cattle have possessed good dairy qualities, 

 which have been gradually improved until we find today a breed of 

 dairy cattle of a high order of excellence. Although only a small per 

 cent, of the cows are registered, practically all look like pure-breds. 



