On 



The Selection of Grasses and 



Clovers 



AiJ. the operations which concern the making of a pasture are 

 important, but it is no exaggeration to say that a judicious 

 combination of the various grasses and clovers which are to 

 constitute the crop may be justly regarded as vital to success. 

 Failure here means the waste of all other energies, for it is 

 worse than useless to incur the labour and expense of establish- 

 ing plants which are not wanted. However good they may 

 be elsewhere, they will be no better than weeds if they fail to 

 answer the required purpose. The choice of suitable seeds has 

 provoked greater conflict of opinion, both among theorists and 

 practical men, than aught else, and in my opinion the main 

 cause of the controversy arises from the attempt to deduce 

 large inferences from small experience. The laying down ot 

 land to grass is only an occasional incident on most farms — 

 perhaps it would be correct to say on most estates — and in past 

 years it was less frequent than at present. Even now it is the 

 exception to find persons who are able to speak from experience 

 based upon actual practice over more than a very limited area. 

 Yet the man who has dabbled a little in laying down land 

 will sometimes follow it up with a letter to a daily or weekly 

 newspaper, or deliver a speech at a local farmers' club, from 

 which it might be inferred that the agriculturists of the United 

 Kingdom will find in a particular mixture of seeds the 

 preventive of all the ills to which grass lands are subject. 

 A little knowledge on laying down land is a very dangerous 



