258 Practical Farming 



narrow shock, and are left there to cure, and not touched 

 till completely cured. The only difficulty about this 

 method is that the greater part of the leaves are lost and 

 much of the outer part of the shocks is blackened by the 

 weather. While the peas will stand exposure to rains 

 better than clover will, it is always better to make a bright 

 and well cured hay and to save the leaves entirely, which can 

 only be done by the completion of the curing in the barn. 



North of the Southern tier of counties in Pennsylvania 

 it is doubtful if the cow pea can be relied upon as a hay 

 crop. But even much further north the cow pea will 

 come in very usefully to the dairyman as a means for 

 tiding over a dry period as a pasture crop when grass is 

 burnt up, for the cow pea, as we have said, is a hot weather 

 plant and will thrive under conditions that make the grass 

 worthless. Being one of the legume family, it has the 

 same capacity for getting nitrogen from the air that other 

 legumes have. When sown on land where the crop has 

 not before been grown the first sowing may not be very 

 successful, as the soil will not be supplied with the bac- 

 teria. But these are carried on the seeds to some extent 

 and if the same land is sown the following season it will 

 be found that the inoculation has been made and the crop 

 will succeed. We have accoimts from farmers as far north 

 as Ashtabula County, Ohio, and in Wisconsin, who have 

 found this to be the case, and on light and warm soils 

 they have found the pea a very useful green manure plant, 

 even where the seed fails to mature. 



The varieties of the cow pea are almost innumerable, 

 as the plant is one of the most variable in its character. 

 The varieties are usually distinguished by the color of 



