Cultivation of Arable Land* Red Clover After-management of. 



any means fo good in quality : confequently, if hay be not much wanted, it is a 

 better practice to feed it, efpecially where the foil is fufficiently dry, than make it 

 into hay. 



The quantity of produce in the firfl crop varies confiderably ; fhowery fummers 

 producing great crops, while in dry ones they are often ftunteid to one half. Be- 

 iides, the natural quality of the foil has a confiderable effect, as well as its being in 

 a high or poor ilate of cultivation. On the general average of years and foils in 

 Middlefex, the two cuttings are faid to produce about three loads of marketable 

 hay ; which, for the hft fifteen or twenty years, are fuppofed to have yielded twelve 

 guineas per acre. In many cafes a much larger profit is afforded. By fome, two 

 tons are fuppofed to be a medium crop for the firfl: cut.* 



It is moftly employed for the fupport of draught- horfes, as it is the general opi 

 nion that it is more nouriming than any other hay, except that of faintfoin. It, 

 ofcourfe, fells at about fifteen millings a ton higher than hay of the meadow kind. 

 It is alfo found highly ufeful in fattening oxen and in feeding milch cows j but is 

 lefs efteemed for faddle horfes, probably from its not having been fo much in ufe a 

 as it would feem well calculated for the purpofe. 



It is fometimes a profitable practice to let the crop fland for feed. In this cafe 

 the method is either to eat it well down in the early part of the fpring, till about 

 the latter end of May, by ewes and lambs, or other forts of ftock, or to let it 

 fland for a fir ft crop of hay, and depend upon the fecond crop for feed. The 

 firft appears, however, by much the beft practice, as the land is lefs exhaufted, 

 confequently in a better ftate for the fucceeding crop; and, at the fame time, the 

 farmer has the great advantage of an early green-feed for his frock in the fpring 

 months. And it feems not improbable but that feed of a better quality may 

 thus be obtained in a greater abundance, as the plants by being mown muft be 

 rendered more weak and lefs proper for affording good feed ; while, by feeding 

 down, they will not only fuifer lefs in this refpeCL but throw out more tio wer- 

 ing-ftems and, of courfe, afford a larger proportion of feed. Where the latter 

 method is followed, the firft cut mould be made as early aspoflible. It is always 

 neceffary to take off the firft growth in one of thefe ways, as the clover plant does 

 not perfect its feed early in the fummer. 



The crop thus referved for feed muft be fuffered to remain till the hufks, or 

 j become perfectly brown, and the feeds have acquired a confiderable de* 



* Kent s Hints, 



