268 MEADOWS AND PASTURES 



much disturbed to see this dust and to observe that the 

 cattle refused to eat the grass where it lay, and sug- 

 gested to the contractor that he owed damages for this 

 nuisance and to this the contractor agreed. Then a rain 

 came and washed off the grass and put some of the dust 

 into the soil. Afterward there was very marked dif- 

 ference in the aspect of the grass, the dusted grass being 

 markedly superior and much more greedily eaten by 

 the cattle, so that my friend laughingly recalled his com- 

 plaint. It seems fairly effective simply to dust lime over 

 the sod on old pastures, though doubtless much of it is 

 slow to be worked down to where it is effective and 

 sometimes it would be advisable to disk or harrow it into 

 the soil. If there is a good sod, however, the earth 

 worms will be abundant there and their casts will be 

 laid above the lime particles so that finally they will be 

 worked down to moist earth. 



Effect of Lime on Pastured Animals. In some re- 

 gions it is common to find animals licking the lime wash 

 from fences and buildings, gnawing bones, and in other 

 ways displaying their lime-hunger. No good animals 

 can ever be produced on such soils at least not until 

 they are corrected. Lime-hunger in a soil means lime- 

 hunger in plants and lime deficiency there, and that, in 

 turn, means animals eating the herbage will be deficient 

 in bone, in stamina and substance. Furthermore, ani- 

 mals in heavy milk can not possibly maintain their nat- 

 ural body lime content, as has been shown by experi- 

 ments at the Wisconsin station, and this lime exhaustion 

 in the milk-giving animal is doubtless responsible for 

 much of the breakdown among heavy milkers. 



