42 FORAGE CROPS. 



Usually, but not always, the roller should follow 

 closely upon the sowing of the sorghum. 



Cultivation. Ordinarily no other cultivation is 

 given to sorghum sown for pasture than that of har- 

 rowing it once or oftener after it has sprouted. But 

 if planted in rows sufficiently distant from one 

 another to admit of using the cultivator, then it may 

 be cultivated several times at proper intervals, in 

 addition to the harrowing that may be given with 

 much benefit just as the first blades of the sorghum 

 begin to show above ground. But it is seldom neces- 

 sary thus to sow the sorghum to furnish pasture. 



When the first harrowing is given to the sor- 

 ghum, it is important that the harrow shall be light 

 and that when used the teeth are placed as far as 

 possible at a backward slant. The harrow simply 

 stirs the surface of the land without cutting down 

 amid the roots of the young plants. Myriads of 

 weeds are at the same time destroyed as they are 

 springing into life near the surface of the soil. 



Just how much harrowing sorghum will stand 

 without harm, and just when it ought to be given, 

 does not appear to have been made the subject of any 

 careful experiments, the results of which have been 

 published. It would seem probable, however, that 

 unless an excess of seed has been sown, if a second 

 harrowing is given, it should not be given until after 

 the plants have made a growth of, say, five to seven 

 inches. They will have then become more firmly 

 rooted, hence the harrow will not so readily pull them 

 out as if the harrowing had been given at an earlier 

 period. In sections where the supply of moisture is 

 insufficient or barely sufficient to produce a crop, the 

 loss of plants up to a certain limit would do no harm. 



