54 BRITISH DAIRYING. 



especially when the grass is deficient in quantity. The cows 

 will give more and better milk, and maintain themselves in 

 better condition, if they have these supplemental rations. 



An early pasture is always welcome, after six months of 

 winter, be it a natural or an artificial pasture. The earliest 

 pastures are always found on the best land, or on land in the 

 best condition, other things being equal, such as altitude or 

 sheltered position. The grass and hay yielded by such land are 

 superior in quality as well as in quantity to those from inferior 

 soils. Hay from well-farmed land is superior to that from land 

 that is out of condition, to a degree that would surprise people 

 who have not put it to the test. Such hay, cut so soon as the 

 grass has arrived at full growth, and before it is ripe, is corn 

 and hay combined when compared with the wiry, innutritious 

 stuff that grows on poor land. 



The forwardest spring I have known, or at all events remem- 

 ber, was in 1889, and grass grew at a great rate on meadows 

 and pastures alike. My own hay was gathered in by Mid- 

 summer Day, though we usually do not expect to begin cutting 

 before the first week of July. This abnormally early grass re- 

 quires more making into hay than that which grows slower and 

 later ; but, if it be well made, it is markedly superior to ordi- 

 nary hay. And when the meadows are early, so are the pas- 

 tures, that are so welcome alike to the farmer and his cattle. 

 On farms that are partly arable, the earliest pasture is the land 

 " seeded down " the year before, if it is not wanted for mowing. 



Condition of Land. 



Land out of condition wet, sour, or poverty-stricken pro- 

 duces grass that cattle do not like, and on which they cannot 

 thrive or yield milk as they ought to be enabled to do, and as 

 they would do on good land. Such grass is not attractive to 

 them, and they devour it under compulsion, and sometimes 

 under protest. This protest is to bawl for better grass, or to 

 break through the fence in search of it. No land can be well 

 farmed if it is wet ; and the first act of husbandry on such land 



