CHAPTER V. 



CROPS ON DAIRY FARMS. 



Restrictions on Cropping. " Arable Dairy Farming." Grand Old Pas- 

 tures. Thin, Light Land. Arable Crops and Grass. When to 

 Mow. Drying Hay in the Rick. Silage. Economical Feediug 

 Stuffs. Green Food. 



Restrictions on Cropping. 



IN the sixties and seventies it was a common practice for land- 

 lords or their agents to place restrictions of a stringent character 

 on the cropping of land. Under yearly tenancies the course of 

 cropping was strictly defined in " agreements," or else limits 

 were laid down, beyond which the farmer was not allowed to 

 go, in reference to varying the system of crop-rotation that was 

 general on the estate, or in the county. But this irksome 

 system of tutelage has been greatly relaxed since 1880, partly 

 on account of the Agricultural Holdings Act of 1883, but 

 chiefly because of the severe depression which has afflicted agri- 

 culture during the past ten or twelve years. The time, indeed, 

 has gone by when farmers might be called upon to submit to 

 hard-and-fast lines of cropping their land ; and now, as a rule, 

 they are at liberty to raise such crops as they deem best for 

 their purpose, and in the manner which seems the most con- 

 venient and suitable. The result is that cropping-rotations are 

 more varied than was formerly the case, and such crops are 

 raised each year as are likely to be most wanted. The restric- 

 tions of old times seem already to have become archaic ; it is 

 indeed a matter for surprise that they should ever have existed; 

 and farmers of the twentieth century will with difficulty believe 



