FEEDING FARM ANIMALS 



to animals that graze upon it. It furnishes excellent grazing 

 in the early spring for ewes that are nursing lambs and also 

 for brood sows nursing their young. 



The grazing of pastures. The grazing of pastures 

 should not begin as a rule until pasturing can be done with- 

 out poaching the land, until the grass or other crop has made 

 sufficient growth to meet the needs of the animals without 

 an excess of expended energy in supplying the same, and 

 until it has parted with an excess of succulence. 



The injury from poaching is found, in part, in making 

 the surface uneven, in part, in destroying some of the plants 

 by pushing them down into the soil, and in part, in the ex- 

 cessive hardening of the soil after the excess of moisture 

 has left it for the time being. Clay soils suffer the most 

 from poaching and they suffer increasingly with the lack 

 of firmness in the sod, with increase in the excess of mois- 

 ture in the soil, with increase in the clay content in the 

 same, and with increase in the poaching. 



All excess of energy expended by animals in supplying 

 their needs when grazing means loss. " It means the utiliza- 

 tion of unnecessary energy to enable the animal to graze. 

 The expenditure of energy in excess of what may be nec- 

 essary to keep the animal in good health while grazing is ex- 

 cessive, and should be avoided. It should be avoided for the 

 further reason, that it involves unnecessary injury through 

 needless treading on the plants. 



Grass or other grazing is possessed of an excess of suc- 

 culence when it induces a condition of the bowels so lax as 

 to hinder increase in whole or in part. That excess of succu- 

 lence varies in plants themselves with the advancement of 

 the same in growth, and with the character of the season. 

 Grain pastures would seem to be more succulent when quite 

 young as a rule than grass pastures. Pastures that may phy- 

 sic animals at an early stage to the extent of preventing all 

 increase, may lead to rapid increase at a later stage of devel- 

 opment by which time they have parted with much of their 



