228 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



pounds of roots, on an average, per acre, and 2,700 pounds of 

 stalks which, when cut, are mixed with the residue of the 

 distillery and fed to cattle. 



Wheat, sown in spring after roots, manured and on a single 

 ploughing, has regularly given results which compare well with 

 winter wheat, not only in point of quantity yielded, but in 

 weight and quality. The general yield is from twenty-seven to 

 thirty-eight bushels per acre. Mixture of wheat is common 

 there, and succeeds well. 



The oat cultivated there is brown and small. It yields well. 

 It is the Houdan oat. Average product from thirty-three to 

 sixty-six bushels per acre. 



The variety of barley is the two-rowed. Its average yield is 

 from thirty-three to forty-five bushels per acre. 



Clover would not succeed well at first, at Grignon, and was 

 not cultivated. Now it yields excellent crops, amounting to 

 from 2,700 to 4,500 pounds per acre. 



The high cost of vetches for seed and the advantages of 

 Indian corn for green fodder have led to the extensive culture 

 of the latter, but they cultivate all the kinds of green fodder 

 from the earliest to the latest. Grignon first introduced the 

 Mo/ta de Hongrie, or Hungarian millet, which has succeeded 

 admirably. 



Colza, after having been cultivated by sowing in rows, is now 

 always transplanted. 



Sainfoin formerly was cultivated alone but is now mixed 

 with lucerne and clover, in order to render the meadows more 

 suitable for pasturing sheep. Lucerne is sown at the rate of 

 twenty-two pounds per acre. The variety which has given the 

 best result is that of Provence. It yields from 2,700 to 5,400 

 pounds per acre. The farm cuts not far from about 300 tons 

 of hay, including the lucerne and clover. About forty-eight 

 acres are in natural meadows, that is, in Timothy, redtop and 

 similar grasses. 



It is a precept of the school at Grignon that the land is a 

 machine which it is best to improve, whenever it is in favorable 

 economical relations, in order to make it work as well as 

 possible. The improvements accordingly commenced on the 

 poorest, or, at least, the most exhausted lands, and they have 

 been pretty complete. 



