OF STRAW, ITS VALUE, AND L'SES. 403 



Mr Young states, that the best mode of keeping straw 

 is, cutting it into chaff, and throwing upon it a moderate 

 quantity of water, f r straw must be kept for any length of 

 time, to be used as fodder, it should be bound in trusses, in 

 which state it is easier moved, lies in less room, and re- 

 tains its strength and flavour longer than when loose. 

 Straw in corn, keeps much better in stacks than in barns. 

 It is difficult to say, how long straw will retain its nutri- 

 tive qualities ; but it is said, much longer in a stack with 

 corn, than either in a barn, or in a barn-yard put up in a 

 straw stack.f It i^ seldom given as fodder, unless to straw- 

 yard cattle, after the month of March. 



There is certainly much nourishment in the heads of 

 grain in general, and, in particular, in the awns of barley, 

 for which the cow-feeders near Edinburgh, give a higher 

 price than for the heads of wheat. Barley-chaff is useful 

 to cows, especially if mashed, which is reckoned prefer- 

 able to steaming, from the greater ease with which it is 

 performed. 



When clover is sown with grain crops, the clover has 



f This however is disputed. It is stated in the account of Mid-Lo- 

 thian, Appendix, p. 57, that if straw is built in ricks, (sows), like hay, 

 in barn-yards, it will retain its nutritive juices better, and be more to the 

 taste of the cattle, than if it had been completely dried before it was 

 led in. Mr Johnstone of Hill-house, (I am informed), threshed some 

 part of his crop directly from the field, in the month of September, and 

 then put the straw in ricks or sows; and in the month of April that 

 straw was better fodder, than what he threshed in April. If this were 

 uniformly the case, it might be advisable to thresh some part of the crop 

 from the field, and to stack the straw. It is evident, that if straw i-^ 

 threshed as it cumes from the field in September, and immediately 

 stacked, it will certainly be as good in April, as straw threshed at that 

 time. The reason seems to be, that, in the first case, the straw has 

 more of its nutritive juices when stacked by itself. In the latter, it must 

 stand out longer before it can be stacked with the corn on it. 



