PEAS AND PEA-LIKE PLANTS 449 



The pasturing of field peas to fatten lambs has become 

 an important industry in the mountain valleys of Colorado. 

 As a rule the peas are sown with a small quantity of wheat 

 or oats to support the vines. The lambs or sheep are 

 turned 'into the pea fields when the peas are mature and 

 are fed upon them for 70 to 120 days. These pea-fattened 

 lambs command a high price in the market. 



540. Garden pea vines. At canning factories where 

 the green peas are separated from the vines by special 

 machinery, the refuse vines are utilized as feed, being fed 

 green, cured into hay or preserved as silage. It is some- 

 times made into silage by putting the green vines in large 

 stacks, this being the common method at canneries. Pea- 

 vine silage has proven to be a good feed for dairy cows as 

 well as for beef cattle and sheep. In 1908, 96 canneries 

 handled the pea vines grown in 66,959 acres, and about 

 60 per cent of the refuse vines were preserved as silage, the 

 rest being fed green or cured into hay. 



541. Irrigation. Peas may be grown under irrigation, 

 but it is doubtful if so short-lived a forage crop will prove 

 desirable for this purpose. 



At the Wyoming Experiment Station small plots were 

 irrigated 1 to 7 times, using about 3 to 5 inches of water 

 at an application. The yields of hay increased with the 

 number of irrigations, the heaviest being 4.2 tons an acre 

 from 7 applications, aggregating 23 inches of water. 



For seed-production 4 irrigations, aggregating 20 inches, 

 gave a yield of 34.75 bushels to the acre, much more than 

 was obtained by using either more or fewer irrigations. 



542. Seed-production. Peas are usually harvested 

 with an ordinary mower having an attachment in front of 

 the knife so that the tangled vines are lifted up from the 

 ground. Two men follow behind the mower and roll the 



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