No. 10. 



Summer Soiling. 



323 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Summer Soiling. 



Mr. Editor, — The readers of the Cabinet 

 are much indebted to Mr. Jenkins for the 

 very particular account of his interesting ex- 

 periment in soiling cattle during the last 

 summer; see page 289 of last number. The 

 final result does, indeed, appear to have been 

 highly satisfactory, although the way in which 

 it was attained was both long and trouble- 

 some. With a less candid narrator, it might 

 have puzzled us considerably to account for 

 this, but your valued correspondent has had 

 the magnanimity to confess that this was 

 owing, in a great measure, to an error in 

 judgment on his part, in selecting for the 

 experiment a lot of cattle peculiarly unsuita- 

 ble to the process of feeding, "being young 

 and rough, the refuse of a drove purchased 

 the previous autumn, and therefore not a fair 

 compaiison with my tenant's cattle on pas- 

 ture, which were choice animals.^^ Now, 

 if experimenters generally would be honest 

 enough to "speak out," as Mr. Jenkins has 

 done, we should be relieved from the task 

 which we are often subjected to, namely, that 

 of reconciling discrepancies which otherwise 

 are quite unaccountable; but it is not every 

 one who can afford to take so lofty a stand, 

 too many leaving an end to obtain, which is 

 incompatible with such a line of conduct: it 

 has been observed, " the best riders are to be 

 found amongst gentlemen." Indeed we are 

 much indebted to him for this impartial and 

 important narrative, and presume there is no 

 doubt of his continuing the plan the present 

 year; with bis acquired experience he will 

 be " fore-armed," and in such hands, the ad- 

 vocates of the system need not fear, I con- 

 ceive, for the result; a system which has 

 been denominated "a carrying the crops to 

 the cattle, and not they to the crops." 



On perusing his statement, I find that "on 

 the .30th and 3lst of May, the cattle ate dry 

 food with increased appetite, the increase of 

 grass seeming to have given a desire for more 

 dry food ; that they again throve and i.n- 

 proved in appearance, the first feeding with 

 grass having produced a lank appearance and 

 loose bowels." Now, here is revealed a se- 

 cret worth knowing, and shows most clearly 

 the advantages of a system, which gives the 

 means of apportioning green and dry food 

 exactly in the way best suited to their need, 

 by wliich their health and well-being may be 

 secured, and their wants correctly judged of 

 and provided for. We know the effects of 

 early grass on cattle while at pasture, and 

 often witness the extreme laxity of their bow- 

 els, as well as their lank appearance, at a 

 time when we had expected a very sudden 

 improvement in their condition, namely, on 



first turning out from winter straw-yard, all 

 which would, no doubt, be relieved by an al- 

 lowance of dry food given in their stalls; and 

 this mode of management would be peculiarly 

 suitable for dairy cows, which, since I have 

 read the account of the effects of limed land 

 upon their health and condition in the paper 

 of ViR, at p. 229 of the Farmers' Cabinet for 

 February, I am quite prepared to consider of 

 the highest importance to the butter, whether 

 as it concerns its quantity or quality ; a too 

 great laxity of the bowels being, no doubt, 

 inimical to both. The remark, that the milk 

 cows fell off while feeding on timothy and 

 clover, is not so easily accounted for; it might 

 arise from the grossness and too great succu- 

 lence of the crop ; such food ought to be ex- 

 posed for a time after cutting, to become par- 

 tially wilted before feeding. It would, how- 

 ever, appear that the experiment was brought 

 to a close just as the feeding of the green 

 oats had commenced — a food of all others, it 

 is considered, the best calculated for the pur- 

 pose; and Mr. Jenkins admits that at the 

 time of turning out, they were eating these, 

 with timothy and clover, with gradual im- 

 provement, but that after eight days feeding 

 at liberty on good pasture, no apparent im- 

 provement in their condition was perceptible; 

 nay, after five days more, he adds, " very lit- 

 tle, if any perceptible improvement in flesh 

 since turned on pasture, with abundance be- 

 fore them ;" all which goes to prove that these 

 cattle were not, indeed, "a fair comparison 

 with his tenant's choice animals, and that 

 their want of thrift was occasioned by being 

 young and rough, and the refuse of a drove." 

 His remarks at conclusion speak volumes for 

 the practice of stall-feeding; the conviction 

 that one acre soiled is equal to four acres fed ; 

 that the cattle are more comfortable than 

 while at pasture, shaded from hot sun and 

 protected from heavy rains, returning without 

 invitation or coercion to their stalls; that the 

 dung paid all expenses of attendance, and by 

 it he was enabled to put away into the barn 

 15 tons of good hay, more than could have 

 been done, had the cattle been kept all the 

 time on pasture, is indeed proof positive of 

 the superiority of soiling over pasturing, and 

 leaving no doubt at all, where cattle are to 

 be kept rather than fatted. 



Did your correspondent ever grow green 

 corn for soiling? — the seed sown broad-cast 

 on a well dunged soil, and the crop mown 

 close while young, and fed in racks with the 

 staves placed horizontally, not vertically, else 

 the cattle could not pull the stalks out after 

 they had grown longi It would appear that 

 this crop must prove not only the cheapest 

 but the best food that could be raised for the 

 purpose, and we hear of the most decided 

 success attending it from all quarters : it is 



