26 The Practical Stud Groom. 



growth of short sweet herbage beloved by horses, a batch 

 of which should be at once put into each of them. The 

 paddocks these horses vacate will, by this time, be showing 

 signs of the "patching" so characteristic of the grazing 

 of horses. A liberal number of cattle should be put into 

 each of these " patched " paddocks the moment the horses 

 vacate them, to ensure these patches being eaten down 

 before they grow too long and repellant. 



The above routine should be zealously pursued so long 

 as it is successful; but on a large acreage and with a fixed 

 limit to the number of cattle, the action of sun and shower 

 will gradually make itself felt, and the grass will eventu- 

 ally " run " clean away from the combined forces of horses 

 and cattle. The stud manager will then have to put on 

 his "thinking cap," and make many and varied calcula- 

 tions as to how many paddocks he can hope to keep in good 

 grazing condition with the number of horses and cattle 

 available, and how many he must " lay up " for the 

 mowing machine and hay-making, with its subsequent 

 useful aftermath. No useful purpose would be served by 

 attempting to outline the routine to be followed. That 

 must be done on the spot, and determined by the varying 

 nature of climate, soil and general conditions on each 

 particular farm. 



It may be urged against taking a crop of hay off certain 

 paddocks, that it would be robbing the soil of nutriment 

 without making any return. But that difficulty is easily 

 met, even if a supply of well rotted compost were not avail- 

 able. By stacking the hay in a corner of the paddock from 

 which it was cut, and then feeding it to cattle in the 

 Winter, every blade of grass would be consumed in the 

 paddock in which it grew, there would be the same return 

 of nutriment to the soil as if it had been grazed instead of 



