IMMEDIATE AFTER-MANAGEMENT OF NEW PASTURES. 93 



a mail 2:0 o\er the (iTOund two or tliree times, and cut these tufts 

 down. The new o;rowth will afterwai'ds be eaten close. 



In the early management of autumn sown grasses, the object 

 to be kept constantly in view^ is tlie [jromotion of free growth 

 before winter sets in. Topping the young grass with the scythe 

 and rolling will jn'ove advantageous to the plants in helping them 

 to cover the ground and become firmly rooted. Immediately the 

 growth begins in spring it will be worth wdiile to nujw once 

 more, and a final rollino- is also essential. After an autumn 

 sowing it is especially necessary to cut the hay crop very early. 

 AVhen it is carried, cattle may be turned in to graze, Ijut sheep 

 had better be kept ofi' until the following year. 



Several of the finer grasses, if permitted to seed in a young 

 state, are so weakened by it that they die, and they appear to 

 perish more readily on some soils than they do on others. This 

 does not show that such grasses should be excluded from a pre- 

 scription for a permanent pasture as some writers affirm. It 

 would be just as reasonable to say that because certain varieties 

 Avhicli revel in a dry soil disappear after a succession of wet 

 summers, therefore they ought to be omitted. A pasture is not 

 laid down that seed may be saved from it, but that it may yield 

 crops of hay and nutritious food. Grasses which require three or 

 four years to attain maturity, and there are varieties wdiich do 

 not reach their highest vigour in less time, must of necessity be 

 Aveakened or destroyed by producing seed in the first or second 

 year after sowing, just as animals are permanently stunted by 

 allowing them to re])roduce their species at too early an age. 



The opinion is widely entertained that the critical period of 

 a pasture is the third or fourth year after it has been sown. But 

 if a pasture begins to fail about that time, it is probably attri- 

 butable to mismanagement and starvation. No farmer supposes 

 for a moment that he can for several years in succession take 

 much off arable land and put nothing on it. Yet this is a very 

 common delusion concerning grass land. And I say most em- 

 phatically that the man who thinks it reasonable to treat either 



