( 35 ) 



such a degree as to scald the roots and destroy the clover. Usually 

 it is best after clover has attained its full bloom, either to cut it for 

 hay, or pasture with stock until about the first of July. When the 

 stock is removed, or the clover hay cured and taken off, and there 

 is rain enough, a second crop will spring up from the roots. This 

 second crop is the most valuable for seed, the seed maturing about 

 the last of August, and sooner, if there be copious rains. To make 

 the most abundant yield of clover for grazing, it should be allowed 

 to grow all it will, but never let it make seed, always grazing it 

 down when in full bloom. When grazed down, take off the stock 

 until it blooms again. Several successive crops may thus be made 

 during the summer. The crop of August is unfit for grazing, the 

 large quantity of seed having the effect of salivating stock to such a 

 degree as to cause them to lose flesh. 



It is a fact, well attested by English writers, and by observant 

 farmers of this country, that when clover has been frequently sown 

 upon the same land, it not only fails to produce a heavy crop, but 

 fails to appear at all. The land is then said to be " clover sick." 

 The remedy for this is by extending the number of crops in the 

 scale of rotation, so that clover will not come so often upon the 

 same land. By Liebig, clover-sick land is supposed to be caused 

 by the roots of clover impoverishing the subsoil. 



Clover has no superior as a grazing plant. When in full vigor 

 and bloom, it will carry more cattle and sheep per acre than blue- 

 grass, Herd's grass, or orchard grass. After it has been grazed to 

 the earth, a few showery days with warm suns will cause it to 

 spring up into renewed vitality, ready again to furnish its succulent 

 herbage to domestic animals. Though very nutritious and highly 

 relished by cattle, it often produces a dangerous swelling called 

 hoven, from which many cows die. When first turned upon clover, 

 cattle should only be allowed to graze for an hour or two, and then 

 be driven off for the remainder of the day, gradually increasing the 

 time of grazing, until they become less voracious in their appetites, 

 never permitting them to run upon clover when wet. Clover made 

 wet by a rain at midday is more likely to produce hoven than 

 when wet by dew. This is because when wet by rain at midday, or 

 after the stalks and leaves are heated by the sun, when taken into 

 the stomach of a cow, this heat generates fermentation much sooner 

 than when the herbage is cool, though wet with the morning dew. 



