33 



New York and other States, have not shown a direct compensatioQ 

 in growth or in milk for grain fed to steers or cows during the best 

 months of grazing. It is assumed by many competent authorities 

 that the increased vigor of animals thus fed will in the end place 

 the balance sheet on the right side of grain feeding at pastures. 

 This, I must grant, is an unsolved problem from the purely mathe- 

 matical side. But when the whole problem is viewed in its relation 

 to soil fertility, or increased yield of crops, and ease of securing 

 daily food, palatability and nutritive value of food and sale value 

 of beef are considered, the balance it appears must be on the right 

 side. I say appears, for the whole question is as yet not worked 

 out and definite figures cannot be given ; but its end may be and 

 should be as follows : on one side an acre carrying a steer and pro- 

 ducing 300 to 350 pounds growth salable at top prices, and on the 

 other, four to six acres producing but little over one-half this growth, 

 that must sell in a second or third class market. The process is, 

 however, a slow one for our times and necessities, but a worthy 

 one. It betters the conditions of pastures that we desire to make 

 good or to gradually improve. It moves in the right direction. 



Chemical Fertilizers. 



I have a field on top of a ridge, where it receives neither workings 

 nor seepage, bearing its twenty-eighth crop since yard manuring and 

 twenty-fourth crop continuously to chemicals. It is now carrying 

 evidence that chemicals act as direct plant food and not as stimu- 

 lants, and that they are adequate plant food for long periods and 

 probably for generations. By their use immediate results are 

 secured. I have a two-acre pasture, treated to chemicals three 

 times, through which 80 cows pass to the main pasture, but never 

 until it is grazed over. To it they return after passing to the 

 brook and drinking. I have sown strips of chemicals through 

 grazing lots, and on such strips the cows soon congregate. These 

 strips give more and sweeter grass, and, it is believed, more effective 

 grass. 



The quantity annually required is not large after the first good 

 growth is secured. There is taken off in 2,000 pounds of milk but 

 10.6 pounds of nitrogen. But as the annual nitrogen supply 

 brought to pastures by rains may be about half this amount, and 

 as probably more is secured by other processes, and as at least 

 half the food taken by a cow is voided in the pasture, the annual 

 deficit may be covered by from 3 to 5 pounds, if, indeed, there is 

 a deficit of this material. However, there are or may be leachings 

 from the soil in small amounts. Only 3.8 pounds of potash passes 

 off in 2,000 pounds of milk, — an amount that on granite soils 



