GRASS, HAY, AND STRAW. 173 



variety of grass thrives best on a certain kind of soil ; hence 

 we find that what is excellent grass on one sort of land is of 

 inferior nutritive worth when grown on another. Also, the 

 nature of the manure greatly influences that of the herbage. 

 It is therefore useless to lay down hard and fast rules as to 

 what are the most suitable grasses under all circumstances for 

 pasture or hay. Figs. 6 to 12 show specimens of some of 

 the best grasses and clovers. The presence of Yorkshire 

 fog, twitch, thistles, docks, sorrel, coltsfoot, sedges, rushes, 

 tussock grass, ragwort, and other useless and injurious 

 grasses and weeds is always undesirable. 



Hay is obtained either from permanent (natural) or 

 temporary (artificial) pasture. The cultivation of meadow 

 (permanent pasture) hay is so much neglected, as a rule, 

 that it is generally inferior to temporary pasture hay, for 

 the production of which the experienced seedsman will 

 furnish " prescriptions " that will give crops respectively for 

 from one to eight years (see Sutton's Permanent and 

 Temporary Pastures]. Besides, the grasses of permanent 

 pasture usually consist of varieties which do not all flower 

 about the same time, and consequently such pasture would, 

 as a rule, be better suited for grazing than for mowing. 

 Horses which are fed on a large quantity of corn, usually 

 prefer the hard hay made from the first and second cuttings 

 to those of subsequent ones, which become successively 

 softer in structure. I have nothing to add to the remarks 

 already made on pp. 98 and 108 to 112 with respect to the 

 quality of hay, except to repeat that it should be dry, fairly 

 green in colour, fragrant in smell, and that the seeds of 

 the contained grasses should not be so ripe as to readily 

 fall out of their ears. As a rule, clover hay becomes 

 more or less brown. 



As explained on pp. 97 and 98, hay made from mature 

 grass is more suitable to horses which are fed on a large 



