CASTLE MARTIN CATTLE 323 



formed, and the plant is rippled to save the seed before 

 the beginning of the retting process to liberate the 

 fibre. 



The most important root crop of the farm was 

 potatoes, of which heavy crops were to be seen, growing 

 from Scotch seed. Our host was diminishing his 

 acreage of swedes because he found them expensive, 

 especially as the land is a little too wet to allow him 

 to fold the sheep upon the turnips. There was a 

 small breadth of sugar beet grown as an experiment, 

 though even the Pembrokeshire end of Wales would 

 seem to be one of the least promising districts for the 

 establishment of the beet sugar industry, which 

 demands above all to be situated in a dominantly 

 arable district, with cheap and easy means of com- 

 munication to bring the roots to the factory. 



The farm was heavily stocked, its main business 

 being rearing cattle for sale as forward stores ; the 

 grassland was not good enough for fattening, and only 

 a few of the more advanced animals were tied up for 

 the winter. In addition to the calves of his own 

 raising, our host bought calves from the milk-producing 

 districts and grew them on, selling the best of the 

 heifers back to the dairy districts when in calf. The 

 cattle were all Shorthorns, though we were not far 

 away from Castle Martin on the other side of Mil ford 

 Haven, whence the black cattle of South Wales take 

 their name. Even in their own country, however, the 

 black cattle are disappearing, as they have the reputa- 

 tion of being too slow in coming to maturity, even 

 more so than the closely related black cattle of North 

 Wales. The farm also carried a heavy stock of sheep 

 Shropshires together with a certain number of 

 crosses with the hill breeds. In this open, mild 

 climate, with little frost or snow in the winter, lambing 



