FEEDING CROPS FOR SHEEP. 151 



rooted plaiiit it easily recovers after having been fed down, 

 and the improvement of the laud for a succeeding crop is 

 well worth all the cost of it. . 



On the most fertile soils thirty inches between the rows 

 has been found the most desirable, the plants meeting in 

 the rows and completely covering the ground. It requires 

 the whole ground to itself, the dense growth quite prevent- 

 ing grass seed from growing. Indeed, on the farm where 

 sheep are kept for the improvement of the land it is grown 

 with this second purpose, as well as for the feeding of the 

 stock. There is no other crop which goes so far in this 

 way to verify the common adage about the golden foot of 

 the sheep, for it is most profitable in both ways. It shapes 

 the land so densely by its thick and rapid growth that 

 weeds have no chance to survive, and making a weak growth 

 are smothered in their infancy, as it were, and are 

 completely exterminated. The culture of the laud as well, 

 is an excellent preparation for the succeeding crop, and thus 

 the keeper of sheep, if he will, as the saying goes, kiW two 

 birds with one stone. 



It is rapid in its growth. At two months after sowing it 

 is ready for feeding down or for cutting. The illustration 

 here given shows a two months old plant, taken from 

 nature by the truthful camera. Of course cutting and feed- 

 ing in racks is the most economical method of feeding, 

 although somewhat more laborious than to have the lambs 

 or sheep gather it for themselves, and while the waste 

 of the crop left after the folding on the land goes to add 

 a valuable manure to the soil, yet by feeding it off the 

 ground we get all the waste left by the flock in doubtless a 

 better and more easily available form, and the return from 

 the feeding in addition. 



The illustration is taken from a bulletin of the Wis- 

 consin Station, where an experimental crop was grown for 

 feeding lambs for market. The crop was grown on land in 

 ordinarily good condition, but the yield made goes to show 

 the importance and value of this crop to the shepherd of all 

 branches of his pursuit. A third cutting was made, which 

 yielded on October 22nd, 2,218 Ibs., the total yield from this 

 plot amounting to 7,669^ Ibs., on one-tenth of an acre, thus 

 making over thirty tons to the acre. 



