INDIAN CORN. 383 



three or four tons of dry forage is easily obtained. Land 

 sown in corn will not only furnish a large amount of hay, 

 but the fodder, if cut and fed to stock as required, will keep 

 three or four times as many as if the land was turned over 

 to the stock themselves. This plan applies with peculiar 

 force to those owning small parcels of land, to renters, or to 

 persons owning a large town lot. Food of a good character 

 rfay be grown in sufficient quantity, on a mere town lot to 

 feed a cow or a horse during the entire winter. 



There is some difficulty in curing corn fodder properly, 

 as it contains so much water. It should be cut and spread 

 in good weather, or, if possible, let it be put in shocks, 

 stand until cured, and then it must have shelter. This 

 shelter may be provided in various ways, either barns, sheds 

 or stacks. 



And immense saving will be made by cutting the whole 

 up in a straw cutter. A farmer who once uses a good straw 

 cutter, not only on stalks, but on hay and all roughness, 

 will never feed without it afterward if he has the industry 

 to do that which his judgment approves. 



It has been a desideratum with all far farmers to secure 

 green food for cattle all through the year. In the colder 

 climates this is impossible, from the presence of snow 

 through the long winter. But in the milder climates of 

 the South, and generally in Tennessee, this can be done by 

 sowing rye, barley and wheat, and also by having a winter 

 pasture of blue grass and other grasses. But within the 

 last few years, a plan has been invented in France, by which 

 any man can have the best of green food, almost identical 

 with that cut out of a field, all through the year. It was 

 long known that the pulp of sugar beets left after extract- 

 ing the sugar, was a very superior food, both for cattle and 

 hogs. Various experiments were instituted by which a 

 plan for its preservation might be devised, and at last it was 

 discovered that if preserved from contact with the atmos- 

 phere it would remain a fermented food, and the process of 



