364 TKANSACTIONS OP SECTION M- 



Section M.— AGRICULTURE. 

 President of the Section: Professor W. Someevillb, D.Sc. 



TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9. 

 The President delivered the following Address : — 



Grass. 



During the past four years — or since the ploughing programme began to take 

 shape — grass land has been officially cold-shouldered in no small degree. 

 The cause was obvious and the reasons were good. The result of compulsory 

 and vohmtary ploughing has been that whereas in 1914 the total area in Great 

 Britain under temporary and permanent grass (hay and jDasture) was practically 

 2I5 million acres, it was barely 19^ million acres in 1918, a reduction, namely, 

 of about 2 million acres. During the same period the arable area, other than 

 temporary grass, increased from about 10^ million acres to 12^ million acres. 

 In Ireland, during these years, the area under grass (permanent and temporary) 

 fell from about 12^ million acres to less than II5 million acres. The United 

 Kingdom at the present time comprises about 30^ million acres of permanent 

 and temporary grass and 15^- million acres of land under crops other than grass 

 and clover. This is over and above some 16 million acres of mountain land 

 used for grazing. 



It is far from my intention to attempt to maintain that grass land is, as 

 compared with tillage, defensible from the point of view of national economy. 

 It has been proved conclusively by various writers, and by none more con- 

 vincingly than by Sir Thomas Middleton, that in respect of nutritive output, 

 and the utilisation of labour, and in its bearings on foreign exchange, arable 

 cultivation is much more attractive than pastoral farming. It is my sincere 

 hope that the Royal Commission now sitting will be able to formulate a policy, 

 acceptable to the Government, which will result in the retention for tillage of 

 at least all that the plough has gained during the war, and, in my view, it 

 ■would be well for the country if a much larger area even than that could be 

 wrested from the grazier. But for the moment the tendency is in the other 

 direction, and under the stimulus of high wages, and increased costs generally, 

 a certain amount of land has already been resown to grass, and preparations 

 are being made for similarly dealing with an increased area next spring. It 

 would, therefore, appear that under any circumstances that can be conceived 

 the area of land under grass is likely to remain at a very high figure, and to 

 be well worth the consideration of this Section of the British Association. 



A considerable proportion of the grass land of this country is of so high a 

 quality that any improvement, and certainly any economic improvement, is hard 

 of accomplishment. Satisfactory as are the high-class pastures of this country, 

 it by no means follows that there is nothing more to learn about them. Grazing 

 practice is in general agreement that the productive capacity of these pastures 

 is maintained by judicious stocking during the growing season, by the regular 

 mowing of thistles and other coarse weeds, by the maintenance of the drains 

 (if such exist), by the spreading of the droppings of cattle, by the avoidance 

 of winter grazing (at least in the case of land liable to 'poach'), and, in many 

 cases, by the consumption of a certain amount of cake, at least during the 

 latter part of the season. On many of the high-class pastures no cake is used, so 



