Feeding Dairy Cattle 



more for it, it would greatly repay us. This gentleman 

 practices a short rotation of clover, potatoes, corn, oats and 

 clover again. When asked if he did not want a hay crop 

 which would stay down more than one year, he said he 

 wanted the clover sod for his potatoes. On some fields he 

 seeded timothy with the clover and used the timothy for a 

 cash crop. Timothy and mixed grasses are a very poor sub- 

 stitute for clover or alfalfa hay for feeding dairy cattle. 



Soy beans, cowpea hay and hay from oats and peas are all 

 crops that may be utilized for a leguminous roughage for 

 next winter. 



Every breeder of Holstein-Friesian cattle should enter his 

 animals for advanced registry. A valuable roughage to have 

 on hand for this purpose to supplement silage and hay is 

 roots. The best feeders advise the growing of the "Detroit 

 Red" table beet for this purpose. Mangels will yield more 

 per acre. "Norbiton Giant" is a large red variety of man- 

 gels for fall and early winter feeding, and "Golden Tankard" 

 is a yellow variety which keeps better for late winter and 

 spring feeding. Potatoes may be used, but ordinarily are 

 not worth more than 15 cents a bushel compared with other 

 crops. 



Some interest is being shown in sweet clover and perhaps 

 under special conditions this crop might be used. 



Finally it may be said that the author wishes this thought 

 to stick, that roughage for dairy cattle for the greatest and 

 most economical production must come from a very few 

 common crops, and every farmer must bend his energies to 

 perfect his knowledge of the production of these rather than 

 seek new crops. These crops are: i. Corn for silage. 2. 

 Alfalfa hay, or, failing this, clover hay. 3. Roots for special 

 high production of milk. 



Nothing has been said on varieties except for roots or on 

 cultural methods. It is hard to make general statements on 

 these points in a short article. The author prefers to leave 

 these points to individual inquiry when the local conditions 

 pertinent to each farm may be stated. 



VI. Curing Hay from the Standpoint of a Feeder 



THE farmer who raises hay to feed to his own stock has 

 a different problem from the farmer who raises hay to 

 sell. The latter has only one object in view, to raise 

 as much dry weight per acre as he can, of a quality which will 

 command a high price. The feeder is raising as much forage 



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