HINTS ON HAYMAKING. 117 



After grass is cut for hay, it parts with nearly three-fourths 

 of its weight by evaporation ; but, except under the influence 

 of long-continued rain, no chemical change of importance 

 occurs in the field.. In the rick, however, very considerable 

 chemical changes take place, such as the creation of sugar by 

 the action of heat on the starch contained in the grass. The 

 difference between good and bad hay nearly as often results 

 from too little or too great heat being evolved in the stack, as 

 from faults in the process before stacking. Overheating, even 

 when it does not go so far as to blacken and char the hay, pro- 

 duces so much acetic acid as to make the fodder sour and 

 unpalatable. Dr. Thompson showed that 387-| pounds of grass 

 are required to make 100 pounds of hay. The loss is chiefly 

 water, but not entirely so.. This is demonstrated by the fact that 

 an animal which thrives on 100 pounds of grass will not do 

 nearly so well on 25 pounds of hay supplemented with 75 pounds 

 of water. The loss of nutritious ingredients is of course attribut- 

 able to the process of fermentation carried on in the stack. The 

 sugar has been largely converted into alcohol and carbonic acid, 

 by which a certain amount of waste has occurred. 



However closely a field may be raked after the hay cart, 

 a quantity of loose hay will remain scattered about, and it v^ill 

 be well worth while to turn in some rough cattle to pick this 

 up, and also to browse on the patches round the headlands and 

 ditches which have escaped the mowing machine. Much waste 

 is incurred by carelessness in this matter, and if the grass by 

 -the hedges and ditches is not eaten down while green it will be 

 unsightly all the summer. Immediately the cattle have con- 

 sumed it they must be driven out of the field, to give the 

 aftermath time to make a fair start. 



The making of aftermath hay is not by any means general, 

 and is always precarious. Autumnal dews and shortening days, 

 combined with the succulent nature^^'f the herbage, are all 

 against it. But as many of the late-growing grasses, of which 

 the herbage principally consists, are specially nutritious, there is 



