138 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



the suitability of sweet clover as a pasture crop, question- 

 naires were sent to a large number of dairy farmers in 

 different parts of Illinois who had pastured dairy cows on 

 sweet clover and as an average on the 81 farms from which 

 reports were received it took only three-fourths of an acre 

 of sweet clover pasture to adequately support a cow. That 

 is the average efficiency of sweet clover as a pasture; not 

 a few exceptional cases but the common experience in all 

 sections of the state and under all the varying conditions 

 on these farms. 



In the northern part of Illinois, farmers can usually 

 turn out about April 25 and can keep the cows on the 

 sweet clover pasture until approximately October 25 — six 

 months — while in the southern part of the state, the sea- 

 son is usually about two weeks longer. Six full months or 

 more of good pasture, capable of supporting well over a 

 cow to the acre, is a tremendous item in the cost of the 

 year's feed and the resulting economy in milk production. 



Best to Seed in Spring in Small Grains 



The most successful management of sweet clover pas- 

 ture requires seeding each year in the small grain. The 

 cattle begin in the spring on the second year's crop which 

 comes on early. They graze on this until the middle or 

 last of August, when they are turned on the new clover 

 in the grain stubble, and use it until the latter part of 

 October. The old clover and the new seeding are growing 

 on the farm each year, and the six months' pasture is 

 partly from the one and partly from the other. The pas- 

 ture requires but one year's use of the land, however, b_e- 

 cause a crop of small grain is cut from the same land on 

 which the clover grows the first year. The expense of the 

 ground is chargeable to the clover for only one year — the 

 second year of its growth. 



The established fact from this farm experience and 

 the four years' bluegrass pasture test at the University of 

 Illinois is that sweet clover has a six months' pasture sea- 

 son and a carrying capacity of a cow to three-fourths of 

 an acre, while bluegrass furnishes pasture for only about 



