PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-THIRD FRUIT-GROWERS 9 CONVENTION. 193 



ing every bit of the root system and weighing that green, then weighing 

 it dry. 



ME. BERWICK. Of course, you know the vicias are used very 

 largely as actual feed in England. Would it be better to cut those 

 \icias and feed them to cattle? 



MR. MILLS. If your conditions are such, the cutting and harvesting 

 of them and feeding cattle is the more preferable way, because you can 

 feed and fatten cattle and not lose over 10 or 15 per cent of the value* 

 of the vines, and you can get the humus deeper down than you can by 

 applying it in the shape of barnyard manure. 



MR. BERWICK. I understand there were thirty-five tons of green 

 feed per acre at one cutting. 



MR. MILLS. Yes. That crop grew ten and a half feet long in the 

 vine. 



DR. SHERMAN. Can you grow the burr clover without irrigating ? 



MR. MILLS. Not with us. I should think that here the burr clover 

 would grow splendidly, and yet last year it did do splendidly for us 

 without irrigation, because we had continued rains. This year we had 

 October rains and none since. 



DR. SHERMAN. It is still alive, but not growing? 



MR. MILLS. Yes ; and we can not afford to let it go beyond at least 

 February now, because last year the moth came and laid its eggs and 

 the cut-worm came and they got our oranges. 



DR. SHERMAN. If they had let it go to seed and the ground got 

 so hard they could not plow it. 



MR. MILLS. That is true. My irrigation cost me a very great deal 

 this spring. The cultivation and irrigation of the lands went from 

 $2.49 to $3.70 over my estimates, because I had to use ten men where 

 otherwise I would have used two for irrigation. I had to flood the 

 ground. But I never had my soil in better physical condition, better 

 fineness, and I never had such a big crop of lemons. We have fifty 

 carloads more lemons on our trees this year than we had last year. 



MR. CRANDALL. I would like to ask Mr. Mills if much of the 

 humus and these necessary elements in the soil are not lost to our 

 orchardists each year by too early turning under of the cover crops 

 that naturally grow on the soil ? It has been my observation in the 

 Santa Clara Valley that that is the case. 



MR. MILLS. When do they turn them under ? 



MR. CRANDALL. Just as soon as the rains come so that the ground 

 is softened sufficiently, whether it is in January, or February, or March. 



MR. MILLS. Now, it is hard for me to answer that, because I don't 

 know just the conditions. I will answer it from our own standpoint. 

 This year we put in our cover crops beginning on the 15th of September. 



13— FGC 



