Strato as Food for Stock. 
149 
produce grain crops very rank in straw, the coarse stalks of 
which naturally contain much indigestible woody fibre. This 
is probably why, in some parts of Lincolnshire and Yorkshire, 
it has been customary to place uncut straw fodder before stock 
so as to allow them to select from the bulk just a little of the 
best of it while being fed on richer food, instead of going 
to the expense of charring and preparing a diet of mixed in- 
gredients, which in localities producing sweet straw of finer 
texture is held to be desirable. On many black soft soils, and 
particularly those very peaty in nature, the straw usually appears 
more spotted and dark than in other districts, and cannot be so 
well adapted for fodder in consequence. 
Johnson's ' Encyclopa?dia ' contains the following in support 
of this view : — " The value and qualities of the straw of the 
different cereal grasses vary considerably according to the soil 
and season. It is thought that when grown on gravelly or rich 
<Jay soils straw is more valuable as fodder than when it is 
raised on black deep loam or cold moory land ; and it is now 
generally admitted that it possesses more succulence when the 
corn is rather green than when it is in a riper state." 
Considerations of this kind help us very much to understand 
why Mr. F. Sowerby should pronounce that of only slight value 
as a feeding material in Lincolnshire, which Mr. F. M. Jonas, 
in Essex, and Mr. J. Ford, in Dorsetshire, appreciate so highly. 
As a rule, the chalks, gravels, and clays, tolerably rich in 
minerals, but deficient in organic wealth, produce much better 
straw for feeding purposes than districts much more famous for 
natural fertility. 
Probably there exists another sufficient reason for straw being 
valued more for the higher object it is calculated to serve on 
many second or third-rate soils than it is found to be when 
grown on richer lands. The hay crop costs more per ton to pro- 
duce on poor than on good soils, and when obtained is nothing 
like so valuable. Many farmers will be found ready to state 
that haymaking, in their respective cases, is calculated to confer 
only slight advantages, and might be very greatly curtailed with- 
out involving any sacrifice worthy of the name. For while the 
hay their farms yield is often possessed of little more feeding 
value than sweet wholesome straw, the latter, in conjunction 
with oilcake, affords a very efficient substitute for hay in feeding 
all kinds of cattle and sheep ; and in numerous instances hay is 
abandoned altogether in the feeding of horses. By importing 
the use of straw and oilcake extensively into the winter-feeding, 
larmers are able to dispense with making much hay, and the 
expenses saved thereby enable them to run up a heavy cake-bill 
