138 
On Green or Fodder Crops. 
where land is tired of swedes, and is clean enough for early sowing or planting, 
kohl-rabi will be found very valuable. Kohl crops should not be allowed 
to stand too long in the spring, as, when the tops begin to run, the bulbs get 
dry and hard, and it is then highly desirable to give a few wurzels with them." 
Green Maize. 
An impression appears very generally to prevail that this crop 
will only succeed in producing a heavy bulk of autumn forage 
in hot fine summers. Professor Euckman evidently holds this 
view, as he writes to me as follows : — 
" During some very hot summers, when at the Agricultural College, I grew 
maize to the height of 7 feet, but on repeating the experiment some plants 
only grew 6 inches high. Anyhow, as a crop-plant, I look upon it as one 
only likely to succeed in our finest seasons, and, in such as we have recently 
experienced, would he Hkely to result in utter failure." 
Mr. Clare Sewell Read furnishes highly valuable testimony 
below, which shows that such a conclusion does not hold ground 
in respect to all soils. Mr. Read did not make trial of the crop 
until after his return from America, but, as will be seen, he has 
been fairly successful, although the seasons have been damp and 
cold. He says : — 
" I have grown green maize the last two years with very fair success. 
Upon my return from America at Christmas, 1879, I brought home some 
early maize, and drilled it about 1 bushel an acre, 18 inches apart, in the 
middle of May. At that season there is no other grain sown, and the rooks 
were no end of a bother. Notwithstanding every efibrt to keep them ofl', 
between 8 p.m. and 5 a.m. they contrived to do a great deal of harm, and 
continued their depredations long after the young maize was up; indeed, they 
pulled up the seed when the plant was fully 2 or 3 inches high. This 
disaster past, the cold wet July of 1880 told against its rapid growth, but in 
August it ran up raj^idly, some being 6 feet high. But the crop was much 
too thin, and although all stock eat it well when cut into chaif, it seemed to 
me too coarse. I therefore determined to sow it much thicker this year. 
I bought some common round and flat maize, and drilled it 9 inches apart, 
and 2i bushels per acre, quite at the end of May. It was then a very dry 
season ; the seed came up slowly, and I am sure fully quite 25 per cent, did 
not germinate, which is the usual allowance that should he made for all sorts 
of common maize imported into this country. Although the seed was dressed, 
the rooks were again most troublesome, and I shall next year smear the seed 
with gas-tar dissolved in boiling water. June was hot and dry, but maize 
evidently will always grow very slowly when young in this country, and 
should therefore be drilled wide enough to horse-hoe. During the harvest 
the wet weather seemed to suit it, and it grew vigorously. 1 commenced 
cutting it in September, and have not long finished it. The hurricane of 
October, and the frost quite early in this month, beat down and half-killed the 
maize ; but the cart-horses eat it as well in its half-withered as in its green 
state. This year the maize was not so tall, but was much thicker on the 
ground, and certainly not so coarse in the stem. It weighed upon an average 
about 21 i tons per acre, and cows, horses, and pigs all seemed very fond of it. 
I could not see any difference in the growth or quantity of the fodder 
produced from round or flat maize. 
