138 Recent Experiences in layhig down Land to Ch'oss, 
[Jbr Schedule of Questions, see page 126.] 
Mr. Reginald A. Warren — continued. 
10. Clovers disappear on the permanent pastures here, but I do not at- 
tribute that to feeding with sheep. 
11. Not less than seven or eight years even with liberal treatment. If 
not well cared for and manured, perhaps fourteen or fifteen years. 
12. Not in this district ; but I have watched the process on poor brashy 
land and sour clay In the Cotswold district, and have seen better pasture 
come than one would expect. 
13. Yes ; when the area is extensive, but it is not noticeable here. 
14. No doubt it is better where good pasture cannot be obtained ; but 
when broken up again it must be very foul, and perhaps full of wireworm, 
until it is time to seed it down again. 
15. The old pastures here consist of strong, deep-rooted grasses chiefly. 
No clover, cocksfoot, or ryegrass is found. This is attributable, I think, to 
the ground becoming hard and dry in summer. The land is first-class wheat 
land, but the grass land does not yield correspondingly heavy crops. The 
herbage, however, whether fed off or made in hay, is very somid and nutri- 
tious. Many years ago an 8-acre field sown with permanent grass seeds (in 
which rj^egrass was mixed) came up very strong, and I folded it over 
closely with sheep in May the first year with very good ellect. 
Mr. Claj{E Sewell Read, lloningliam TJiorjie, Norwich. 
1. A stiff loam, resting on a clay or brick-earth subsoil, 
2. Some of the land when in arable cultivation was di-ained many 
years ago. 
3. About twenty-five inches ; climate dry, and this farm seldom catches 
any thunder rain or showers in a drought. 
4. Mixtures from Messrs. Sutton & Sons, Reading. 
5. Yes, but the proportion I do not know. 
6 and 7. A portion of the root crop was folded early in the autumn and 
drilled with wheat nine inches wide. In the spring the wheat was horse-hoed, 
and the seeds sown and harrowed in and rolled down. I am sure this is the 
best method of sowing grass seeds in the Eastern counties. If without a 
corn crop, the animal weeds smother the seeds. If sown with spring corn, 
the soil is either too cobbly or too loose, and some seed is buried too deeply, 
and some never grows. With autumn wheat the land becomes consolidated, 
the horse-hoe raises enough fine mould to cover the seeds, and there is a fine 
friable well-consolidated seed-bed, which Ls what the young grasses delight 
in. Wheat stands up better than barley or oats ; they often lodge and kill 
or smother some of the seeds. I have never known success attend autumn- 
sowing of seeds. Often the winter kills the most delicate plants, and I have 
seen all the seeds lifted clean 'out of the land by frost and destroyed. I 
have seen permanent grass seeds sown witli rape ; but then the rape should 
not be fed, but mown green, and used for fodder upon another field or in 
the yards. The stalks are, however, often a nuisance in the following 
year. 
8. I mow the seeds the first two years, and as soon as the hay is off apply a 
good dressing of farmyard manure and mould (a sort of compost of any refuse 
and scrapings), and when 1 he second crop is well up, stock with cattle. Every 
other year, until the seeds are ten or twelve years old, they have been dressed 
with a compost, but this could not be done where any great extent has been 
sown. 
9. Ryegrasses add greatly to the bulk of hay in the first two years, and 
