230 
The Past Agricultural Year. 
drained at 4 feet — although I certainly do not prefer such deep drains ou 
strong clay — and in fair coudition. Clovers did not take well in 1878 ; but ah 
I only sow the best English and Welsh Red, and the best seeds of other 
clovers and grasses, they stood the winter well ; and, although much later in 
spring, the ha5'-crop was a fair one. 
Turnips and swedes left on the ground during the winter were almost a total 
loss. I had some hundreds of loads rotten, and a great many more just 
like sponges, 'i'hose " planted," i.e. pulled with tops and roots left on and 
placed close together, kept good, and made capital feed till April. We had 
not a particularly bad seed-time, and the land worked remarkably well. 
As to fallow operations, a decent fallow was scarcely to be seen. Speaking 
personally, I like fallow ploughed for the first time in March and April : as a 
rule it works much better than that done in autumn ; it does not get " soured " 
below, and keeps weeds back. My experience is that the autumn furrow is 
labour lost. This refers to bare fallow on strong land. As to draining, 1 
quite believe that for strong land 2^ feet is plenty deep enough, and I keep 
the ridges in the old form, but not too high. No end of harm has been done 
iere by draining 4 feet and laying the land fiat — the water cannot get off. 
I'he outlook for farmers is gloomy in the extreme. 
J. W. Annett. 
YoBKSHiKE. — OUiver, liichmond. 
1. Livestock. — The winter and spring of 1879 bore hard on the' flock- 
master. With due care and liberal feeding, doubtless many flocks have come 
through the ordeal without serious loss ; but in order to this a large expendi- 
ture on extraneous food has been incurred. On the Earl of Zetland's farms 
here, managed under my supervision, about 440 ewes are annually put to the 
ram ; one-half (being Black-faced Moor-ewes) are kept on a small moor on the 
outside of the estate, at an elevation of 1000 feet above sea-level. The others 
(Shropshires) are kept on the home farm, at an elevation of 550 feet. The 
keep of the Moor-ewes, in ordinary seasons, has been an allowance of hay, 
during such jjeriods of the winter, averaging about one month, as the grass 
and heather have been covered with snow. This, with what they could pick 
up, had hitherto brought them very well through the winter. Last season 
they were hay-fed from the middle of December to the end of Ajiril, at a cost 
over ordinary seasons of not less than 6s. per head ; and even with this many 
of the ewes clipped very poor. The mortality in lambing, however, was not 
above 1 per cent, greater than the average of ten years previous, and the loss 
of lambs not quite 4 per cent, greater ; and these were principally from the 
shearling ewes. 
. The Shropshire flock during the winter months is run over 250 acres of old 
pasture-land, getting a few turnips thrown down daily after the end of 
November, supplemented with a little cake and corn about a month before 
lambing. When the ground was covered with snow they had a mixture of 
puljDed roots and straw-chafl' daily, with 1 lb. of cake each — as much of the 
roots and straw as they could eat. Under this treatment the flock has done 
well, rarely losing as many ewes as 3 per cent, per annum, and frequently not so 
many as 2 per cent. During the last winter and spring they were trough- fed 
for four months, at an expense over ordinary .seasons of at least 10.5. per head. 
The deaths from October, when jjut to ram, to July 31, were twelve, an in- 
crease of nearly 3j per cent, over the average of years. On the 31st July 
we had fourteen lambs fewer than the previous j'ear, which was an average 
one. On the whole, the loss sustained by deaths, smaller increase and extra- 
keep, cannot have been less than 200/. Some of our neighbours who had fed 
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