236 
The Past Agricultural Year. 
it told upon a few animals of bad constitution. From the heavy fall of snow, 
wliich liiy very long upon the land, cattle were far more than usual in this 
district deiieudent upon dry fodder for their subsistence ; and the hay-crop of 
1878, one of the heaviest ever known in this district, barely sufficed to 
maintain the cattle through the long severe winter and cold last spring. I 
liad my roots all secured before the hard weather fully set in, except 2 acres 
of cabbages which were carted out to cattle and yearling sheep in the snow 
in the early winter, and, although frozen, were consumed without difBculty. 
I attribute one or two cases of abortion in the cows to this use of frosted 
cabbage. Cattle have not, however, thriven so well as usual during the grazing 
season. They were cold and uncomfortable, and the grass was washy and 
deficient in quality as well as in quantity. The experience of managers of 
dairy factories who take exact measurement is that they had 25 per cent, less 
milk daring the season from the same number of cows ; and this was 
generally confirmed by private dairymen. Pastures, even when usually sound, 
were much trodden and damaged by heavy stock. In the valley of the Dove, 
where large numbers of cattle are fattened in the grass season, there was 
general complaint of the bad growth of the cattle, very many beasts having 
been worth little more than when turned out. 
2. TiUnge Operations. — My root-land was sown with wheat just previous 
to the hard frost ; the seed lay in the ground nearly four months. On the 
drier land it eventually came well. On the strongest land the deluge of rain 
in March rotted much of the seed, and it came up thin. Spring corn went 
in well, the strong land working freely from the frost. The root-land worked 
very well, having been ploughed in October and November. My mangolds 
were all sown in April, but the cold weather hindered their start. The 
difficult}' of keeping down chickweed and other condition weeds was very 
great. Swedes were a good plant, but in low jilaces were much checked by 
the excessive wet. 
Cabbages, of wiiich most farmers in this district grow some, planting in 
May for autumn-consumption by cattle, were generally very poor. Many 
pjlants were destroyed or injured by the winter ; and on all heavy land the 
excess of rain damaged, if it did not utterly spoil them. Though cabbages do 
not in ordinary seasons do well on dry soils, they suffer on all tenacious soils 
at least as much as any root from excessive wet. 
Drainage, even where deep enough and with drains at moderate distances 
apart, has proved only a partial and inefficient remedy on clay soils for the 
damage produced by excessive wet. 
Autumn cultivation in this comparatively late district is not always possible 
or desirable. Where the laud is clean and tolerably free from annuals it is 
better ploughed deeply, without stirring the surface, early in the autumn, and 
then left untouched until the work of sowing roots is commenced ia April or 
May, leaving the winter's frost to pulverise the soil. In a fine early season 
much good may, however, be done by working and cleaning in the autumn 
any dirty land. 
As to bare fallows, the season was most difficult for cleaning them. I do 
not have them. I think any land requiring them regularly ought to be laid 
away to grass. 
W. 1'. Carrington. 
Staffordshire. — Elford Park. 
1. Live-stock. — As regards sheep, the losses have been fearful, and this has 
not been confined to one district or class of farm. Men who never had a 
rotten sheep before have lost scores. Two or three cases occur to me : one 
