The Portland daily press., 1877-07-10
THE PRESS.
THE FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.
Haynaking.


Hay should come as near as possible 10
dried green grass. Haymaking consists es-
sentially in evaporating the water from grasses
cut in succulent stage, and should be con-
fined to this alone, while the best hay will be
made by those who realize that the process is
simply treating grass so that it may be stored
with safety. If it were possible to expose
every blade of grass as soon as cut to a tenn
perature of 200 deg. for few hours, and then
pack under a waterproof roof, the hay
would be as good as the grass could yield.
The nearer the farmers haymaking ap-
proaches this result the better will be his
crop.
Out of the constituents of which grass is
composed the mucilage, starch, gluten and
sugar are alone of anytnutritive value; the
woody fibre serves only to give bulk to food,
thereby assisting animal digestion. The
main object of haymaking is to retain these
nutritive elements, all of which are soluble in
water and, easily assimilated. This is very
impertectly done even by the most approved
methods, since the 1915 pounds of grass,
that are required to make 100 pounds of hay,
contain 29.13 parts soluble in hot water, and
S,21iparts in cold water, while its equivalent
in the 100 pounds of hay contains only 16
parts soluble in hot water, and only 500
parts in cold water, thus showing great
loss of nutritive matter in the drying process.
This is illustrated by the fact that a COW,
thriving for certain period on 100 pounds OF
green grass, cannot receive the same benefit
from its equivalent, or % pounds of hay,
without the addition of grain food.
Hay should not be too long exposed to the
rays of the sun, because this excessive drying
and baking affects the conversion OF starch
and soluble substance into indigestible woody
fibre after the hay is cut; hence the mory
xuickly the drying is effected the less extern
sively will such changes take place. 1t is
also:desirable to preserve its green color and
peculiar fragrance, and simply dry it so that
as little heating or fermentation as possible
shall occur in the NOW, or such heating as is
produced by the sap remaining after the
principal moisture has been removed, i'm
proves the quality of the hay, because it has
the effect of rendering the fibres Of the grasses
morestender and.of changing part of the more
pithy matter into sugar, on the same princi-
pie as is effected in the mailing of barley, Civ.
ing sweet taste very palatable to horses and
cattle.
The main point is to protect the hay from
dew or rain; water washes away the soluble
salts and other nutritive matters. since in
every ton of good hay there are.ione hundred
pounds of valuable elements soluble in cold
water and over three hundred pounds in hot
water. Avoid housing any wet hay as the
the water will cause fermentation in the NOW
and destroy some of the most valuable prop.
critics. Avoid hauling to the barn, or even
cooking hay after nightfall, and never open
hay-cocks in the morning until the dew has
evaporated. If the weather is unfavorable
the less hay is disturbed the better; hay will
preserve great part of its nutritive qualities
for many days when mown wet or saturated
with rains whilst lying in the swath and not
ofirrnd IF rQnaafodlu dru and xuat IL yp
soon become ualueless. 1t is folly to NEEDLE
with hay amid frequent showers, as it is fal
better to have it somewhat tainted in the
hay.cock than bleached and exhausted of its
nutriment and spoilt by frequent attempts al
spreading.
The tendency of the age is toward a more
rapid harvesting of the hay crop. Inventive
genius has brought nearer to perfection the
machinery by which the various operations
may be much fastened, and experience has
proved that after all, the hay that was made
and put in during the daylight of some single
bright and sunny day, was vastly superior in
feeding and marketing qualities to that which
was subjected to heat and air enough to give
it the appearance and name of grass-straw
The same rules cannot be applied to al
growths, since coarse grass requires less max
ing than fine, sncculent heritage, and cloyel
needs curing in the cock. No hay should b.
so dry as to be twisted in the hand.
AS rule, especially in years past, farmers
have dried their hay too much, and could al
such realize that one ton of properly-curei
hay, with its constituent parts well retained
with its aroma and green color well pre-
served, was worth fori feeding purposes, two
tons of the yellow, odorless and favorless
product that too often is the result of thu
seasons labor, change of system in haymak
ing would occur this very summer that
would add millions of dollars to the value o
the hay crop in America.-Boston Cultiva
tor.