Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1879-09-11
Importance and Value Of the Oat
Crop.
UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA,
DEPARTMENT. OF AGRIcULTuRE,
ATHENS, GA, August 30.
Editors Chronicle and Constitutionulist:

ATHENS, GA, August 30.
Editors Chronicle and Constitutionulist:
The injury done to tho corn crop
throughout tho greater part of Georgia, by
tho protractcd drouth in June ana July,
renders it necessary that our farmers should
cndeavor to supply the deficiency by raising
a greater amount of small grain than thcy
have been in the habit of raising, if they
wish to save themselves from being obliged
next Bprng to purchase food for man and
beast from the West.
! would specially recommend them to
prepare for large oat crop.
This, by providing o sufficient amount
of food for the work animals 10 tho spring,
will leave the bulk Of whatever corn is left
of the present crop for bread, and will,
hope, teach our farmers what | believe is
true, namely: First, That oats arc the
cheapest forage crop they can raise. Sec
ond, That they are the most nutritiyc, as
they coDtain more of the flesh and muscle
forming, heat producing and fattening
elements than are contained in the corn and
fodder, which arc the general feed given TO
horses and mules.
Third, That they yield higher percent
ngc of profit on the use Of fertilizers than
corn; and fourth, that oats, instead Of being,
as many crroucously believe, an exhaustive
crop, when properly cultivated improve the
soil 1t is the cheapest forage crop. Oats
should be sown in ptember-thc time
when tho laboring force on plantations is
least occupied, and, therefore, nro sown at
nominal cost, especially where part of
that force works for stated yearly wages.
The sowing the crop in the spring is also
Inexpensive, as two hands in three days can
save and put away four acres Of oats. If
th:A cost is compared with that Of making
corn aud fodder, it is obvious that for the
same expenditure fully double the quantity
of forage can be made in oats that can be
made in corn nnd fodder. They arc the
most nutrtive horse feed. Chemical analy
sis has demonstrated that in tho three classes
OF substances which enter into stock food
pamcly, the albuminoids or muscle forming
aud the carbo hydrutes and oils, or heat
aud fat-producing, oats (the grain, straw
and chaff, arc richer than corn. In En-
gland oats orc the only grain on which the
race horses and those used in fox hunting
the highest types of muscular strength and
condition--are fed.
They yield higher percentage of profit
on tho use of commercial fertilizers, I
have found by actual experiment that the
application of 81 SO worth of good ammo
mated super phosphate per acre to oats will
more than double the production Of the
natural soil, whilc the same amount applied
sr cor1, except in unusually favorable
seasons, does not yield anything like that
percentage of increase. That they improve,
not exhaust the soil Oats furnish large
quantities of nitrogen in their roots and
stubblc, and considerable amount is also
taken up by the growth of weeds and grass
after the crop is cut; while corn is undeni-.
ably nitrogen exhausting crop, because
during its entire growth and cultivation in
the hot summer months, every blade of
grass and everything that produces nitrogen
is speedily destroyed, whereas the oat plant
oppropriatcs during the period Of its
growth tho soluble nitrogen contained in
whatever fertilizer is applied to it, and the
subsequent growth Of grass and weeds in
GUNNER holds tho rcst, which can neither
be evoporatcd nor washed away,
From three to three and half acres Of
land we'll broken, enriched by the applica-
tion of from $50 to 200 pounds of good
ammoniatcd super phosphate, sown in Sep
tcmbcr, with two or two and q half bushels
Of genuine rust proof oats, will yield a
sufficient quantity Of food for one horse or
mule. takes about the came area of land
to produce sufficient quantity Of corn and
fodder, with favorable seasons, to support
one work animal. If tho relative cost of
labor in producing the oats and corn and
fodder be taken into accounts it will be
found that the cost of the latter is fully
double that Of the former.
But to raise oats to reach the end to
which | have indicated, We must not, as is
too often the practice, scratch 10 without
manure, at any time between November
and March, bushcl or bushel and half
of my seed we can find, on the poorest
piece of land on our farm. We must con
cede to oats the rank to which their impor-
tancc and value cntitlc them, and employ
tho same care which we give to cotton and
corn, if VIC would derive the benefits which
they arc capable of offering. Very respect.
fully, WM. NJ. BROWNE,
Professor of Agriculture, &c.
Tho liberal philosophers Of The Springfield
(Mass.) Republican Informs the world that
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