Rocky Mountain husbandman. [volume] (Diamond City, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1884-07-31
SUCCESSION IN MEADOWS.

The indolent farmer likes to let hls grass
stand until it is ripe. After wheat harvest
is over, the timothy stalk has become large
| ly converted into woody fibre and sugar: if
can often be cut with safety and hauled in
the same day. A the period of bloom. or
before, it contains rs or eighty per cent of
water, which requires one or two days of
sunshine for its evaporation In June there
| are thunder and sudden dashes OF rain Al
ter harvest the weather is generally more
settlri, and then haymaking is less tedious
and troublesome. To get a days cutting of
good hay wet is very provoking, to saw
nothing of the 'ss occasioned by the soak
ing. Wheat must be harvested at a certain
stage; timothy can be put off-so reasons
the average farmer. With the great major
ity of farmers the paramount, controlling
reason why grass is cut late, is simply thar
it is more convenient to cut it then-not
that it is better. AS to the chemistry of
hay-lf the expression is allowable-the
chemist Of the Department of Agriculture
teaches that, in most cases, cultivated grass
es are best cut ut or about the bloom. At
this time we secure a union of the greatest
weight and highest nutritive value. cor
relatively. The absolute amount of nitro
gen present in albuminods is highest, woody
fibre is not excessive, and digesubility is at
an average. II cut earlier, digestibiity and
palatableness are higher, as well as the pro-
portion of abumen; woody fibre is less, but
ia an Of
great evaporation of water. and nutritive
ratio is more abnormal. Cut after bloom.
weight and woody fibre are greater. but the
latter impairs the digestibility and palata-
bleness. and the nutritve ratio is diminished
by the conversion of albumens into ammids.
In Mr.. Stah's excellent paper, page 532,
regret tina: he did not give any of his own
experience. He gives what Prof Sanborn
calls the the testimony of the steer as to the
superiority of timothy cut after bloom, both
in quantity and quality. Prof. Sanborn
states that many farmers, probably, have
been led to pronounce against late-cut hay
because they fed it on alternate weeks with
early-cut, which is more palatable to stock:
consequently they went back, during the
week when late-cut was given to them,
from distaste for their feed. -. ,.
1t is scarcely pertinent to inquire here,
why cattle relish better the early-cut hay,
in the face of the fact that the late-cut con-
tains more sugar. That such is the fact. the
prove; he can satisfy himself Of it by simp-
ly chewing the stalk. The grasses belong,
together with the sugar-cane, to the great
family of GrGnainee. and it is well:known
fact that the cane of Florida yields more
than that of Louisiana, because the absence
OF frost in the peninsular State allows the
cane to become ripper before it is harvested.
That is to say, the cane and the timothy cut
late have gained in sugar. but not in the al
buminoids, over the greener. cut. And this
statement agrees with the deductions chem
ical analysis made by Prof. Gardner.
Now, the fact that stock of all kinds pre-
fer the early cut hay, shows that sugar is
not appetizing to them. They like, best of
all, the green grass in the field, which con-
tains an enormous proportion Us to so per
cent of water; and of dry feed, they relish
best those which were cut greenest. The
nearest approach to grass is their choice.
But, as will appear farther on, their taste
is not an infallible guide to the feeder.
Take fodder corn and corn fodder--one
cut when the plant is green and succulent,
the nearest equivalent to green grass-the
other, when 1t has developed its seed to
point just beyond the milky state. Fodder