The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1900-07-17
A iCulture.
THE yALI cbF RAPE AS FOOD FOR
sHEEP,-LRINE AND POULTRY.

ering Every Phase of This Important Sub
isot-Au About the Cultivation of Crop
the Value of Which Has Been Demon
strated and Which is Becoming Popular in
This and Adjoining States.
correspondence of The Progressive Farmer.
Among the many forage plants of
the South there are but few of more
importance to the maker of pork or
mutton than rape.
Rape is a native of the Old World,
where it has long been cultivated as
salad for human consumption and
As a fodder for domestic animals. In
some sections it is grown to a con
siderable extent for the seed, from
which oil is extracted, after which
the residue is made into a cake or
meal to be used as a concentrated
food stuff. This plant has been
grown in Northern sections of the
United States and used for for forage
purposes for something like ten or
fifteen years. In some States large
areas are sown to be grazed off by
sheep and hogs, for which, with the
addition of some corn or other starchy
foods, it seems to form almost per
feet ration.
For several years after it's intro
duction to the United States it was
thought to be of value only in the
far North: therefore it's cultivation
in the South was not attempted until
within the last few years. 1t is not
grown yet on one out of a hundred
farms where it should be of great
profit.
1t is not only valuable IN itself
alone, but it adds to the efficiency of
other folders and grains withcwhich
it is used. Four acres of corn with
the addition of an acre in rape pas
ture, will give more pork or mutton
than would 6ve acres of corn with
out the help of rape.
1t is not necessary though in
growing rape in the South to set
apart one field for that and nothing
else. Rape is cool weather plant
and continues to grow during all the
more open weather from fall to
spring, but few hot dry days such
as are apt to occur late in May or
during the summer interferes with
its growth so completely as to ruin
it for forage purposes. This winter
growing habit enables the farmer to
raise a crop Of corn, tobacco or pota-
toes, and in some cases cotton, on a
piece of land during the summer and
a crop Of rape during winter.
This practice cannot be kept up
very long, however, without the use
of liberal quantities of fertilizers, as
rape requires as much nourishment
as nearly any other crop, and must
draw it from the soil. 1t is far bet
ter to follow a rotation in which rape
will follow nitrogen gathering crop
such as peas or clover this does
away with the need of applying fer
tiiZers rich in nitrogen, leaving only
potash and phosphorus to be supplied
to the crop. The phosphorus for a
crop of one acre of rape can be
secured in an application of from one
hundred and fifty to two hundred
pounds of South Carolina rock or
floats" showing 26 to % per cent.
phOsphOric acid. The potash neces-
sary would be supplied in from eighty
to one hundred pounds of muriate of
potash containing so per cent. actual
potash In case leguminOus crops
have been grown on the soil within
the past year or two no nitrogen
need be applied artifcially while if
the land has been devoted to the
growth of corn, or cotton or tobacco
for several years without clover or
peas, nitrogen should be applied at
the rate of from fifteen to twenty
pounds to the acre. This amount is
found in one hundred pounds of sui
phate of ammonia, or one hundred
and twenty pounds of nitrate OF
soda, Or in from two hundred and
nifty to three hundred pounds OF
cotton seed meal, or the manure
made from feeding three hundred
pounds of the meal to milch COWS.
Fair fields of rape, however, may
De secured from fertile, well-pre
pared soils without the aid of any
commercial fertilizer whatever. A
soil that will produce a good growth
or turnips or cabbage will, under
Ialr treatment, bring a good crop of