The Republican journal., 1908-11-12
TIPS FOR FARMERS.
Some Valuable Especially for New England

| Washington Correspondence, Boston Tran
script
| AS result of three years. study of
the most successful dairy farms in New
England, L. G. Dodge, scientific assist
ant in the farm management lnvestlga-
tons of the Bureau Of Plant Industry,
has been able to report to the Bureau
series of criticisms and suggestions which
farmers may find of practical use. The
information is timely, for although
dairying has been profitable business in
New England, conditions have changed
in recent years, and the outlook is said to
be not as satisfactory as it has been in
the past. Some of the present difficult
ties are due to the high prices of concen-
| trated feeds and of labor. Some sections
of New England, furthermore, says Mr..
Dodge, feel the pressure Of unsatisfac-
tory market conditions, especially those
sections which ship milk to the large
cities, where the farmers are offered
price for their milk on which they can
hardly make a profit.
According to Mr. Dodge the fact that
grass is so much at home in the New
England States has led to serious fault
in New England dairy farms, namely,
the mismanagement of grass lands.
llll0 IOlol0to Slllclly VI a ldSh VI PAoPSl
treatment for permanent grass lands and
of suitable rotation for other lands, as
we'll as for the use Of grass growing on
land which does not give profitable re-
turns from grass and should be devoted
to tree growth, either as woodlands or
orchards. Another fault quoted is that
of cutting the hay crop too late in the
season, which shortens the life of the
meadow and results in an inferior quality
of hay for dairy feeding.
Mr.. Dodge also notes the failure to
utilize the land for other crops available
for that section, especially corn. In
southern New England he finds little
| difficulty in growing good silage corn,
but as one travels northWard there IS
evidence of lack Of suitable varieties of
corn for this purpose. In all but the
most northern counties in New England,
Mr.. Dodge believes, varieties of silage
corn can be grown. What is most need
ed, he says, is to give sufficient attention
to the selection of suitable seeds.
The report of the expert describes sew
eral farms, sometimes with illustrations,
of which he says that they have demon
strated that the average New England
farm is working at only small fraction
of its capacity.
Hon. C. L. Jones of Penobscot county,
Me-, raises all the roughage and some of
| the grain for forty head of cattle, four
horses and twenty sheep on forty acres
of tillage, and spares from this area three
or four acres for potatoes every year.
About twelve acres of flint corn are
grown each year for silage, nearly as
much small grain, a mixture of oats and
barley, and the remainder of the forty
acres, aside from the potatoes, is devot-
ed to hay. The rotation comprises one
year of corn, one of small grain, one of
clover hay, and part of the land is run
is seldom left in hay more than two
years before it is again ploughed up for
corn, making either three-year or
four-year rotation.
The manure is smostly applied in the
late summer and fall with a manure
spreader, both as a top dressing TO the
new seeding or other grass land and to
the land to be used for corn the next
year. 1t is applied at the rate of ten
loads per acre for either purpose. The
seeding is done with the grain in The
spring. Mammoth clover is seeded at
the rate of twelve to fourteen pounds to
the acre, with two or three pounds of
redtop and four quarts of timothy. The
result of the short rotation, the frequent
manuring, and the heavy seeding is
crop of three tons of hay to the acre at
one cutting. Other crops yield in pro-
portion, so that this farm furnishes feed
for so large a number of stock that it
seems unreasonable to the average
dairyman.
Another farm described is that of Pro-
fessor J. w. Sanborn in New Hampshire,
consisting of some 400 acres of titled
land suited to frequent poughing and
rapid rotation, besides 100 acres of per-
manent meadow and another ITS acres of
permanent pasture.
The 400 acres of easily ploughed land
one year; peas and oats for hay, one
year; clover for hay, two cuttings, one
year; potatoes to sell, one year; Hunga-
rian millet for hay, one year; timothy for
hay to sell, two years, and then one
year Of pasture.
The hay from the whole Of the cleared
land in 1894, when Professor Sanborn
took the farm, amounted to 112 tons. In
1905 the yield was 800 tons, this increase
being accomplished by frequent plough
ing of the land and frequent applications
of manure, which serves to illustrate on
large scale what has been shown al
ready in other places in New England,
namely, that land which can be ploughed
conveniently and is therefore adaptable
to a rapid rotation can by this kind Of
treatment generally be made to produce
the roughage necessary to keep COW
for each acre, at-.least, if it be supple
mented with pasture for part Of the sum
mer feed of the COW.
The fundamental principle on which
Professor Sanborn is working is that it is
fully as much the amount of milk or but
ter produced per acre which counts as it
is the amount per cow, and he is develop
ing the land accordingly. To build up
dairy farm on small acreage, of course,
it becomes necessary to leave out the
potatoes and hay to sell and to devote all
the titled land to the support of the herd.
In the vicinity of Boston, rye sown
September 10th is ordinarily fit to cut
for feed May 18th and lasts until about
June 5th. Winter wheat and vetch
sown Sept. goth is fit to feed from June
5th to July LIST, and any left over makes
good hay. Oats and peas sown first
April 18th will be fit to feed by July LIST,
and successive seedlings, even up to July
lst on low land, will furnish green feed
until Sept. LIST. If the later seedlings
must be omitted for lack of suitable land,
green corn planted May 18th will fill the
Gan until a frost comes Barley SoWn