SOILING CROPS FOR COWS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1833, 20 August 1913, Page 10

SOILING CROPS FOR COWS.

' A BEAST TO AN ACRE. An American farmer whose holding of less than 200 acres carries 110 milking icows all tho year round and shows a handsome cash profit on the investment, •gives a lead that might be followed with profit by the majority of dairy farmers in this .country where land is expensive. The' secret of tho Americans' success is found in tho adoption of the system of feeding soiling crops to his cattle. Only one small field is laid down in permanent pasture., In tho summer, green rye and iwheat;-mixed with lucerne 'first rotation, next .oats and peas "and lucerne, thin maize and lucerne, and last in Into!-'summer, maize ensilage, i with a •little -lucerne. The , winter ration is 'made'up of maize ensilage, lucerne hay, and-sometimes a little mixture of wheat middlings, .gluten, and linseed meal to balance tip the roughage. When lucerne ensilage is used the grain ration is reduced'."" Signs are nob wanting to provo that" the New Zealand dairy farmers are awakening to .tho possibilities of increas? cd incdlne through the systematio use of supplementary fodders for their cows, all the year lound. It should hot be long •before ,a large area of the best dairying country will be carrying a beast to the aero which will, in addition, give a better nverago yield of milk than been shown under the old conditions of pasturage, Herd-testing is being generally .adopted and the unprofitable cows cast aside, but to give a cow a fair chance to prove ho.v worth she must be provided 'with-sufficient material of the right kind; therefore, systematic feeding must go hand-in-haiui-with culling.