FARM NOTES FOR THE MONTH.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2221, 8 April 1881, Page 4

FARM NOTES FOR THE MONTH.

rjW3IXTEIT BpaOIAEIiT POB THE " WBBKIY PBBaa."3

Harvest being finished and the greater part of the grain throohed and delivered, farmors aro anxiously looking for a good rain to enable them to get on ploughing for autumn crops. The fine weather has been vory suitablo for all threshing and harvest work, but tho pasturos are dreadfully dried up by the long spell of dry weather, and if the muohdoaired rain does not soon fall, and that abundantly, feed will bo very scarce during tho coming winter. In fact the ground is so hard-baked that it is questionable whether a good rain now will revive the grass sufficiently to give a fresh bite before tho frosts set in to oheok all growth. Boot crops, too, are somewhat t'no worse for tho drought. They should be all takon out this month and pitted away safely for the wintor, and will probably be in good demand, considering the ba: - onoD£ o! tho paddocks. Mangolds aro excellent feeding for milch-cows, nothing bottor, whon green food is scarce. Earners who have a good Btore of these roots will be in a p' sition to roap oome benefit from the increase in the demand for butter which is sure to take place within a month or two. Mangolds are not so extensively grown as their value deserves. Th-sy will keep a cow in milk longer than tho best hay, and increase the yield of milk without imparting any unpleasant flavor. This root, on good land, will yield a tremendous weight of food per acre, end there is no land better suited for them than the rioh deep loams on the seaboard of Canterbury. Providod the ground is in a condition for working, lucerne should be now sown, which will come very useful as green feed in early spring, beforo there is muoh of a bite in the meadows. Lucerne not being a very hardy plant is net so well adapted for sowing in the fall of the year, on account of its liability to be nipped by the frosts before it is well • established. The winter tare or vetoh is well adapted for sowing at this time of the year. It does not suffer from tho severest weather, and will produoe a good weight of sound food. Tares are generally sown aftor a corn crop of either oats or barley ; it is of no use to sow them, howevor, if the land has been worn out with previous crops. A rather sandy soil, with a light subsoil, is best fitted for bringing them on quickly; olay land, no matter how well manured, will not produoe a mowing of vetches worth anything. About two bushels of seed to the acre is usually considered to be suffioient. As the seed of the spring and winter tare are very much alike, it is difficult to distinguish between tham, and unloßs tho farmer grows his own seed he must bo oareful to purohase from a noighbour or a seedsman upon whose word he oan depend. I£ lucerne is sown now the ground must be well worked and harrowed ; the seed being small must not be covered with much earth, ten or twelve pounds of seed per acre will be ample. As soon as the present crop of is disposed of, it is time to commence preparing the land for another one. Next month is early enough for sowing autumn wheat, but the earlier the land is ploughed the better, if tho feed can be spared. To save a few weeks feeding, some formers delay ploughing leaground for wheat until immediat..ly_ before ■owing, which is manifestly an unwise proceeding. The land requires some time to sweeten and settle between ploughing and ■owing, otherwise the feod goes into a sour, raw, and hollow bed, which militates greatly against the future welfare of the crop. Those farmers who have not a large area of arable land, and whose chief aim should be to obtain the greatest possible yield from each rood of ground, will find that subsoiling the wheat field in nine cases in ten increases the yield to an extent that will more than repay the extra labor and expense. On many old farms the soil has never been stirred more than six or seven inches from the surface, and being repeatedly ploughed at or about this depth, the trampling of thn horses together with the natural hardness of the ground is almost sufficient to prevent the roots of the wheat plant from boring down for nutriment or for moisture during a dry summer. Besides the above advantages, subsoiling facilitates drainage and draws off the surplus ■urface water, the effeots of which on a young crop are well-known to be exceedingly detrimental. Autumn wheat derives greater advantages from subsoiling than the spring vorioties. The latter, not requiring so long time to mature, have not time to send the roots duifii In searou or rood, but require a richer surface soil that will force the plants into maturity in less time than is taken by the slower growing winter wheats. The same operation in preparing land for autumn barley will more than repay expenses in the returns at harvest time. It is only by exercising great care and judgment in growing this crop that any profit is derived from it. Stagnant water is fatal to barley as well as wheat, and subsoiling relieves the surface of tho water, which cannot run off, and so prevents the barley roots from an excess of oold standing water. Autumn-sown barley is preferable to the spring sorts for malting ; in faot, a good sample of malting barley is generally in good demand, simply because it can only be grown under the most favorable circumstances, and with good management. There are large quantities of land annually sown to barley that is not at all fit for it, and the result is an inferior quality of grain, only fit for horse or pig feed, for whioh purpose it will not bring so good a price as oats or tailing wheat.