MANURING GRASS LAND.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 17 December 1913, Page 3

MANURING GRASS LAND.

While every farmer recognises that, cropping exhausts the soil, and that. it is necessary to supply constituents of which tWb soil has been; robbed', or in which it is naturally deficient, few consider the actio a of animals in this respect. In dairying, for instance, a milch cow producing 60001bs of milk in a season removes (Professor Wrightson estimates) 1111) of phosphoric acid, besides what is stored up in the calf. He considers that, requires, U acreS of pasture to keep a cow, she will remove as much phosphoric acid per acre as is removed by corn-grow-ing on the four-courso system. Grass land is then robbed by grazing' animals, as readily as arable land by a crop; but in the latter case the practice is to restore what has been takr en away. Northern farmers (says The Australasian) have learned that a liberal application of superphosphates "to the wheat crop, besides aiding the crop, gives very tangible results in the pasture afterwards. A vigorous growth of clovers! arid other nutritious fodder plants invariably follows when the land is thrown out. .On the other hand, where the land has been devoted to dairying for a number of years, the better grasses disappear and coarser kinds take, their place. The same occurs with sheep. Jaist ay in cropping wlierfi" growing year after year results.' in the spread of diseases peculiar to that plant, so grazing continuously affords every help to animal diseases. A leading veterinarian some years ago pointed out to Western district dairymen that their losses with cows/ through cripples was due to a want of phosphates in their feed. It is hardly likely that any manuring of grasses will be attempted on large arenas anywhere ; but on dairy farms, if the industry is to be carried on profitably for a length of • time, this matter must be considered. • The obvious remedy i<; to adopt a practice of mixed farming, whereby the dairy herd will benefit in two ways.