KALE AS FODDER.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1291, 26 November 1896, Page 4

KALE AS FODDER.

The dwarf species, with its stems divided into a number of leafy branches is preferred to that known as Jersey kale. It is more productive. As a winter fodder it should be sown in spring on a deeply, well-tilled and manured loamy soil. It can bo grown in drills 41b or to the acre, or sown in seed he-la and after transplanted. About lib of seed will supply sufficient plants for an acre. When sown in drills these should be 2ffc and the plants thinned out lift apart. An experienced grower says :— " Cows increase their milk wonderfully when fed with kale cattle cabbage. It is the most desirable of any green crop I have seen. It is a plant that produces more feed per acre than any other, and does not disagree with stock or impoverish the land." The manager of the Bodalla Dairy Company, New South Wales, thus expresses his opinion of the kale as a fodder plant:— " I ploughed up ten acres of land where a crop of maize had been the previous year. After ploughing, I had it well harrowed, and then with a team of bullocks hooked to a cultivator had it worked as deeply as possible. It was then again harrowed and drilled into drills 28in apart. In the drills I soweii 3cwfc of Fison's mangold

fertiliser and l|cwt of salt per acre. I Five acres I sowed with mangolds, the other five with kale. The mangolds were thinned to Ift apart, the kale to 30in. The mangolds produced 60 tons 17cwt per acre and the kale 50 tons 4cwt. The seed were sown late in spring, and during the first three months were several times horse hoed between the drills. I valued the crop at 15s per ton, and fed 1600 pigs on it for over two months. The advantage the kale has over the mangold is that it can be cut off the stalk and will sprout out immediately, and in two months give another good yield. In the driest of seasons it will continue to grow. Iu this south coast country the kale as fodder for milch cowb is hard to beat. If the farmers would only cultivate it, they would be able to carry double the number of stock that they do on maize, sorghum or grasses."