MAKING FARMS PAY.

Otaki Mail, 27 August 1930, Page 4

MAKING FARMS PAY.

ECONOMY IN PASTURE MANAGEMENT.

UTILITIES OF LUCERNE, ROOT CROPS AND ENSILAGE. LECTURE BY MR-"R. P. CONNELL. Under tho auspices of the Ohau branch of tho Farmers' Union, some 25 farmers gathered at Mr G. F. Anyan's property, on the Main South Road, on Wednesday afternoon, when an address on pasture management and fodder crops was given by Mr R. P. Council, of the Fields Division, Palmerston North, who afterwards accompanied them on a tour of the farm, to assist them to study pasture conditions at first hand. DISTRIBUTING FEED THROUGH THE YEAR, In dealing with the question of making feed available all the year round, Mr Council said that in this district there were two factors of major importance. One was that the grass paddocks provided tho cheapest feed. The other was that the grass had a marked weakness, in that, under ordinary circumstances, 70 per cent, of the whole year's growth was made in four months—from the middle of September to the middle of January. Together with this fact it had to be borne in mind that tho stock did not require 70 per cent, of their feed in those four months. The position was one affecting the natural requirements of dairy stock, and was not so bad in the case of sheep. When the pasture shortage came, fat lambs could lie sent away, and the feed requirements then fell -greatly. There were three ways open to dairy farmers to overcome the pasture difficulty. Probably the mojt important course was the handling of the pastures so as to upset the natural development there and not have to use the 70 per cent, product in four months. Tho process needed was to keep the grass growth specially short, and particularly in the October to December period. The second course was the production of ensilage, and the third was the growing of special crops'. Throughout the Manawatu there was a tendency towards the idea that the Agricultural Department was not favourable to special crops, but was recommending farmers to rely on grass alone. That was absolutely wrong. AVliat the Department had been doing for some years was to emphasise the 'importance of the proper management, of grass, but at no stage had it said that the crops could be neglected as a general thing. There were a number who had the idea that the highest type of farming consisted of having a grass farm, solely. That might be occasionally the highest type, but usually it was very profitable and desirable to Lave some crop on the farm. USE OF FERTILISERS.

To upset the natural production of grass, manuring was first necessary. It had 'been held in the North Island that ■the proper time to manure was July and August. This would increase the production of grass in the following tour months. In other words, the farmer would be increasing the difficulty of his position. A greater flush of feed would be brought about, and there would be difficulty hi dealing with it. As manuring grew in popularity, more farmers were asking what they could do with the flush. It did not follow that manuring was no good because the outlay was not reflected in the cash returns. He admitted that often the money spent on manures was not received back in cash returns, but this was not on account of any weakness in manuring, but because of failure to deal with the extra growth produced. Tho Department was suggesting for fTTis district that very often manuring could advantageously be done towards the end of November or early in December, and again in March, as well a 3 in July and August. It was not suggesting the total stoppage of the July and August manuring. If only one period was fixed on it should not be those two months. If .the farmer thought that he could only do manuring at one time, it should be in March. In a dry season, however, that would be inappropriate; and he had to set his operations according to the weather conditions. The best practice consisted of putting on manure at three different seasons—summer, autumn, and the July-August dressing. • NITROGENOUS MAN UK E.

In addition to a modification of the ordinary phospluttic manuring, to which the foregoing remarks applied, Mr Connell said, there was the advisability of using a nitrogenous manure, in' the form of sulphate'of ammonia, lie "was not too sure how this district stood in regard to nitrogenous manuring, lie was not in a position, on the field evidence that had been gathered, to tell a man cither to go ahead or not to use nitrogenous manure. However, certain conclusions had been reached! Sulphate of ammonia might be used under special circumstances to great advantage, to give extra feed at a tint-? when it was ordinarily short—in July and August. It should be known that in three weeks after the application :here was a fairly substantial increase in growtJt - ;tt tl,is timo of year.- it was advisable hi keep in mind that the! greater part of that influence had been exerted in three months from the date cf the application of the manure. If one cwt. was put on in the first part of August, then by the end of October the greater influence was gone, but the owner would have a substantial in"creasc, amounting to.-JErom..-60 to 100 per cent. More often than not, the carrying capacity had been increased tor. those jhree months. That was of vital importance if the farmer was short Of feed for that period; but it v;,is not of great importance if by other means he had good feed. If f ( e >vas noil short of feed, it had to be borne in mind that 13s per cwt. was a pretty heavy price for manure if he was only going to have the benefit for three

ill; months. If he was largely depending ijl r " Sizing for the year's snpplv of J 1 feed, it might bo highly advantageous ' j to. use sulphate of ammonia. [ IMPORTANCE OF HARROWING. . ! The next point, which waft to be ft'stressed throughout . the Wellington j province, Mr Connell continued, was j - the influence of harrowing in extend-

I ing the period ex good growth of pas i turesy By this means one kept this ' pasture plants "y°i U! g in nature, owing t« jtn.il aeration and the extra' rnamir- ? ing from the distribution of animals' ; droppings. TJlurf a greater period, was obtained Anting which those plants gmw vigorously. The farmer could i.a phis tray have green growth some weeks I earlier than if the same fields were ! I not harrowed. Harrowing was also j HJieful in keening the growthshort. Que j would wonder why, at this time of the jjear, there was any-need to keep the |. growth- short; but. in Kovember 'and ! December the greatest fault with the j j-astures-in the • ilanawatu was that II rhcy were too long. If harrowing was j rot a«ne, it became increasingly"diffi-" j cult to fappp the.pasture all over in the j pesirable short condition. Considers- ! tiori also! had to he given, to the-rank I growth that arose awjuid droppings. J Htoefc: would not eat this gro\yth un- 1 . \,I?M forced to. The' alternative 'to ?;arr&wjiig, in this case, was ."to take the stock -out. of th.i paddock; hut by the ; time that another grazing was ready rtie position hud become worse. ; TliV V.'it-fc iji!g,it :-e k,.p t lo.ig enough, oa in- pa.-itiire to c-ii i]t,- rankigrowth, but

their production. /Whichever way the farmer proceeded without narrowing, he was going to have .an, undesirable result. There was a,goofl'deal of harrowing going on in this district generally, but he was pretty certain that in three or four years the amount of harrowing would have increased three times over what was done last season. It was only a matter of farmers who were not harrowing observing the results of what others were doing. He had in mind ,not harrowing once a year, but several times. Just when it should be done was difficult to say unless one knew the particular farm, ibut ho did not know any farmer who did too much harrowing. There was a period in the year when it might not be advisable to harrow —the dry late summer period, when, if the farmer harrowed, he was apt to have droppings scattered all over the grass; and if rain did not come, that grass was not touched by stock. There were farmers in the Manawatu who harrowed after every grazing, End their pastures were a picture. As to the typo of hariowing he was often asked questions. There were two periods when a very severe harrowing was desirable: oho was in the autumn, when one expected renewed growth; the other was in the July-September period. The harrowings in tho summer had for their main objective the proper scattering of the droppings. If the need for penetration was as great as implement makers stated, farmers would be doing very heavy harrowing right through the summer. The experience of the Department was that two drastic harrowings were sufficient, and the others could be very light, as long as the droppings were well scattered. Another aspect of grass control spoken of by Mr Council was the production of ensilage to deal with surplus summer growth. Ensilage, he stated, could be made irrespective of the weather. In November and early in D - ccmber, the farmer could take off some gf. the surplus growth. SUPPLEMENTARY FEED. Referring to the growing of crops other than grass, the lecturer said that the first question was, When should those crops be grown? Were there farmers who should not grow any crops except their grass? There were some < who should not grow crops, but they ■were few and far between. Generally it could bo taken that if on any farm some of the pastures could be improved by ploughing, growing crops for a year or two, and then sowing a new pasture, then crops should be utilised as a step towards putting land in new pasture. Most of the farms in the district were in that position. Some of the fields were growing grass that could be improved by cropping. Then there were farms where the pastures were about right and it was a question whether ploughing would lead to a better sole of grass. The majority should go in for special crops, provided that they could be groi\*n without having to p'ay money to any extent for labour and implements. If a farmer had a 40-acre farm of good grass, it would pay him to plough up three or four acres and put in special crops if ho could do it with the' labour that was ordinarily on the farm and if he did not have to buy expensive extra implements. Generally on the farms there were implements and horses, and that meant that the farmer could grow those crops if he wished to do so. LUCERNE AND ITS PROSPECTS.

As to the crops that should be grown, Mr Council said the one he_ would first mention was lucerne. This could be grown profitably on a great deal of the land between Wellington and the Rangitikei River where it was not being grown to-day, and that included this district. In the past there had been more failures than successes, but that had been due to a lack of knowledge of the crop; the knowledge of it was all the time increasing. The advantage of lucerne was that it provided feed with almost certainly when the pastures were likely to afford insufficient. It supplied green feed duriug the summer period which was almost perfect for that period. From January to March it could hardly be improved on as a fodder. It did not matter what the season was, lucerne would provide that feed. Apart from that fact, it provided materia! that could well be made into high-class hay. at a time when haymaking was likely to be safe as far as the weather was concerned. After Christinas the farmer could get two or three cuts of lucerne, one of which was for green feed and the others for haymaking, it was fairly frequently advanced against lucerne that it gave tho owner feed when he did not want it. On many farms it became difficult to deal with the first growth—that in September: if the farmer attempted to make it into hay, he

met with disaster. It should be made into ensilage. A lucerne area was often so small by itself —two or three acres—that it would not give enough; green stuff at that season for the economical making of ensilage. There would, however, be some surplus grass, and the two mixed together in ordinary loads, or part of the stack made from one and part from the other, would •rive enough for an economical saving of ensilage. If the farmer had only a small quantity of materia! to make into 'ensilage, the loss became too great. They could count on a loss of lft. all round a stack, and it was better for this loss to take place on a stack 20ft. square than on one only 10ft. square. As to failures with lucerne, one of the main reasons had been the 11011-feeding of the crop. It

I had' been held that lucerne did not require top-dressing. Farmers had acted on that advice, and their crops had failed. Thpre was evidence that, if they had freely top-dressed it, they would not have had failures. The main dressings require! were phosphates, preceded by a liberal dressing of Hme. Some farmers had brought about failures by top-dressing at the wrong time. The July-August period was wrong, because ene of the troubles was the invasion of fhe crop with weeds. What should be done was to top-dress it after the first cut and .again probably some, where about February, also about November. Another cause of failure was too much cultivation. He had seen a beautiful lucerne field in which there was a disc harrow and a Whakataue hairoiv; if the owner continued f-ulti-vating it at the rate he was doing, he would be complaining in three years 3 time that 'his lucerne was no good; the farmer's idea was that he was going to get rid of the weeds in it—couch and dock —but if he cultivated enough to kill those weeds, he would kill his lucerne; he should „ feed his lucerne from November onwards, and the 1 extra vigour that he put into.it by that means would enable the lucerne itself to deal with the weeds.

I One other cause, of failure operated in respect of lucerne crops,. Mr Connell j said. That was, that the ground did I imp have in it a particular organism j that was necessary for the success of I the crop. . Lucerne, lite clover, worit- | f ed in harmony with certain bacteria, and occasionally that which was -rer quired for lucerne was absent. It seemed obvious that one should take special steps to see that the organism was in the soil. However, there was no definite way of finding out except by frying; no specialist could, by examination in the laheratory, give the farmer ..the information ?-in a' reasonable time. If the farmer tried-the'crop on an extensive stale and had; a failure, ir>wa».a pretty costly experiment. The Department supplied " free to farmers who were going to establish lucerne,, material that provided the organism ■organism,'wan in the soil, the addition'-' 1

of the 'iSßltnre "gave arhetter crop. Generally it was i f6tind, l through this district, that lucerne could be got without the aid-of but;it generally became weakly about twelve months after it was.sown. VALUE OF MANGELS. The next special crop that was being neglected, said Mr Connell, was the mangel. Every farmer should have a plot of these. No crop would give such a profitable response to good treatment. High fertility in the soil (vas required iu the first place, and then plenty of cultivation; the grower nhould thus get from 50 to GO tons an acre, and with that he would have a very valuable standby to see him through July, August and September—the pasture shortage period. Right through the North Island there was an impression that the mangel was not a profitable crop for sheep-farmers. Most sheep-farmers did not bother with it, but a few did. Those who wore doing so stood out in their own districts in respect to their fat lamb returns. The mangels were not fed to the lambs, but to the ewes. As a result of their getting them about this time of the year, they gave birth to lambs that had been well norished, the ewes were in good condition and milked well, and the lambs were cleared fat off the mothers more readily and at a greater •veight than on neighbouring farms j where the ewes had not been so fed.

Referring to fertilisation of the land, ihe lecturer said that the manure that irould suit one farmer would not suit another, or it might be too expensive because of the better class of soil. One thing stood out, however, and that was thai not sufficient manuring was done. The land around Palmerston North and Feilding was pretty good. Every year 'or 10 years farmers' root-growing competitions had been held, and the men vho Were well up on the list were those who manured with 8 to 11 ewt. per acre. On the other hand there \rore farmers who only put on 3 or -1 ».wt. per acre, .and their results were placed from halfway to the bottom of the list. A man. whose butter-fat was the best in the Wellington district— COSlb to the acre —grew less than an acre of mangels, but his manuring was at the rate of 13 cwt. FEED VALUES COMPARED.

Speaking of t"ie relative feeding values of root, crops, hay and ensilage, Mr Council said that one often read in the papers that ensilage was particularly valuable as a feed. A ton of hay, as a straight-out feeding proposition in the winter, was' equal to about three tons of ensilage. A ton of ensilage had about the same feed value as two tons of roots, '.clip relative proportions, therefore, were one of hay, three of ensilage, and six of roots. Ensilage had plenty of merits of its own, without being given merits to which it was not entitled. What some of tho writers probably had in mind was that, if ensilage was saved young, the dry matter in it was a better feed than the dry matter in hay. While hay contained proportions of two of water to eight of dry matter, in ensilage the ratio was reversed, and a hundredweight of the dry matter of the latter was better than the same quantity in hay. That was true because ensilage was saved early in the season, when the grass was more nutritive than later on. Ensilage was not as good a-milk producer as roots. It was repeatedly stated in print that ensilage was splendid forage for cows in February. If it was made when the grass was at the ordinary hay stage, it would not be good forage. It would be immensely better than nothing at all, but would not be as good as soft turnips or green millet. Frequently ensilage was made too late; if it was made early in November, it would be really good forage; it would be made of grass that had not so far produced flowering heads. If the farmer was counting on it being used in February, as it should be, lie should start its production early in the season; he could have two . lots, saving one from the mature grass for winter feeding—an excellent plan.

Mr Connell answered a number of questions, and, on the motion of Mr 11. J. McLcavey, president of the Ohau branch of the Farmers' Union, he was accorded, by acclamation, a hearty vote of thanks for his interesting address and the great amount of information he had given. A tour of inspection < '■' Mr Anyan's property was then made by all present, and a pleasing impression was gained of fhe manner in which it had been tended. Comprising just under 70 acres, it gave the excellent return of 10,-jooJbs of butter-fat last year, and the owner stated that for two years there had not been a case of abortion among his cows. The pastures generally were found to be in tine condition for the time of year, and the control of cocksfoot in particular gave evidence of careful management.