Aggricultural and Pastoral.

Otago Witness, Issue 801, 6 April 1867, Page 17

Aggricultural and Pastoral.

Ploughing should have commenced as goon asthe last crops were housed or secured. Heavy stiff land should he subsoiled, and wet land drained. Thrashing, clearing and thatching will still require attention ; while mnrketing, storing root crops, and laying down land to grass, must not be neglected.

Farmers who keep dairy co\v9, or thee who live near a good matket for the sale of fodder, would find it advantageous to give some attention to green crops for a succession. Cape barley is a crop that would bear frequent cutting, but drier food, such as oaten hay. is more nourishing. A variety of oats called the winter oat, tillers like wheat, will bear being eaten off by sheep in the Spring, and afterwards produce an excellent crop. Maize may be sown broadcast, and cut for green food. It belongs to the gras9 tribe, and when cultivated for fodder, it must be produced as much like grass as possible. All kinds of holcus may be treated in the same way, that is — sown thick, like gra«s seed. Lucerne is a valuable food, being 1 little injured by continued dr}- weather. It may be cut five times in the season. Saintfoiu i$ an* other valuable perennial, more nutricious than lucerne. It thrives well sown broad«ist, four bushels to the acre, with a bushel of oats or barley, which shelters the young plants. Cbicory is a valuable green crop, will last fur several years without renewing, and bears cutting four times in the year. The California prairie grass grows to the height of eighteen inches, or even taller.; will bear cutting three oribur times in the year, and is a permanent grass. Tares are a good green crop, and improves the land by well coveiing it. Clovers of various kinds are found very advantageous for feeding, stock. Then we have Italian rye grass, buckwheat, &c, affording a wide field for choice.

Id saving potatoes, if an empty outhouse can he spared, they should be laid on the floor, bnt not in too thick a mass, lest heating and premature gangrene should be the consequence. Potatoes cannot be kept in a more fresh and healthy condition than by leaving them during the winter in the land, provided it be perfectly porous aDd dry, and that a heavy covering of litter be laid over the ridges.