PASTURE MANAGEMENT

Taranaki Daily News, 21 October 1933, Page 12 (Supplement)

PASTURE MANAGEMENT

BETTER THAN FERTILISERS FINNISH SILAGE MANUFACTURE. LOSSES FROM MILKING IN DARK. (By C. E. Cuming.) It has been emphasised in these columns before that the managdLient of the pasture has more to do with the composition' of the sward than any fertiliser. practice. There is nothing to equal the judicious use of sheep as followers on after cattle in improving a pasture, especially where sufficient sheep can -be crowded on to evenly graze the pasture in a short time, to rapidly eat the grass down but not to punish it. The pioneers of the new system of grassland management stressed the point that more intelligence was required with intensive grazing than with the range system of grazing and experience is proving soundness of this observation. Martin G. Jones, of Jealotts Hill Experiment Station, England, recently reported on an experiment carried out to discover the influence of management on the sward. The experiment showed that, although the nitrogenous dressing approximately doubled the actual yield of fodder during the early period of grazing, it had little influence on the botanical composition of the sward. On the other hand, the time and intensity of the grazing considerably affected the botanical composition in relation both to the proportion of grasses and clovers and to the inroad of weed grasses and thirstle, thus governing the improvement or deterioration of the sward. In fact, it is declared that the method of stocking is the governing factor in determining the botanical nature of the sward. The plots' which stood out as superior in this experiment were subjected to a system of controlled close grazing on a rotational basis with an intervening period of complete rest. This method of grazing—the system advocated in these columns—showed how weeds are hampered in competition with the rapidly growing species of grasses, which are also the most palatable. This method also proved valuable in elimination of weeds from badly infested pastures, frequently with the aid of artificial manures. It should be noted that the above experiment was concerned solely in the discovering of the best means of improving the sward from the botanical point of view, or from that of carrying the highest proportion of good grasses. The enquiry was not concerned with providing a pasture which would give grass which would be of the highest feeding value, grass that would contain the complete mineral food the animal requires. We not only want a pasture comprised of the best and most persistent grasses, but grasses that will provide the complete food they should. This is a problem research workers have yet to solve. # # * ■ * * Finnish Silage.

The mystery is ‘disappearing from the Finnish system of making silage. We have known that by the process developed at the great experiment farm of the Co-operative Butter Export Association of Finland grass could be preserved as silage in practically its original state. The food value of it was declared to be equal to that of the best summer grass. The method was patented and when the Finnish authorities were approached by a New Zealand firm to purchase the rights for this country the price was quite prohibitive. But now that more particulars are available as to the method employed it is difficult to see where any patent comes in. We were told that hydrochloric acid was the main factor in the process but that other acids were also used. It now appears that the only other acid used is sulphuric acid, and this in only small amounts. This being so it is certainly hard to understand how the Finnish patent right can be sustained. An argument used against the process is the cost of the acids, but there are in New Zealand large plants for the making of sulphuric acid (the superphosphate plants) and hydrochloric acid is simply made from sulphuric acid by the use of common salt. Now that Imperial Chemical Industries have interested themselves in this important matter we may surely anticipate having demonstrations made in New Zealand of the process in the near future. # * * * Great Herd Sire in Bullock Team.

What interesting reading it would make if all the stories of valuable herd sires sold or slaughtered before their great value was known could be collected into one volume. We hear only occasionally of these tragedies of the industry. They must be common in every district, though fortunately they are becoming more rare as the work of group herd testing move forward and places the work of dairy farming on a business basis. The latest addition to our collection of stories of sires discarded before their value became known is particularly interesting. A man had a very rough-looking Jersey bull, and thought he did well, after using him for two seasons, by selling him to a bullock driver for a few pounds. And the little-thought-of sire worked for some time as a draught animal on the roads. One day the bullock driver met a farmer who was hard up against it taking a crossbred Friesian bull to the saleyards. It was a rapid deal. The bullocky wanted a better draught animal and the farmer wanted a change of bulls as cheaply as possible. The change suited both parties. Shortly after this the original owner of the rough-looking Jersey joined his district testing association. To his surprise he found that the bull he sold to go into a bullock team had left him the best heifers he had ever owned, heifers that were easily leading in the association. He determined to get the bull back. Neighbours, however, had heard of the value of the discarded herd sire, and within a week the latest owner of the bull had received a number of offers for it. Money was scarce with him, but he had enough sense to know that a really proved sire was even more scarce and he would not part with him even for the tempting offer of the old owner. Thus herd-testing discovered a great herd improver in a rough-looking, but great constitutioned and highly prepotent bull that was not worth tuppence on appearance.

• # # # • Grass and Minerals. Many research workers in Europe and America are coming to appreciate the fact that the mineral content of grass has a much more important bearing on animal disease than has been generally supposed. Apart from the great value of lime and phosphate to the maintenance of health and production capacity other minerals, such as potash, are declared to be necessary. Writing on this important subject Woodman and Evans, of Cambridge University, said: —“Malnutrition on pasturage of sub-normal mineral content is due directly to the failure of the diet to supply the necessary in organic materials for constructional purposes and for maintaining the normal balance of minerals in the blood and tissues, and is not, even in part, to be ascribed to any indirect effect, such as is embodied in the suggestion that the mineral deficiency leads to under-nutrition of the animal by causing a depression of its appetite and its capacity to digest the organic constituents of the herbage.”