RURAL TOPICS

Waikato Argus, Volume XV, Issue 6052, 28 September 1903, Page 4

RURAL TOPICS

COCKSFOOT AS A PASTURE. Although cocksfoot furnishes an important part in many of our artificial pastures, there are objections to its use in mixtures of seed for sowing where a regular system of rotation is allowed. More deeply rooted than ryegrass, it is very suitable for anything in the way of a permanent mixture; but for temporary pastures this very permanency is a serious objection, and difficulty is sometimes experienced in ridding the land of it when the grass land is being broken up. For nutritive value, however, there are few grasses that stand so high as cocksfoot, and on this account it is deservedly held in high favor. 1 lately came across the experience of a South Canterbury farmer which goes to confirm this opinion. A few years ago he decided to test the relative merits of grasses for feeding milch cows, and sowed three paddocks of equal size—one with ryegrass, one with ryegraps and clover, and a third with cocksfoot alone. He then selected a certain number of cows, which he divided into three herds and grazed in the three paddocks. Toe first year the cows in the cocksfoot paddock gave the best results, their produce taking the highest place for the best quality as well as quantity. The second year the herds were changed, that from the ryegrass being put into the cocksfoot. r lhe event proved that it was cocksfoot that produced the results, for the herd that had yielded the worst results on the ryegrass save the best on the cocksfoot. The third year the herd from the ryegrass and clover was placed on the cocksfoot and scored an easy first. This surely proves conclusively that for dairying purposes the cocksfoot stands pre-eminent.— 'Agricola,' in the Bruce Herald.