Pastures in Winter.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17413, 28 May 1928, Page 18 (Supplement)

Pastures in Winter.

Use the Harrow. Much can now he done to assist the pastures in recovering from the effects of a severe summer’s grazing. When the pastures have been top-dressed they will surely he eaten close, and where they have not so been treated no time should he lost in giving them a top-dressing, (he chain harrows should now he used or sheep droppings should be worked in. This means that much valuable fertiliser is made full use of, and it also means that the whole pasture will be cleaned and freshened. Onee a month is not 100 often to chain harrow the pastures, and it is best done after a shower of rain or a heavy dew. This is a job which can be very profitably attended to even when it is too wet to work the land. RANK PATCHES SOON DISAPPEAR. It may be that little improvement is noticeable after the first one or two strokes, but persevere —each stroke leaves the ground and the grass better than it found it, and it is surprising how soon the pasture takes on a more lawn-like appearance. All those rank patches will soon disappear, and stock will be induced to graze more evenly. Where the grass grub has been operative during the summer, to tthe extent that bare patches are appearing, attention should be directed now so that the grass has a chance to recover before next spring. Usually it is a case, where the grub is concerned, of a survival of the fittest —that is to say, that the grub is alway more or less present with us, and it is just a case of which of the two, the grub or the grass, is the most active, and to whether we see the grub or not. WHEN FERTILITY WANES, , When fertility wanes the grub is able to assume the mastery, but where the grass is strong and virile the grub has no chance. The aim, of course, is to prevent the giub from operating at all,, and surest way to do this is to topdress. Even when the grub has eaten the grass out in patches, the first step towards the renovation is to apply a good dressing of lime, superphosphate and potash salts. Five hundredweight of carbonate of lime, three hundredweight of potash salts per acre is a suitable dressing. If possible, stock should be wintered in this paddock, and any carting out that has to be done should be so arranged that as much feed as possible is carried out on the bare patches. Hay especially should be fed in this way, as the seed cast will be effectively covered by trampling stock. This tramping also discourages the grub in addition to actually crushing a good many. There is no reason why a little additional seed of white clover should not be spread also. At this time of the year cattle need hay feeding, so that where the grass-grub has proved toublesome two important operations can be carried out simultaneously.