GROWING CARROTS FOR SHEEP-FEED.

New Zealand Journal of Agriculture, Volume XV, Issue 5, 20 November 1917, Page 277

GROWING CARROTS FOR SHEEP-FEED.

Mr. E. T. Macpherson, of Kohi, Waverley, who has only a limited area of cultivable land, found of late years that owing to blight and other troubles he could not grow turnips or swedes. He looked about for something to take their place, and has been experimenting with stump-rooted carrots— Horn and Guerande Horn varieties. Starting with an acre or two, the results were so satisfactory that last .season he increased his area to n acres. I saw. the crop, and although a portion of the land was rather dirty with couch the crop was a very good one. So far as could be noticed, Guerande Horn is the better of the two carrots, Early Horn having a tendency to crack about the "month of May, especially if the root is at all large. Mr. Macpherson' informed me in the middle of October that the u acres had carried 320 full-mouthed ewes, also four medium draught horses and two hacks, four dairy cows and one bull, for four months,, and that he still had plenty of carrots for six horses and the dairy cows and bull until the end of that month. The ewes, he added, when put on were very . poor stores, but at the date mentioned they were well forward and were expected to be ready as fats for the buyer early in December. Mr. Macpherson’s method of carrot-growing is to cultivate the land well, and sow in November 2 lb. of seed to the acre through every coulter of the drill, with 2 cwt. to 3 cwt. of carrot-manure, giving no after-cultivation. The carrots being stump-rooted the sheep can get the greater part of'them, and a stroke of. two of the disk harrows turns out the shells. Farmers growing carrots for sheep-feed might also try the White Belgian variety, which stands well up out of the ground, and is thus suitable for feeding-off. J. W. Deem, Fields Supervisor, Wanganui.