It is no more than fair for me to say concerning my plan of feeding,
that I have occasionally been obliged to modify some of the details, on
account of unfavorable circumstances. For instance, I have been forced to
cut grass from the highway in front of my house, to supply a deficiency
in some crop, caused by unfavorable weather, or some accident or other.
In the spring of 1878, my clover failed to catch, leaving me to make
up for the loss of that crop as well as I could. It was certainly most
unfortunate, inasmuch as it seriously interfered with the whole system
of rotation. To carry out the plan of soiling successfully requires
considerable time and labor. And on the whole, unless one has plenty of
the former at his disposal, and a good wholesome inclination for the
latter, he could do full as well to adopt the old time practice of having
his cow pastured by the week, in which case no other labor than milking
would be required, while, if she were allowed a feed of meal or bran at
the time of milking, night and morning, very satisfactory results would
be obtained.