. Cyclopedia of farm crops. Farm produce; Agriculture. 306 FORAGE CROPS FORAGE CROPS vator, preventing the loss of humus and of plant- food by keeping the soil covered with a crop throughout the growing season. The turf and fine " aftergrowth " adds much to the fertility of the surface soil, when the meadows are plowed for cultivated crops. The clovers, and other legumes, so extensively grown as forage, take much of their nitrogen from the air and add considerable to the stores already in the soil. As a rule, forage-crop- ping and the feeding of the forage to farm live- stock is ther
. Cyclopedia of farm crops. Farm produce; Agriculture. 306 FORAGE CROPS FORAGE CROPS vator, preventing the loss of humus and of plant- food by keeping the soil covered with a crop throughout the growing season. The turf and fine " aftergrowth " adds much to the fertility of the surface soil, when the meadows are plowed for cultivated crops. The clovers, and other legumes, so extensively grown as forage, take much of their nitrogen from the air and add considerable to the stores already in the soil. As a rule, forage-crop- ping and the feeding of the forage to farm live- stock is therefore a more economical system of farm management than the direct sale of farm crops. Incidental Forage-like Plants. Figs. 414-423. By the Editor, C. F. Wheeler, and others. The main forage crops are treated elsewhere in this Cyclopedia, in their proper alphabetical order. There are many incidental and littl :-grown plants sometimes mentioned in connection with forage and rotation discussions that may be brought together here. Bird's-foot clover, Bird's-foot trefoil, Yellow trefoil {Lotus corniculatuf!). Leguminos(v. A peren- nial clover-like plant with a long taproot, stems spreading, from a few inches to two feet long, with clusters of five to ten bright yellow flowers on the ends of the stems. It is widely spread in the Old World and naturalized in this country, espe- cially in the South, where cattle and sheep eat it readily. It withstands drought and may be sown in mixtures in dry pastures. It does well on light, sterile soils, and roots deeply. It begins to grow early, and is chiefly valuable as a spring pasture. Broom sedge. A name applied to several spe- cies of Andropogon or Beard-grass, especially to Andropogon Virginicus, which is common in sandy soil from eastern Massachusetts to Virginia, Illi- nois and southward. Stock eat this grass readily when it is young, and it furnishes pasturage during the season. When fields are left without culti- vation for a time, it be
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