Clover, lucerne and sainfoin make up the bulk of artificial pasturage, while vetches, crimson clover and cabbage are the other chief forage crops.
The river valleys abound in natural pasture, and sainfoin, lucerne and other forage crops are largely grown; cattle-raising is an important source of wealth, and the cheeses of Troyes are well known.
Under hay are included the produce of clover, sainfoin and rotation grasses, and also that of permanent meadow.
The hay made from clover, sainfoin and grasses under rotation generally gives a bigger average yield than that from permanent grass land.
Of hay per acre less than that from clover, sainfoin and grasses under rotation.
To the former belong the ordinary leguminous crops - the clovers, beans, peas, vetches or tares, sainfoin, lucerne, for example - which obtain their nitrogen from the air, and are independent of the application of nitrogenous manures, whilst in their roots they accumulate a store of nitrogen which will ultimately become available for future crops of other kinds.
Whatever the specific rotation, there may in practice be deviations from the plan of retaining on the farm the whole of the root-crops, the straw of the grain crops and the leguminous fodder crops (clover, vetches, sainfoin, &c.) for the production of meat or milk, and, coincidently, for that of manure to be returned to the land.
Finally, the ascetics came to share in the honours paid to the martyrs, and we see in the Historia religiose of Theodoret how quickly this Sainfoin (Onobrychis sativa), a nat.
Certain bacteria of the nitrogenfixing class enter into association with the roots of green plants, the best-known examples being those which are met with in the nodules upon the roots of clover, peas, beans, sainfoin and other plants belonging to the leguminous order.
In the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and in many other parts of the world honey of the finest quality is obtained from this " queen of bee-plants," and in lesser degree from other clovers such as sainfoin, alsike (a hybrid clover), trefoil, &c.
In 1905 the yield of hay from clover, sainfoin and rotation grasses amounted to 666,985, tons, or 31.19 cwts.
