WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH OUR PEATY SOILS? 175 



WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH OUR PEATY SOILS AFTER 



DRAINAGE ? 



BY W. ASA EOWE, OF AUEELIUS. 

 [A paper read before the Ingham County Farmers' Club Institute, at Mason, Friday, Feb. 6, 1886.] 



How shall we treat our swampy, mucky soils after drainage? This is a 

 question that many of us are interested in at the preseut time. Immense 

 tracts of this class of land lie all about us, and probably one-half of the 

 farms of Ingham county have more or less of it upon them. We have arrived 

 at that stage in the development of the country where other lands are largely 

 cleared up and improved, and now have time to begin work on these un- 

 sightly places, these eyesores of the community and breeders of innumer- 

 able diseases, these places which will cause any of us to take our friends the 

 long way around to our homes when they make us a first visit, so that they 

 may not see them and form an unfavorable impression of our country at 

 first. 



During the past few years great activity has been shown in draining these 

 lands. A little over a year ago I noticed in a neighboring county paper 14 

 different drains advertised to let at one time by a single township drain 

 commissioner, I speak of this only as showing what is being done or has 

 been accomplished, and as an indication that it is fully time to discuss the 

 after-treatment of these lands. 



Some few people have an idea that after drainage the swamps will be 

 ready to be tilled and used about as other lands, while others know by dearly 

 bought experience that this is not so. 



A very common impression in regard to sw"ampy land is, that it is naturally 

 the richest part of the farm, or that if it were not for the water it would be 

 the best part of the farm, but those who have tried them know that if they 

 are to cord up the wealth contained in a swamp, even after it is pretty 

 thoroughly drained, it must be in some other way than by following the old 

 upland rotation of corn, oats, wheat, and clover. 



Some of the things to be considered in working with swaraj^y land are : 



1st. They are by location inclined to be frosty. Cold air, like cold water, 

 settles to the lowest points attainable, like the hollows where our swamps 

 usually are, so that a chilly night, such as we frequently have in summer, 

 which leaves vegetation unharmed on uj^land, may, and frequently does, 

 freeze and destroy crops in these places. 



2d. Another peculiarity which tends to still further lower the temperature 

 of swampy ground is that at night it rapidly parts with the heat stored up 

 during the day, so that a plant growing on j^eat would freeze much sooner 

 than one growing on some other kind of soil in the same position. By expe- 

 rience it has been shown that humus cools as much in one and three-fourths 

 hours as clay loam in two and one-half hours. 



These are serious drawbacks and must be kept in mind or Dame Nature 

 will assert her supremacy by destroying in a single night that which we have 

 labored weeks or months to grow. Y/e can not hope to change the location, 

 but perhaps we may change the texture, of the soil so that it will not radi- 

 ate heat so fast, and thus help matters some. 



