116 BOARD OF AGRICULTUEE. 



tliree-fiftbs stating it to be three-fourths of a ton ; nearly a third at 

 a ton. The others at less and more, from which it appears probable 

 that the actual yield is something less than a ton per acre. Regard- 

 ing the probable increase during the last five years, it appears to 

 have been on an average ten to twelve per cent, and principally 

 from better tillage, comparativ^ely little waste or swamp land having 

 been reclaimed. As to the extent to which it may be profitably 

 increased still farther, and the means of accomplishing the same, 

 some replies are here appended : 



" The present crop of hay caa unquestionably be doubled by a more liberal 



application of such dressing as it is in the power of almost every farmer to 



obtain, without cash expenditure beyond the team and hands ho ordinarily 



employs for the summer's work, if he will haul muck, or turf, or loam, or 



decomposed vegetable matter of any kind, to his barn cellar, or shed, and 



yards, and hog-styes, thus working up some of his leisure time. Saving the 



liquid manure and wasted wash would more than double the amount and 



value of the manure on every farm that I have observed closely enough to 



form an opinion upon." 



J. F. Anderson, So. AVindham. 



" It can be doubled by discontinuing the present practice of fall feeding, by 



under-draining, and top-dressing." 



E. G. BrxTON, Yarmouth. 



" Guano has been applied to grass lands in this town, both last year and 

 this, on almost every variety of soil with uniform success, in every case 

 increasing the crop. In one instance, one hundred and fifty pounds of guano, 

 with two hundred pounds of plaster, spread on three-fourths of an acre — soil 

 a clayey loam, quadrupled the crop of grass." 



William Gregg, Freeport. 



" Three tons per acre might be raised as easily as to cut but one, and the 

 three tons costing no more. Now for an experiment that I made. I had a 

 piece of ground, from which there was cut but a half ton per acre. 1 plowed 

 it up in the spring, manured it well by spreading on the green-sward, plowed 

 and planted to corn, which was manured in the hill. The crop of corn and 

 fodder paid for the labor, manure, and seed. Next year, spre.id manure over 

 it, plowed in the manure four inches, sowed it to oats and grass seed. I took 

 from that piece, August 2d, three tons of oat straw to the acre; up to thia 

 time the crops were worth all I had expended, and interest on the value of che 

 land. The first two years it yielded three tons to the acre ; then, by applica- 

 tion of top-dressing once, 1 was enabled to cut the same amount up to this 

 time, which has been three years more." 



S. P. Wayberry, Cape Elizabeth. 



