DAIRY MEETING. 221 



HOW I GROW GRASS. 



By L. E. McIntire, Waterford. 



In the first place I want to tell you a little something of the 

 land I try to grow grass on. I would like to explain to you as 

 far as possible the nature of the soil, its location to the frost 

 line, and other conditions I have to consider in connection with 

 my other farm work. 



I am a strong believer in crop rotation as far as practicable, 

 but I have one section that is what is called brook intervale. This 

 piece of land grew grass for thirty-five years before it was 

 plowed or fertilized in any way. This section is below the frost 

 line, and one year with another is not a safe place to plant corn 

 or potatoes. We will call this section number one. From this 

 piece we come to a ridge of land sloping gradually to the south. 

 This soil is composed of a gravelly loam and is natural corn 

 land. We will call this ridge section number two or home 

 farm. In connection with this, my home farm, I have twenty 

 acres more of good land well adapted for growing grass, grain 

 01 potatoes, but with this disadvantage, it is one mile from home 

 and all up hill, so you can readily see that it is not profitable 

 to haul barnyard dressing up this hill. This last section is num- 

 ber three. 



These three sections comprise the farm I have had to contend 

 with for a number of years. I always liked to see a good piece 

 of grass growing; in fact I like to see any good crop or well 

 tilled field ; it seems to bring us nearer in touch with nature than 

 almost any other occupation. 



However, I think it was some hungry Holstein cattle that 

 stimulated me more than anything else to grow grass for hay, 

 in order to feed them through our long cold winters, and have 

 them come out in good condition in the spring. I started to in- 

 crease my hay crop in the section we called the hill farm, or 

 number three, by the use of ashes. I had no trouble to grow 

 a good crop of grass for hay, but the ashes were heavy and the 

 expense of hauling ten miles was great, so I began to investi- 

 gate and experiment with chemicals, and soon found I could 

 haul more value with a pair of horses in one load of chemicals 



