38 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



complex. "When time given to this work means money, on 

 many farms it would be cheaper to invest what it would cost 

 to clear land of bowlders in the purchase of land already 

 cleared, the farmer showing practical wisdom, under such cir- 

 cumstances, in planting his bowlder-covered acre to wood, 

 throwing it into pasture, or still continuing to do the best he 

 can with it, under the circumstances, as tillage. 



There is, however, a large class of farmers, whose land — 

 either from its natural quality, or from its vicinity to a mar- 

 ket — is so valuable, that they are led seriously to discuss the 

 practicability of removing these hereditary obstructions to 

 their progress in thrifty farming. To that class I address 

 mj^self. Let us examine the bowlders as to their size, their 

 number, how they lie, — whether mostly above or below the 

 surface ; for digging around them is one of the serious items 

 of cost, while those deeply sunk never blast as well as those 

 near the surface, and when blasted require extra work to get 

 them out of their deep beds. Again : we should regard the 

 kind of rock they are of ; for the granites smash up far better 

 than the rocks into whose composition hornblende enters. 



Finally, the value the rock may have after removal is to be 

 considered, either to the public for building-purposes, or to 

 the farmer himself. Sometimes this may come by using the 

 rock for building some long-needed house or barn. Having 

 had to consider some of these points on three of my own 

 farms the past three years, while removing thousands of tons 

 of bowlders, I will present my method of dealing with these 

 hard-headed obstructionists, with what experience has taught 

 me, always ready to light my taper at the lamp of any of 

 my fellow-farmers whose experience may supplement my 

 own. The man with some patent lever will be apt to come 

 along about the time you begin to start your bowlders, — a 

 something to lift the bowlder from its bed after a couple of 

 stout hooks are fastened to it by holes an inch or so deep 

 drilled into the rock. Some of these save-labor contrivances 

 are good in themselves; but my experience teaches that 

 whether they are of value to you or not turns on the readi- 

 ness with which you or your foreman take to the plan. For 

 instance, one man will hit at once the knack of drilling these 

 holes at the right angle, so that the hooks scarcely ever draw 

 out ; while with another the hooks as often as not draw out. 



