76 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



therefore concluded to offer my pasture for premium, that we 

 might at least have a report ou the subject. And believing, as 

 I do, that good pasture land is as profitable as most other 

 lands, at the price at which it is usually valued ; that a large 

 proportion is comparatively of but little income, and that much 

 of it can be profitably improved, it therefore seems desirable 

 that individuals should communicate their experience to others, 

 and it may be expected that some benefits may be derived 

 therefrom. 



My pasture contains in all about seventy acres, and is sub- 

 divided into smaller pastures by stone wall. The soil may be 

 termed a gravelly loam, with a mixture of stones, and on some 

 of it the stones are so abundant that it cannot be conveniently 

 ploughed. It is somewhat hilly ; most of it is rather moist; 

 although there are some dry knolls. Some of it was old bound 

 out pasture forty years ago, and from other portions of it the 

 wood has been taken off at different periods. Some of it was 

 formerly ploughed and planted with corn, without manure, o^ 

 with a very little compost in the hill, then sowed doWn to 

 grain and hay seed, which partially improved the pasture for a 

 short time. We occasionally used some plaster, but fearing 

 that it might essentially injure the land, we used but little. 



About twenty years ago, we commenced using it more freely, 

 and for the last few years have used it on nearly all our pasture 

 every year, or once in two years, at the rate of one and a half 

 or two bushels to the acre. Some of our pasture land is 

 benefited more than others, but all of it is improved more 

 or less. 



Some years ago I purchased about fourteen acres of land, 

 one-half of which was covered with wood and bushes, the other 

 half was an old bound out pasture, which had not been ploughed 

 for twenty-five years. Previously to that time, it had been 

 planted and sowed without manure, until it would hardly pay 

 for cultivation. It had been rented for several years for three 

 dollars per year, and the person that hired considered it a hard 

 bargain. During the seven years I have sowed it with plaster 

 four or five times, and it is now a good pasture. I think the 

 feed is now worth as much on one iicre as on the whole piece 

 when I purchased it. But I think it is not what it would have 



