418 AGEICULTUKAL KEPOET. 



its eai'liuess; and fiiir yield on poor laud. lu Grenada Coiiuty was Ircrm 

 two to three weeks earlier than varieties usually ])lauted. 



Four to live AveeiJS earlier than the Creole yellow^ corn, but the yield 

 not as large, near Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 



Reports received from nine counties in Texas. Bexar County : Ready 

 for grinding June 24, lour weeks earl ier than Texas corn. Hunt County : 

 Planted March 1, and harvested July 30, twenty days in advance of 

 other corn. Yield ]>er acre, 40 bushels. Says a correspondent : " Should 

 this corn retain its qualities without deterioration, I know of nothing of 

 the kind -which wiii further advance the farming interest. It is proof 

 against early drought." Dallas County : Yield per acre, OS bushels, 

 weighing o8 pounds per measured bushel. Is from three to four weeks 

 earlier than common varieties. Kendall County: A month earlier than 

 other varieties. Victoria County : Two crops may be made. Marion 

 County : Two vveeks earlier than other varieties. McLellan County : 

 Yield 25 per cent, larger, and ripened sixteen days earlier than varieties 

 generally cultivated. 



GEASSES. 



With especial reference to the wants of the South, and to further its 

 awakened interest in more systematized methods of farming, great care 

 has been exercised in procuring suitable seeds oC the grasses. The 

 southern agricultural and local press are urging v. itli great warmth and 

 pertinacity the absolute necessity' of resort to the grasses for a recuper- 

 ation of the soils exhausted by exclusive crops and a bad system of 

 labor. As an example of the earnestness of this movement toward im- 

 provement, a writer in one of the prominent farm-journals says, speak- 

 ing of clover, that " a few^ pounds of diminutive seed furnish machinery 

 to absorb from the atmosphere and pump out of the earth the elements 

 of fertility needed to replace what our wasteful and improvident prede- 

 cessors have exj^ended. * -"■ * I solemnly believe that, in the benign 

 providence of God, clover is to be the Moses Vv-hich is to deliver 

 southern agriculturists from the bondage of poverty and debt by restor- 

 ing our wasted and worn inheritance to its original fertility." Large 

 quantities of the grasses have been sent to the South, and the demands 

 made upon the Department are constantly increasing. Almost exclu- 

 sively in the South were distributed the Bromus Schraderi, an annual, 

 rather coarse, but adapted well to foddering, and Jltalian rye-grass, 

 [LoUnm pcrennc — var. Italicum,) and Alfalfa, (Mcdicago sativa.) Red 

 clover [TrifoUum iwaiense) in considerable quantities has been sent 

 South and to the farther West. Sullicient time has scarcely elapsed for 

 the letarn of reports of experiments to any great extent. 



A correspondent writing from Prince William County, Virginia, states 

 that farmers have ceased raising tobacco, and determined to adopt a 

 system of crop rotation, and asks that the Department distribute grass- 

 seed in the county, which is well adapted to clover. 



A X)lanter of Hale County, Alabama, thinks it will take tiuic to ciad- 

 icate the ])rejudices o.f i^lanters against grass, which they have been 

 fighting all their lives, and that the salvation of the South in great 

 measure depends upon the introduction of cereals and grasses. 



Of the liescue- grass, {Bromus Schraderi.) Mt. C. W. Stewart, Montgom- 

 ery County, Texas, says that it proves to be of great value. Four mules 

 and two niilch-cows were pastured on less than two acres of this grass 

 all winter, besides hogs. Using the Rescue, there is a very perceptible 

 diffeirence- in the flavor and the quality of butter and milk. A i)arty 



