NATURAL HISTORY. 37 



age is fine. It grows well in rather a dry soil, but will grow on 

 a variety of soils, from the dryest knolls to a wet meadow. It 

 does not withstand our severe droughts as well as some other 

 grasses. Its reputation is far higher in this, than in its native 

 country, where it is denied l)y most farmers even a place among 

 the grasses to be recommended for cultivation. It endures 

 the frosts of winter better, perhaps, than most other grasses ; 

 and in Kentucky, where it attains the highest perfection as a pas- 

 ture grass, it sometimes continues luxuriant through their mild 

 winters. It requires at least two or three years to become well 

 set, and it does not arrive at its perfection as a pasture grass 

 till the sward is older than that, and hence it is not suited to 

 alternate husbandry, or where the land is to remain in grass 

 only two or three years and then be ploughed up. In Kentucky, 

 tlie best blue grass is found in partially shaded pastures. A 

 well known farmer of that State, in a communication to the 

 Ohio Farmer, says : " In our climate, and soil, it is not only the 

 most beautiful of grasses, but the most valuable of crops. It 

 is the first deciduous plant which puts forth its leaves here ; 

 ripens its seed about the tenth of June, and then remains 

 green, if the summer is favoral)le in moisture, during the sum- 

 mer months, growing slowly till about the last of August, when 

 it takes a second vigorous growth until the ground is frozen by 

 winter's cold. If the summer is dry, it dries up utterly, and will 

 burn if set on fire ; but even then, if the spring growth has been 

 left upon the ground, is very nutritious to all grazing stock, and 

 especially to sheep and cattle, and all ruminating animals. 

 When left to have all its fall growth, it makes fine winter pas- 

 ture for all kinds of grazing animals. Cattle will not seek it 

 through the snow, but sheep, mules and horses will paw off the 

 snow and get plenty without any other food. When covered 

 with snow, cattle require some other feeding ; otherwise they do 

 well all winter upon it. 



" It makes also the best of hay. I have used it for that for 

 twenty years. It should be cut just as the seeds begin to ripen, 

 well spread, and protected from the dew at night by windrowing 

 or cocking ; the second evening stacked, with salt, or sheltered, 

 with salt also. When properly cured, stock seem greatly to 

 prefer it to all other hay. I would not recommend it for 

 meadow, especially, however, because the yield is hardly equal 



