308 Landscape Gardening 



Choose if possible a calm day and sow your seed as evenly 

 as you can. The seed to be sown is a mixture of red-top 

 (Agrostis vulgaris) and white clover (Trifolium repens), which 

 are hardy short grasses, and on the whole make the best 

 and most enduring lawn for this climate.* The proportion 

 should be about three-fourths red-top to one-fourth white 

 clover. The seed should be perfectly clean; then sow four 

 bushels of it to the acre; not a pint less as you hope to walk 

 upon velvet! Finish the whole by rolling the surface 

 evenly and neatly. 



A few soft vernal showers and bright sunny days will 

 show you a coat of verdure bright as emerald. By the first 

 of June you will find it necessary to look about for your 

 mower. 



And this reminds us to say a word about a lawn scythe. 

 You must not suppose, as many ignorant people do, that a 

 lawn can be mown with a brush hook or a common meadow 

 scythe for cutting hay in the fastest possible manner. It 

 can only be done with a broad-bladed scythe, of the most 

 perfect temper and quality, which will hold an edge like a 

 razor. When used it should be set low so as to be level 

 with the plane of the grass; when the mower is erect, he 

 will mow without leaving any marks and with the least 

 possible exertion. 



After your lawn is once fairly established, there are but 

 two secrets in keeping it perfect - - frequent mowing and 

 rolling. Without the first it will soon degenerate into a 

 coarse meadow; the latter will render it firmer, closer, 

 shorter, and finer every time it is repeated. 



A good lawn must be mown every ten days or fortnight. 

 The latter may be assumed as the proper average time in 



* We learn the blue-grass of Kentucky makes a fine lawn at the West, 

 1ml with this we have no experience. -- A. ,J. D. A more modern pre- 

 scription is the following: Kentucky Blue grass, Poa pratensis, 9 Ibs.; 

 Rhode Island Bent grass, Agrostis canina, 3 Ibs.; Red Top, Agrostis alba 

 inilyaris, 4 Ibs.; English Rye, Loliurn perenne, 3 Ibs.; White Clover 

 (optional) Trifolium repent, 1 Ib. The seed should be put in on a very 

 quiet day, seventy-five to one hundred pounds of "fancy recleaned" seed 

 per acre being used, or about one-half pound per square rod. F. A. W. 



