138 



FARMERS' REGISTER— BUCKWHEAT AND CLOVER. 



which attended lay efforts I am indebted to the failure 

 of all those hopes I had previously entertained, that 

 salt had only to be applied to the ground, to establish 

 an important chara,cter as a great fructifier of it. I 

 beg to repsat, that the idea of decomposing salt for 

 agricultural purposes first suggested itself to my mind, 

 from the disappointment thjit ensued on using it in its 

 natural state. Influenced by a sanguine expectation 

 that great good would attends its use, I commenced 

 trying it, on a great variety of crops, immediately on 

 the duty being removed in 1824. I employed it in 

 quantities of irom eight to sixteen bushels, applying 

 it at diilerent seasons of the year, and on soils exhibit- 

 ing every variety of texture, from a retentive clay, to 

 the lightest sand; and, from the minute attention whi'ch 

 I paid to these trials, I can confidently state, that no 

 good etfects resulted worth notice, excepting, perhaps, 

 to the potato crops: on these it was thought to have 

 done a little good, but certaiidy nothing of a striking 

 character." 



COMPARATIVE ESTIMATE OF BUCKWHEAT 



AND RED CLOVER AS GREEN MANURE 



HUSBANDRY OF THE VALLEY OF VIRGINIA. 



Jlockingham, June 16, 1834. 

 To the Editor of the Farmers' Register. 



In sendins; to you my second j'ears' subscrip- 

 tion for the Farmers' Register, I have annexed 

 fiome desultory remarks, principally u]}on the sub- 

 ject of buckwheat as a green manure. I have not 

 observed in any of the communications on- this 

 subject, published in the Farmers' Regteter, that 

 property ascribed to buckwheat, wdiich in my es- 

 timation, constitutes its chief value in the improve- 

 ment of a tarm; that is, its tendency to cleanse the 

 land of noxious weeds, blue-grass, briers, &c. 

 Ol" its value as a green manure, I do not think 

 highly. In this respect I diH'er wholly with your 

 correspondent who in your 8tli No. (I believe, for 

 I have not the No. before me) expresses the opin- 

 ion that an equal amount in value in clover seed, 

 buckwheat and plaster, would at the end of. the 

 first year with the buckwheat (two crops being 

 plastered and ploughed in) benefit the land as 

 much or more than the clover would do (manage 

 it as you will) at the end of the second year.. I 

 have certainly never made any experiment mere- 

 ly for the purpose of testing the relative merits of 

 buckwheat and red clover, as agents in fertilizing 

 the soil, though I have several times used the 

 former, and all my life (as a farmer I mean) been 

 in the constant use of the latter, with the view 

 both to pasturage and the improvement of the 

 land — and am very decidedly ol' the opinion, that 

 iipon my land at least, (generally a sandy loam) 

 -the buckwheat (manage it as you may) cannot 

 impart one-lburth — perhaps not a tythe of the fer- 

 tility to the soil that the clover would, if properl}' 

 managed. From the results of my several ex- 

 periments, I believe, that upon such a soil as mine, 

 (it might perhaps be different in stifle, hard, clay 

 lands,) a piece of land well set in clover, and 

 having a proper dressing of plaster of paris would 

 derive more benefit from the roots and stubble of 

 the clover, (when the first crop had been mowed 

 for hay and the seed saved ii-otn the second crop) 

 than any quantity' of buckwheat straw, that could 

 grow u|)on and be ploughed under in one season, 

 could impart to it. But whilst I believe that there 

 can be but little comparison between the value 

 as green manure, of buckwheat and red clover, 



(when it is sown upon lands in a proper state lor 

 the reception of the seed) I do not mean to de- 

 preciate buckwheat: on the contrary^ I think it a 

 valuable auxiliary in the improvement of our 

 lands. Judiciously used, it would be an excellent 

 pioneer to the introduction of clover into lands that 

 are too poor, or too foul to produce it Witiiout the 

 aid of manure, or some cleansinjg crop. I have 

 found it valuable in subduing a stubborn blue-grass, 

 and in preparing lands so infested, for Avheat. 

 This blue (or as it is sometimes here called wire or 

 iron) grass, frequently dispossesses the clover in 

 parts of our fields the second year that they are 

 in clover, in which case it is fre([uently extremely 

 difficult so to prepare the land for wheat as to pre- 

 vent the encroachments of this grass in the 

 spring. I have often seen fields of wheats sown on 

 a clover lay, almost totally destroyed by it. Last 

 year a small part of the field that I cuhivated in 

 corn (say seven or eight acres) had become com- 

 pletely sodded over with it. The field had been 

 in wheat the year before, sown on a clover lay, 

 and this nuisance had sprung up, and diminished 

 the product of the wheat at least fifty per cent, 

 upon this spot wdiere the grass had supplanted 

 the clover the. year before. Upon this spot, instead 

 of planting corn, I determined to sow buckwheat, 

 (say a bushel to the acre, about the last of May.) 

 It produced a very heavy crop, Avliich, when in 

 full perfeciion I had rolled down and ploughed in. 

 The whole field is now in wheat: where the buck- 

 wheat grew scarcely a spire of blue-grass appears; 

 whilst in some of the corn lands adjoining, though 

 it had been well cultivated ivith the plough and 

 hoe, and particularly so where any of this grass 

 appeared, the grass is by no means so completely 

 destroyed. It may perhaps also be proper to re- 

 mark, that this grassy spot had also been some- 

 wdiat infested with sassafras bushes. None of 

 them grew with the buckwheat, nor do they yet 

 appear in the wheat. But as this is the only 

 piece of my land that is infested with sassafras, 

 and this the only experiment upon it, I cannot pre- 

 tend to determine whether they are- permanently 

 destroyed or not. From this experiment, and 

 others previously made, lam satisfied that buck- 

 wheat is valuable in preparing foul land, lor wheat: 

 but all my observations concur in proving (to my 

 mind conclusively) that its capacity of impartuig 

 fertility to the soil can scarcely bear any compari- 

 son at all with that of red clover. 



In the case above stated, the crop of buck- 

 wdieat was so luxuriant, that several of my neigh- 

 bors declared it was a pity to plough it down; 

 and yet there is not much superiority in the wheat 

 on this spot over that on the adjoining corn land,^ 

 while it is decidedly inferior to every other part of 

 the field, which contains about eighty acres. 

 Buckwheat when suffered to stand until it ripens 

 the grain, is a very great exhauster indeed — and 

 the straw, when dry, is of less value for manure 

 than any other vegetable substance that I know 

 of, (hemp shoves only excepted.) When plough- 

 ed in as green manure, the land should be well 

 compacted with a heavy^ roller passed over it more 

 or less frequently, according to the looseness of 

 the soil, otherwise it renders the ground entirely 

 too spongy for wheat, and more especiahy if clover 

 seed is intended to be sown wnth- the wheat, the 

 roller is almost indispensable. But the growth 

 of the clover seed may be ensured by the use of 



