PASTURES AND PASTURING. 157 



ment for a few weeks, and fed bountifully with oats o^ other 

 grain. Every green thing was gnawed down ; but such 

 fields and farms showed marvellous improvement. 



I can specify few plants in the third class, — those that 

 come in to occupy a deserted soil, — and indeed I am not sure 

 of any ; yet I have in mind many of the poorer grasses and 

 sedges and weaker weeds that appear in all vacant places. 

 I consider these as better than nothing, as holding the soil in 

 place and preparing for a better vegetation ; but I have not 

 seen this result. Indeed, the chief individual I can name 

 (^Danthonia spicala), 1 have many doubts about. It is a 

 thin, weak-growing grass, which abounds in neglected moun- 

 tain pastures, its slender, dry columns whitening the whole 

 surface ; it may well be called poverty-grass. It has been 

 charged as a thief, taking possession of the soil to the exclu- 

 sion of its betters, for it is nearly oV quite worthless. When 

 fertilization and seeding with better grasses have been tried, 

 and failed, then we will condemn the danthonia. 



We have given truly a formidable list of what we would 

 not have in a pasture ; and, while we may take courage from 

 the fact that while but few of these thrive in any one soil, — 

 some taking the wet and others the dry, — some the rich 

 and others the poor, — yet, in their combined numbers, they 

 do rob us of much of the productiveness of our pastures. 



The remedy that I have so often offered as effectual against 

 them — close pasturing — will also, under some conditions, 

 prove injurious to the better grasses. They need some sea- 

 sons of rest from close cropping to occasionally form seed, 

 and by developing larger foliage also a larger root growth. 

 We need to keep some pastures ahead against a period of 

 drouth. Keep that which will bear keeping, and by a judi- 

 cious change develop the best productiveness of each field. 



By this time you will see that I do not recommend any 

 grand specific for our pastures, nor a " special fertilizer for 

 grass ; " but advise rather by a system of management pro- 

 viding as best may be for each acre or rod, to keep out 

 thieves, to encourage the growth of the best grasses, to 

 retain the natural fertility of our fields, and to increase it by 

 the judicious feeding of such outside materials as seem best ; 

 or in some cases the application of bone-dust, plaster, barn- 



