WATER-MEADOWS. 



323 



CATCII-WOltK. 



is ploughed and wrought with the spade, after which 

 the turf may be replaced, and beaten smooth with the 

 back of the spade. Such 

 a meadow will be ready 

 to take on the water at 

 once, whereas a mea- 

 dow sown with grass 

 seed could not be free- 

 ly watered for two or 

 three years. 



The flooding of wa- 

 ter-meadows begins as 

 soon as possible after 

 the last crop of hay is 

 removed, and gene- 

 rally takes place about the month of October. The 

 water is kept in circulation over the meadows for two 

 or three weeks at a time, and is then let off, and the 

 ground made perfectly dry for five or six days. This 

 alternate flooding and drying is carried on through 

 the months of November, December, and January, care 

 being taken to let off the water as soon as it begins 

 to freeze. Very early in the spring the grasses begin 

 to shoot forth, and a brighter tinge of green enlivens 

 the meadows. The periods of watering are then very 

 much shortened, not lasting more than a few days at a 

 time. By the middle of March most of the meadows 

 in southern counties are fit for the reception of live 

 stock, and the watering is, therefore, discontinued ; but 

 in the north it is often carried on during the whole 

 month of May. Flooding the land during summer pro- 

 duces rich and rapid vegetation, but such as is quite 

 unfit for sheep, being more liable than any other food 

 to produce the fatal disease the "rot." 



From the above details, it may seem that the con- 

 struction of a water-meadow is a very simple affair; 

 but this is not really the case ; there are numerous in- 

 tricacies in the subject which cannot be here described, 

 Y 2 



