1858. 



NEW ENGLAND FAEMER. 



245 



For the New England Farmer, 

 A METHOD OF RAISING GBASS. 



I have been reading with much pleasure, and, I 

 think, profit, the last annual report oftheMassa- 

 sachusetts Board of Agriculture. As I do not 

 learn from it that any one has adopted a method 

 of raising grass precisely like my own, I take the 

 liberty of communicating to you my method, as 

 well as the steps by which I arrived at it. I know 

 very well that we are all inclined to regard our 

 geese as the most beautiful swans, but if my ideas 

 are worth nothing, the paper may serve to kindle 

 your fire. 



My land is a clayey loam, resting on a subsoil, 

 the first layer of which is a mixture of clay, loam 

 and gravel, that, brought to the surface, exposed 

 to the frost and mixed with the surface soil and a 

 liberal dressing of manure, makes a productive 

 grass land. Below this, at the depth of about 

 two feet, is a hard pan of blue clayey gravel, al- 

 most as impervious to water as a cemented cellar 

 bottom, and this rests on the underlaying slate 

 rock at the depth of from five to twenty-five feet. 

 The land in no part is hilly, but has descent 

 enough to carry off the surface water. 



It came into my possession in 1851, and I cut 

 that year about four tons of inferior hay from 

 seven acres. The next year I sowed about half 

 an acre with spring rye, clover, herdsgrass and 

 redtop seed. The ground had corn and potatoes 

 on it in 1851, and was in good condition. The 

 summer was hot and dry. The rye did badly and 

 the grass almost disappeared under the scorch- 

 ing suns of July and August. It rallied some- 

 what before the next summer and produced from 

 fifteen to eighteen hundred weight of hay from 

 the half acre. 



In 1852 I had two and one-fourth acres in cul- 

 tivation with corn and potatoes, on which I 

 spread and plowed in, twenty ox-cart loads of 

 manure, and put ten more in the hill per acre. In 

 September, I dug the potatoes on one-fourth of 

 an acre, spread and plowed in three loads of ma- 

 nure, and seeded down with herdsgrass and red- 

 top. After the corn was harvested, I had an acre 

 more plowed and harrowed, and about the twen- 

 tieth of November, sowed half a bushel of herds- 

 grass and a bushel of redtop seed on it, and 

 rolled the ground just as it froze for the winter. 

 In the following spring, I seeded down the re- 

 maining acre with barley and a mixture of clover, 

 herdsgrass and redtop seed. I had sixteen bush- 

 els of barley, and the grass looked finely in the 

 autumn. The ground seeded the preceding Sep- 

 tember, although the grass suffered considerably 

 from the winter, produced about eight hundred 

 weight of hay and the acre sown in November a 

 little over a ton. 



In 1854 my field appeared as follows : on the 

 quarter acre seeded in September, the herdsgrass 

 had spread and the redtop came in so as to cover 

 the ground M'cU ; on the acre sown in November 

 there was a beautiful strong turf covering the 

 whole surface, while on the acre sown with bar- 

 ley the winter had killed a good deal of the clo- 

 ver and left many spots bare, where the ground 

 had settled below those portions covered with 

 grass and the turf was generally broken and un- 

 even. On the one and one-fourth acre seeded in 

 autumn, there was about threj tons of hay, and on 



the acre sown with barley about thirty hundred 

 weight. After haying, I spread two hundred and 

 fifty bushels of leached ashes on the acre and one- 

 fourth sown in the fall. 



In 1855, which was a bad hay year, I had about 

 two and a half tons from the acre and one-fourth, 

 and about twenty-five to thirty hundred weight 

 from the acre sown in spring. The latter had be- 

 come mostly redtop. I let it stand till the seed 

 was ripe enough to shell out in making the hay, 

 and in the fall, I spread two hundred bushels of 

 leached ashes on it. This brought in considerable 

 clover and thickened up the redtop so as to give 

 me a very fair crop, but it has always fallen below 

 the part sown in the autumn by ten to fifteen hun- 

 dred weight per acre. These crops have mostly 

 been sold standing on the field, the purchaser 

 having the privilege of weighing whenever he 

 chose to do so, rather than to take tliem at my 

 estimate, and in all cases when weighed, they 

 have exceeded my estimate. 



Thus far it is evident that my experience is in 

 favor of late fall sowing ; for although the Sep- 

 tember sowing, with its extra dressing of manure, 

 slightly exceeded the November sowing the first 

 year, there has been no difference since. The re- 

 sult has been still more decidedly against raising 

 spring grain on such land as mine. The cost of 

 the grain sown, with the extra labor in harvest- 

 ing, threshing, &c., would amount to much more 

 than the difference in the average value of a crop 

 of spring grain and that of an average first crop 

 of grass, even should the land be plowed for the 

 grass, as in the above experiment. In addition 

 to this, if recollected that the annual grass crop, 

 when the ground has been exhausted by ripening 

 a grain crop, falls at least half a ton below that 

 which follows the corn immediately, the question 

 to my mind is settled. 



At the risk of tiring your patience, I wish to 

 give you the results of an attempt to get a large 

 crop of grass the first year. In the spring of 1854, 

 I had an acre by the side of the lot, on which I 

 raised barley in 1853. It was in corn the year 

 before, and had twenty loads of manure to the 

 acre, one-half spread and plowed in, and the re- 

 mainder in the hill. This year, 1854, 1 spread 

 twenty loads per acre and plowed it in, then 

 spread two hundred bushels of leached ashes and 

 furrowed so deep that the rorn, which was plant- 

 ed in drills, could be covered without raising the 

 rows above the surface. There was compost put 

 in the furrows equal to ten loads of manure per 

 acre. The field was cultivated twice. The first 

 time the ground was levelled and the weeds cut 

 up, the second time the small stones were picked 

 up and wheeled to the edge of the field ; herds- 

 grass and redtop seed were sown and the ground 

 raked over with a common hand rake, such as is 

 used in the hay field. The labor, except picking 

 up the stones, was just about equal to two hoe- 

 ings, and the surface was left beautifully even. I 

 had a forest of corn stalks, about two cart-loads 

 of smutted ears, and fifty bushels of sound corn 

 to the acre. The season was hot and dry, and in 

 the fall, I found no grass except on a wet place, 

 and under some large apple trees. As my ground 

 was in fine condition and very smooth, I did not 

 like to plow it up again until I tried some way 

 to get it into grass. In the fall, as soon as the 

 ground froze enough to hold the stumps of the 



